The Festival Customs of Miao Dragon Boat Festival

The Miao family still retains unique and excellent traditional customs. First, before the dragon boat race, you must plant seedlings and do farm work well, otherwise you will be looked down upon to participate in the race; Second, because of some contradictions in daily relations, people who participate in the competition must shake hands and unite as soon as they get on the dragon boat; Third, the organizers released a fat live duck at the finish line for the sailors who arrived at the finish line to chase and catch. This scene is very interesting.

Each village has its own dragon boat, which is beautifully made; A boathouse was built to protect the dragon boat. On the steep banks of the river, you can often see long wooden houses with tile roofs, that is, boathouses. Before the dragon boat is launched, please ask Zhai Lao to go down to the beach, sing an ancient song about the origin of ancestors in front of the dragon boat, and kill a rooster to worship the ancestors first to ensure the safety of the boat. As soon as the game is over, the dragon boat will enter the warehouse to shelter from the rain and sun. So Miao's dragon boat can be used for 10 years or 10 years, or even hundreds of years.

At the end of the Dragon Boat Festival, each village should choose the fattest pig in the village and invite the whole village to have dinner after slaughter to thank the whole village for their support of the Dragon Boat Festival. The Camus Dragon Boat Festival is from May 24th to 27th in the lunar calendar, and as early as May18th and19th, the dragon boat will be washed. On the 22nd and 23rd, the mother ship was tied to the ship and the faucet was installed. On the 24th, a grand opening ceremony was held, and a square table was placed beside a well or ditch with a dragon god. The legs of the table should be tied with branches without leaves and bark, an umbrella, red cloth, paper money and a handful of grass. Provide a liter of rice on the table and take down a white rooster to sweep away evil spirits and worship God. In the past, on the first day of the Dragon Boat Festival, wizards were asked to recite scriptures. Now, the witchcraft etiquette here is mostly simple. However, the rules of witchcraft are endless. For example, the dragon boat must not stop or rest in the process of crossing, and must row to the end in one breath. After the dragon boat turned around, the helmsman gave each sailor a bunch of exorcism grass and threw it into the river together.

During the Dragon Boat Festival, there were a sea of people on both sides of Qingshui River. Besides boat racing, there are folk activities such as drumming and blowing sheng. This period is also a festival for young men and women to sing and love each other. Dragon is a symbol of luck and strength in Miao people's minds. The Miao people's dragon boats are unique, usually dug by Chinese fir trees or Chinese parasol trees. There are three parts: denominator boat and two side boats. There are six cabins in the center of the mother ship. The fourth cabin is filled with pigs, sheep, geese and sailors' food presented by relatives and friends during the Dragon Boat Festival. The sub-boats on both sides are places for sailors to paddle. The Miao people row the dragon boat standing, which is different from the Han people sitting and rowing. The hull is about 20 meters long, and the bow is tilted high above the water, and a big faucet is installed. The faucet is carved from willow wood, and the carving is very beautiful. It is painted with gold, silver, red, green and white colors, as dazzling as scales. A pair of longan are bright and vivid, holding their heads high to the sky. On the dragon horn like a horn, there are generally auspicious words such as good weather, peaceful country and safe people.

Usually, the dragon boat is placed in the dragon boat boron specially used to put the hull, and some dragon boat sheds are covered with couplets, such as: the dragon boat is eternal, loyalty and filial piety are prosperous for a lifetime, the ceremony is heavy for a thousand years, and it is spread all over the world, the meaning of the country is eternal, and the sequence is prosperous for a hundred years'. Horizontal approval is mostly for people to reunite and come to the DPRK. Pull a string between the two corners and hang a small red flag. Behind the horn stood four pheasant feathers more than one meter long, which looked very dignified. The stern also rose out of the water, with grass, called phoenix tail. Dragon boat racing consists of drum head, gong hand and hand. Drum head is the conductor on the dragon boat and the most prestigious person elected by the whole village. A teenager with more than ten winds served as a gong player, 38 sailors, and brave young people in the stockade. In the competition, each sailor holds a wooden paddle with a palm width and a length of about 1.5 meters. Wear hemp fiber and a hat to pray for rain.

The dragon boat race is very fierce. It is a sports activity that competes physical strength, skill, wisdom, courage and unity. It is a striking category of Miao folk sports activities and has won the love of people of all ethnic groups. The Dragon Boat Festival shows the simple beliefs of the early Miao people, and also traces the development of the early Miao civilization and traditional culture. It reproduces the wisdom and strength, brave consciousness and the spirit of unity and progress of the Miao people at that time. Qingshui River is the upper reaches of the main stream of Yuanshui River Basin, which is famous for its pure water quality and flows through the whole territory of Qiandongnan Prefecture. Yangdujiao, which originated in Xiamaoping town, Jinping County, Guizhou Province, flows into Tianzhu County, passing through the six towns of Benchu, Zhu Lin, Yuankou, Baishi, Jiangdong and Wengdong in Tianzhu, with more than 50 villages along the coast. It flows through the river for 77 kilometers and accepts three streams along the river: Sanmenxi, Jianjiang, Guidaxi, Wenxi, Jiangdongxi, Wayao and Wengwaxi. There are many peaks and peaks on both sides of Qingshui River, which are green and dripping. The scenery is beautiful, the water is clear and slow, and the famous Qinglang Beach runs from Zhagong to Qinglang. Qingshui River is rich in carp, catfish, herring, ray and other fish, especially abalone with long snout. Miao and Dong compatriots live on both sides of the strait. It is suitable for the growth of many kinds of trees and is the producing area of high-quality Chinese fir. The produced Chinese fir is tall and straight, dense in texture, elastic, high in fat content, not easy to rot and widely used, and is an excellent building material.