Local custom

Landlord, your problem is too big. Let's take the Spring Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival as examples to illustrate.

Mid-Autumn Festival

Appreciate the bright full moon

Mid-Autumn Festival, China has the custom of enjoying the moon since ancient times. There is a record of "autumn twilight and the moon" in the Book of Rites, that is, worshipping the moon god. In the Zhou Dynasty, every Mid-Autumn Festival night, activities to welcome the cold and offer sacrifices to the moon were held. Put a big incense table with seasonal fruits such as moon cakes, watermelons, apples, plums and grapes, among which moon cakes and watermelons are absolutely indispensable. Watermelon must be cut into lotus shapes.

In the Tang Dynasty, it was quite popular to enjoy and play with the moon in the Mid-Autumn Festival. In the Song Dynasty, the Mid-Autumn Festival was more popular to enjoy the moon. According to "Dream of Tokyo", "On the Mid-Autumn Festival night, your family is dressing up and the people are fighting for the restaurant to play the moon". On this day, all shops and restaurants in Beijing have to redecorate their facades, tie silk on archways and sell fresh fruits and refined food. The night market is very lively. Many people visit The Upper Terrace, and some wealthy families enjoy the moon in their pavilions and arrange food or family dinners to reunite their children.

After the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the custom of enjoying the moon in the Mid-Autumn Festival remains the same. Many places have formed special customs such as burning incense, planting Mid-Autumn trees, lighting tower lanterns, putting sky lanterns, walking on the moon and dancing dragons.

Eat moon cakes

People in urban and rural areas of China have the custom of eating moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival. As the saying goes, "August 15th is full, and Mid-Autumn moon cakes are sweet and fragrant". Moon cakes were originally used to worship the moon god. The word "moon cake" first appeared in Liang Lumeng written by Wu in the Southern Song Dynasty. At that time, it was just a cake-shaped food like Ling Hua cake. Later, people gradually combined the Mid-Autumn Festival with tasting moon cakes, which symbolized family reunion.

Mooncakes were originally made at home, and the practice of mooncakes was recorded in Yuan Mei's Menu with the Garden in the Qing Dynasty. In modern times, there are workshops specializing in making moon cakes, and the production of moon cakes is becoming more and more elaborate, with exquisite fillings and beautiful appearance. There are also various exquisite designs printed on the outside of the moon cakes, such as "the Goddess Chang'e flying to the moon", "jathyapple of the Milky Way" and "Three Tan Yin Yue". It has become the wish of people all over the world to show people's reunion with a full moon, to show people's eternal life with a round moon cake, to pin their thoughts on their relatives in their hometown and to pray for a bumper harvest and happiness. Moon cakes are also used as gifts to send to relatives and friends and to connect feelings.

Other Mid-Autumn Festival customs

China has a vast territory, a large population and different customs. The Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated in a variety of ways, with strong local characteristics.

In Pucheng, Fujian, women have to cross nanpu bridge to live longer during the Mid-Autumn Festival. In Jianning, hanging lanterns on Mid-Autumn Festival night is a good omen to ask the Moon Palace for children. People in Shanghang County celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival, and most of their children are invited to visit their parents when they are in Yue Bai. When Longyan people eat moon cakes, their parents will dig out round cakes with a diameter of two or three inches in the middle for their elders to eat, which means that they can't tell the secret to the younger generation. This custom stems from the legend that moon cakes contain the message of anti-meta-killing. Before the Mid-Autumn Festival in Kinmen, Yue Bai should worship God.

There is a custom of Mid-Autumn Festival Yue Bai in Chaoshan, Guangdong, which is mainly aimed at women and children. As the saying goes, "men are dissatisfied with the moon, and women don't sacrifice stoves." At night, when the bright moon rises, women set up a box in the yard and balcony to pray. Silver candles burned high, cigarettes filled the air, and the table was filled with good fruits and cakes as sacrifices. There is also the custom of eating taro in the Mid-Autumn Festival. There is a saying in Chaoshan: "River to mouth, taro to eat." August is the harvest season of taro, and farmers are used to using taro to worship their ancestors. Of course, this has something to do with farming, but there is also a popular folk legend: 1279, Mongolian nobles destroyed the Southern Song Dynasty, established the Yuan Dynasty, and brutally ruled the Han people. Mafa defended Chaozhou against the Yuan Dynasty. After the city was broken, the people were slaughtered. In order not to forget the suffering of Hu people's rule, later generations used taro as a homonym with "Hu tou", which looked like a human head, in order to pay homage to their ancestors and pass it on from generation to generation, and it still exists today.

