Anji Spring Festival Folk Custom

Lunar New Year is the most important festival of the Chinese nation for thousands of years. Although some Chinese New Year customs are getting farther and farther away from us, we can't forget the traditional culture contained in them. Now let's take a look at Anji's traditional Chinese New Year customs. Kill pigs, make rice cakes, make tofu and bacon.

A few days before the Spring Festival, it was the busiest time for peasant women. They prepared soybeans and glutinous rice and soaked them in water to grind old tofu and make rice cakes. Killing pigs in the new year is a custom in Anji rural areas. Although life is good now, it is still something to be happy and proud of to raise a big fat pig with a few hundred pounds. Moreover, the taste of the year in rural areas began with the killing of pigs. Please invite your neighbors, relatives and friends to eat fresh pork and enjoy the harvest together.

The New Year's Eve dinner is mainly composed of pork, pig blood, tofu, roasted vermicelli, winter bamboo shoots, peasant chicken, etc. Each table has at least ten dishes. Drinks are the favorite of local people, such as yellow rice wine and Anji local yellow rice wine, red rice and so on. Neighbors let go of their bellies and feasted. After the villagers have finished eating pig rice, all they have to do is to marinate the rest of the meat and prepare it for the New Year and the next year.

Sacrifice one's ancestors before eating New Year's Eve.

Sacrificing ancestors during the Spring Festival is one of the traditional customs in rural areas of China. Although for various reasons, modern people's awareness of ancestor worship is getting weaker and weaker, this custom still exists in some rural areas of Anji.

According to Yu Guilan, an 86-year-old local man, ancestor worship activities usually begin before the New Year's Eve. It aims to show respect and memory for ancestors through the Spring Festival, so that ancestors can bless their children's peace, health and prosperity. First, list the names of the dishes (tofu and fish must be included in the dishes, but onions are not allowed, which is homophonic "rushing"), light red candles, set a small handleless wine cup and chopsticks, and burn three "gold ingots" (paper money) next to the two gates, which means letting the gatekeeper go. Pour the wine into the wine, then light three incense sticks and invite the deceased ancestors, such as grandparents, to come in for dinner.

In the whole process of ancestor worship, wine should be screened three times, once every 3-5 minutes. The dishes, glasses, chopsticks and benches on the table are not allowed to move, otherwise it is considered disrespectful to the ancestors. When offering sacrifices to ancestors, the whole family will kneel on the ground devoutly, silently praying for ancestors to bless the whole family with peace, prosperity and rolling financial resources. Near the end, it is also very particular to start burning paper. Generally, the oldest elder in the family is qualified to burn paper money. In the process of burning paper money, paper burners distribute their property reasonably so that everyone in their ancestors can get a' red envelope'.

Others go to the grave to worship their ancestors, commonly known as tomb sacrifices, mainly to burn incense, sacrifice and worship in the cemetery. Usually go to relatives' cemeteries to worship. After ancestor worship, according to the auspicious direction shown in the almanac, light lanterns, incense and set off firecrackers. Ancestors have souls in heaven. When they see their filial son Sun Xian, whose family is rich, they will certainly smile in the grave.

In addition, Anji's Spring Festival customs include wearing new clothes, playing with dragon lanterns, solve riddles on the lanterns, posting Spring Festival couplets, hanging New Year pictures, observing and welcoming the New Year, setting off firecrackers, giving lucky money and many recreational activities.