Breathing & Seeing Again

Ah, today is a blue sky day. Although the sky is actually bluish-gray, the sun is out and I can see across Chaoyang "Sun" Park 朝阳公园, the largest urban park in Asia, which is right across the street from my apartment. http://www.sun-park.com/

Today, since I could actually see, I went to the Lama Temple ("YongHeGong" 雍和宫) and the Dong Yue Temple. The Dong Yue Temple is a Daoist temple and home to the largest collection of stone tablets from different eras in Beijing. I'm sure you will learn as much as I did from this description posted about one of the tablets:

Lucent Tablet - The tablet of "White Paper Congregation" was carved at Shun Zhi 7 year Qing Dynasty (b 1650). Six holes carved at the head of the dragon is a tragic of craftmanship which created a new style of the arts of carved stone. Thus it was the honor name of "Lucent Tablet" in older Beijing residents.

Temple fairs are the big thing over Spring Festival (Chinese New Year), and the fair at the Dong Yue Temple was the Beijing Folk Culture Festival. Much like the fairs we're used to at home, this one involved a lot of greasy "traditional" food and a magic show. "Toss the coin to hit the bell and ensure you will have a son this year" was a Chinese a twist on the standard carnival games prize scheme. More on temple fairs at this link: http://www.china.org.cn/english/features/SpringFestival/200000.htm

Today is the 5th day of Spring Festival, so fireworks have ramped up again after a couple of quieter nights. The most important nights are the 1st night (New Years Eve), the 5th night (the arrival of the God of Wealth), and the 15th night (Lantern Festival).

You might ask why the same fireworks used to scare away evil spirits on the 1st night are used to welcome a spirit on the 5th night. Well, the answer is that traditionally, they should not be the same fireworks. There are noisy firecrackers (炮竹 "pao zhu") and beautiful fireworks (烟花 "yan hua", or smoke flowers). The problem is that the fire crackers they use here are as large as what we would call fireworks, and the beautiful fireworks make just as much noise as beauty. Thus, we Westerners miss the subtle distinction.

Anyway, the fire crackers first came into use in ancient times, when Chinese began staying up until midnight to ring in the new year. Since evil spirits and ghosts were known to lurk about, steal children, and show up in your reflection in mirrors late at night, people set off firecrackers to scare the spirits away so they could safely visit with their family in the wee hours. They also began giving children red envelopes with money so the evil spirits would steal the money instead of the child during the year. That's how the money in the red envelopes got the name 压岁钱 "ya sui qian", literally money that's pressed down - you press it right there on top of the munchkin's head so the spirit can't miss it.

OH, and what about the beautiful flowery fireworks? That's to welcome the God of Wealth and show him the way to your door. Who wouldn't feel welcome with multi-colored bombs exploding everywhere?