Burning towers on the night of Mid-Autumn Festival is also very popular in some places. The height of the tower varies from 1-3 meters, mostly made of broken tiles. The tower is also made of bricks, accounting for about 1/4 of the tower height, and then stacked with tiles, leaving a tower mouth at the top for fuel transportation. On the night of Mid-Autumn Festival, it will be lit and burned. The fuel is wood, bamboo, chaff, etc. When the fire is booming, rosin powder will be poured to cheer, which is very spectacular. There are also folk rules for burning stupas. Whoever burns the stupa to the whole house wins, and those who fail or collapse in the burning process lose. The winner will be presented with colorful flags, bonuses or prizes by the host. It is said that burning towers is also the origin of Han people's resistance to cruel rulers and Mid-Autumn Uprising at the end of Yuan Dynasty.

During the Mid-Autumn Festival, the folk customs in Jiangnan are also varied. Nanjing people love to eat moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival, so they must eat osmanthus duck, a famous Jinling dish. "Sweet-scented osmanthus duck" should be listed in Gui Xiang. It is fat but not greasy and delicious. After drinking, you must eat a small piece of sugar taro and pour cinnamon pulp on it. Beauty speaks for itself. "Guijiang" was named after Qu Yuan's "Helping the North to close its doors and drink Guijiang" in Chu Ci Shao Si Ming. Cinnamon pulp is a kind of sweet-scented osmanthus, which is picked around the Mid-Autumn Festival and pickled with sugar and sour plum. Jiangnan women are good at turning poems and songs into delicacies on the table. People in Nanjing enjoy the moon with their families, which is called "celebrating reunion", the group sitting and drinking is called "full moon", and the market trip is called "walking on the moon".

At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, there were Moon Tower and Moon Bridge in Nanjing. In the Qing Dynasty, there was a moon-watching building under Lion Mountain, all of which were for people to enjoy the moon, and most people played the Moon Bridge. When the bright moon is high, people go to the Moon Tower to play the Moon Bridge, so as to enjoy watching the Jade Rabbit. "Xiyue Bridge" is located in the Confucius Temple on Qinhuai River, next to the mansion of Ma Xianglan, a famous prostitute. On this night, the literati gathered on the bridge to play the flute, sing songs and reminisce about Niuzhu playing with the moon and writing poems for the moon, so it was called playing with the moon bridge. After the death of the Ming Dynasty, it gradually declined. Later generations have a poem saying: "The romantic Southern Song Dynasty has been exhausted, leaving the west wind to be a long Banqiao, but remember to take the Yuren Bridge and teach the flute under the moon." Longbanqiao, the original Moon Bridge. In recent years, the Confucius Temple in Nanjing has been renovated, some pavilions and pavilions in the Ming and Qing Dynasties have been restored, and the rivers have been dredged. Until the Mid-Autumn Festival, you can enjoy playing with the moon together.

In Wuxi County, Jiangsu Province, incense is burned on Mid-Autumn Festival night. There are silks around the incense barrel, which depicts the scenery in the Moon Palace. There are incense sticks made of thread Kaori with paper kuixing and colorful flags on them. Shanghainese Mid-Autumn Festival Banquet with Sweet-scented osmanthus honey wine.

On the night of Mid-Autumn Festival in Ji 'an County, Jiangxi Province, every village burns crocks with straw. When the crock is red, put the vinegar in it. At this time, the whole village will smell a fragrance. During the Mid-Autumn Festival in Xincheng County, grass lanterns are hung from the evening of August 1 1 to August 17.

