With the Qingming Festival, a traditional Chinese festival that is celebrated on the fifth solar term of the Chinese calendar, on the way next Tuesday, many people take it as an opportunity to remember their family line and ancestors by visiting their graves, and leaving items behind in remembrance.
Food, tea, wine, incense, and joss paper have been frequently used as offerings. Nowadays, however, some people are choosing more bizarre items, such as paper-made luxury cars and digital devices.
CFP Photo
CFP Photo
CFP Photo
Items such as fake money, credit cards, ID cards, and even entertainment devices like mahjong machines can be found among national market including the city of Huaibei, in east China’s Anhui Province.
Netizens were quick to comment online with mixed reactions to the offerings.
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“It is contemporary to be creative with ideas of offerings, but to recognize the importance of the event is also important,” one netizen, @daqianjiedao, commented.
Another, @xuzhouzhangdashuai, was more serious about such superficial choices that he believed just appealed to people's vanity. ”No matter how luxurious the offerings are, it will never replace the importance of practicing filial piety when people are still alive.”
On the other hand, there are people choosing more meaningful items that contain unique and special memories to show their sadness, according to media reports.
Wang Shuren, from northwest China’s Heilongjiang Province, has never burned paper-made offerings for his wife, who died from esophagus cancer in 2013. Rather, as a high school teacher who is so obsessed with poetry, he always chooses to bring manuscripts and newspapers with his poems published on them to the grave, along with a bunch of roses.
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With the Qingming crowds across the country reaching a number of 13.38 million people last year, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs, there’s a huge potential risk in terms of safety and the environment on the burning of paper-made items.
Folklore experts have suggested eco-friendly guidelines for people to choose more virtual flowers and online tributes, which will benefit every one of us and be better for the environment..