Children build a hollow pagoda with bricks during the Mid-Autumn Festival in Wuyuan County, Anhui Province. Curtains, plaques and other decorations are hung on the tower, and a table is placed in front of the tower, displaying various utensils to worship the "tower god". At night, lights and candles are lit inside and out. Children in Jixi Mid-Autumn Festival play Mid-Autumn firecrackers. Mid-Autumn Festival firecrackers are braided with straw, picked up and smashed stones after soaking, making a loud noise, which is a custom in Youlong. A fire dragon is a dragon made of grass with incense in it. When you visit the dragon, there are gongs and drums teams. They tour the village before being sent to the river.

In Sichuan province, in addition to eating moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival, people also eat cakes, ducks, sesame cakes and honey cakes. In some places, orange lanterns are also lit and hung at the door to celebrate. There are also children who burn incense on grapefruit and dance along the street, which is called "dancing meteor ball" Jiading County's Mid-Autumn Festival is called "Guanyin Club" for offering sacrifices to land gods and performing zaju, vocal music and cultural relics.

In the north, farmers in Qingyun County, Shandong Province offered sacrifices to the god of land valley on August 15, which is called "Young Miao Society". Zhucheng, Linyi, Jimo and other places have to pay homage to their ancestors in addition to the moon. Landlords in guanxian, Laiyang, Guangrao and Postal City also entertain their tenants in the Mid-Autumn Festival. Jimo Mid-Autumn Festival eats a kind of holiday food called "Wheat Arrow". Banquet for son-in-law at Mid-Autumn Festival in Lu 'an, Shanxi. Datong county calls moon cakes reunion cakes, and it is a custom to keep vigil on Mid-Autumn Festival night. Wanquan County, Hebei Province called the Mid-Autumn Festival "Little New Year's Day", and there were pictures of Xing Jun and Guan Di reading the Spring and Autumn Festival at night on moonlight paper. Hejian county people think that the rain in Mid-Autumn Festival is bitter rain. If it rains in the Mid-Autumn Festival, the local people think that vegetables must be terrible.

On the Mid-Autumn Festival night in Xixiang County, Shaanxi Province, men row boats and climb cliffs, while women set up banquets. No matter rich or poor, people should eat watermelons. On Mid-Autumn Festival, drummers blow drums along the door to ask for money. In Luochuan county, parents lead students to bring gifts to their husbands, and there are more lunches than school dinners.

Some places have also formed many special Mid-Autumn Festival customs. In addition to enjoying the moon, offering sacrifices to the moon and eating moon cakes, there are dragon dances in Hong Kong, piling towers in Anhui, Mid-Autumn Festival in Guangzhou, burning towers in Jinjiang, moon-watching in Shihu, Suzhou, moon-dancing by Dai and Miao, moon-stealing dishes by Dong and dancing by Gaoshan people.

the Spring Festival; Chinese New Year

Spring Festival in Old Beijing

Since the beginning of the twelfth lunar month, some scholars have written Spring Festival couplets under the eaves of cities in an attempt to earn some money for the New Year. After the sacrifice, the new Spring Festival couplets were gradually posted, and thousands of families took on a new look. Some people use James Zhu, others use red paper, and only the imperial court and imperial clan princes use white paper with red and blue edges as the rules. Those who are not imperial clan shall not use them at will.

In the twelfth lunar month, plum blossoms are tied in a big-bellied and small-mouthed utensil and placed about five feet underground. When the fire warms the ground slightly, the plum blossoms will gradually turn white, put in paper cages and sell in the city. Momo, plum blossom and Spring Festival are also acceptable. Tents are set up and paintings are sold in prosperous areas. Women and children rushed to buy them for fun.

On the first day of the twelfth lunar month, porridge sellers lined up in the market on the street. There are even walnuts, persimmons, dates, chestnuts and dried water chestnuts, which are sold with baskets on their shoulders. Followed by fat pheasant, Guandong fish, wild cats, wild birds, bacon, iron sparrow, fruit cover, giant Buddha flower, bean light thousand pieces, Louzizhuang ingot. After October of the lunar calendar, we sell Wei paintings, door gods, hanging money, gold and silver foil, yellow money, gold coins, burning paper, glass mirrors and windows. After the 20th, honeydew melons, sugar cakes, glutinous rice cakes and kwantung sugar will be sold. When the stove was delivered on the 23rd, Shenma was provided with copied beans with rotten grass. There are also kiln sellers, porcelain bowls, incense burners and candlesticks in Beijing. Stuffed gourd, children save money; Support the pot tile, and the furnace mouth is used as an aid. After 25th, sesame stalks, pine and cypress branches, atractylodes rhizome and so on are sold for "aging". The price and money in the twelfth lunar month are more expensive than usual, so there is a proverb that "the water and soil in the twelfth lunar month are three points more expensive". At this time, the old man always advised the younger generation to spend money carefully, so there was another proverb, "Twenty-seven or eight, take all the goods and catch them to the end."

On the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, we celebrate Wang Houla and cook fruit porridge. Rice and beans were prepared the day before, and figures were carved with hundreds of fruits. Cooking porridge in the middle of the night, the whole family gets together to eat and feed it to relatives and neighbors, which is Laba porridge. Laba porridge is cooked with yellow rice, white rice, glutinous rice, millet, water chestnut, red cowpea and peeled jujube paste. And dyed with red peach kernels, almonds, melon seeds, peanuts, hazelnuts, pine nuts, sugar, red ponds, grapes, etc. Never use lotus seeds, lentils, coix seed and glutinous rice, which will hurt you. Peel the fruit once every seven days, wash the utensils once, and operate all night until the porridge is cooked at dawn. Afternoon is not allowed except for ancestor worship and Buddha worship. There are also red dates, walnuts and so on. Make it into lions, children and other categories to see smart thinking.

Eating wonton on New Year's Day in Yangxian County is called "filling the warehouse". In Huangxian County and Penglai area, it is wasteful to get up early on New Year's Day. The hostess holds a red candle to light up every corner of the room, which means to drive away the darkness with light, and then paste all kinds of window grilles made of flour on the windowsill. After getting up, the child has to climb the door and play three swings. It is said that they grow very fast. In some areas, cooking jiaozi with sesame stems means that the New Year rises like sesame blossoms, and steamed bread should be put in the pot after meals, which means there are "leftover heads". In the first year, the new wife in Jiaodong will go to her husband's grandparents' house to pay a New Year call, which is called "Zagen". It is said that when you get to your grandparents' house, you can take root, and there will be no divorce and early widowhood. In the old days, there was a custom of "sending the poor on the fifth day". Firecrackers should be set off on that day to show "driving the five poor". Qufu held the "Wenqu Star Club" on the fifth day. On the evening of the fifth day, the students will go to the teacher's house to burn incense and worship Confucius. Then the teacher will write an article, and after writing it, the teacher will burn it, which is called "Wenqu Star Club".

Spring Festival in Shaanxi Province

All the clans in Fuping County are portraits of their ancestors. On the first day, they called their children and grandchildren to worship. After the sacrifice, they were given a golden banquet called "Sacrifice Sitting". On the second day of the following year, relatives and friends give each other pasta and pork, which is called "Worship Festival". On the first day of New Year's Day in Gaoling County, yellow paper is hung on a bamboo pole at dawn to worship heaven, which is called "welcoming the gods". It is said that charcoal can be hung on the door, and it can kill the plague. Shiquan County takes yellow paper as money and hangs it on the door on New Year's Day, named "Bao Gai Qian". Lintong county regards the fifth day as "send the poor festival". After cutting the paper, every household takes it to the door and throws it away. Everyone must eat enough on that day, which is called "filling the five poor"

Spring Festival in Sichuan Province

People in Chengdu don't eat during the New Year, because "rice" and "sin" are homonyms. In order to avoid taboos, they eat glutinous rice balls or dried noodles to pray for family reunion and longevity. Liu Ge and other places will celebrate the "off-year" on the seventh day of the first month. Besides worshipping God and ancestors, they will also have a family reunion dinner. Chengdu people visit Du Fu Caotang in the western suburbs every day. On the first day of the Lunar New Year in Changshou County, nine candles are lit outside the door, which are called "nine-level candles" to respect heaven and earth.

Spring Festival in Anhui Province

In Anhui Province, New Year's greetings began at noon 12 on New Year's Eve and ended at noon 12 on the first day of junior high school. And compete with each other who puts the thickest firecracker paper, which means who has the grandest New Year. Young people play the game of "beating the old nest". After New Year's greetings, he dug a hole in the ground and put in copper coins. Everyone threw out his own copper coins, and the money outside the hole belonged to him. On the fourth day of the fourth lunar month, Shouchun welcomed the God of Wealth. Merchants must offer offerings such as fish heads, mushrooms, taro, etc. The homonyms are "fish head", "time to arrive" and "luck", which are considered as good omen for making a fortune.

Spring Festival in Guangdong Province

In Haifeng area, young people and elders pay New Year greetings, and elders will give them red envelopes or oranges. Chaozhou's Spring Festival diet includes pickled vegetables, rotten jiaozi, fermented steamed stuffed buns, tube frying and five-fruit soup. On the fourth night, every household should light a lamp and prepare a jar of water, which is called "waiting for water". On the first day of the first month in Dongguan, taro is offered with sugar, which is called "wealth is predestined friends".

Spring Festival in Fujian Province

Before going out on New Year's Day, Xiamen people should worship the jade emperor in the sky, which is called "offering sacrifices to the gods". Sacrifice flowers and fruits to God in the morning, and sacrifice and a bowl of spring rice to God at noon. Spring rice is a spring flower made by inserting red paper on white rice. "Spring" and "surplus" are homophonic in Fujian, and spring rice is a good choice for its "annual surplus". The fourth day in Zhangzhou is called "Jiegu". In addition to burning incense in the temple, a candy and cake box called "recommendation box" should be prepared for the audience to meet the gods in the main hall.

Spring Festival in Zhejiang Province

On the first day of the Lunar New Year in Wucheng County, a long pole sokcho was placed on it, which was lit and burned, and gongs and drums were played, which was called "Qingtian Silkworm". Light a lantern on the pole until March 3. Ningbo will eat bean porridge after ancestor worship on New Year's Day. Before closing at night, have another "closing gun". Shaoxing uses a "tea bowl" for Chinese New Year guests, in which olives and kumquat are put, and tea eggs are put at the same time, which is called "holding gold ingots".

Spring Festival in Jiangsu Province

During the Spring Festival in Jiangning County, a rooster was posted at your door. On New Year's Day, there were more believers in Wuxian than in Tong Yuan Temple. Suzhou custom: On New Year's Day, three firecrackers should be set off to open the door, which is called "promotion to the third level". When you go out in the morning, you should follow the direction specified in the yellow calendar, which is called "Happy God". In order to burn incense in temples such as the City God Temple and the Land Temple, you must go through ten temples, which is the so-called "ten temples to burn incense". From New Year's Day to Lantern Festival, huge coal is burning in the stove, which is called "Happy Group". Legend has it that people in Zhuan 'an eat jiaozi, so they eat jiaozi every day from the early morning of the New Year's Day to the Lantern Festival. Women in Wujin County cut off pine and cypress branches on New Year's Day, wrapped them in red silk and put them on a bun. It is said that they can live longer.

Spring Festival in Hubei Province

Wuchang regards the fourth day of the first month as "New Husband's New Year". When the new son-in-law returns to the Yue family, he must endure the teasing of the Yue family and not get angry. The order of Huang Bei's New Year greetings is "family worship on the first day, mother-in-law worship on the second day and family worship on the third day". Those who lose their loved ones at home will write a dress on a wastebasket and stick it at the door, refusing to celebrate the New Year.

Spring Festival in Hunan Province

Xinhua must prepare an extremely rich breakfast on New Year's Day. People think that the richer the first meal in the New Year, the richer it will be this year. Setting off firecrackers to welcome the New Year is a custom in Changsha. After taking a seat, send two betel nuts, called Yuanbao, and wish them a fortune.