The main lunar festival times of the year in Shangmeizhujing Village, Maoling Town, Fangcheng District, Fangcheng District, Guangxi The dishes are as follows:
On the first day of the Spring Festival (the first day of the first lunar month): every household kills a big capon in the morning to celebrate the New Year (New Year greetings) to worship their ancestors, perform lion dances and beat gongs and drums in the ancestral hall, and wait for everyone in the village to wait for noon After we came together to worship, we set off firecrackers together. The smoke from the firecrackers flooded the entire ancestral temple. After setting off the firecrackers, we all took the chicken home. When we got home, we fried pig's trotters, steamed pork trotters with pork, and cooked pork with sauerkraut. Steamed fish or pan-fried fish, stir-fried southern rice noodles with pork, chicken and duck, boiled chicken and deep-fried 籺 (籺, pronounced "@" in the local Cantonese dialect). On the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year, it is important for the whole family to sit down at the same table to eat. You are not allowed to eat in the soup on the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year. The Spring Festival in Shangmeizhujing Village only celebrates the first day of the Lunar New Year, not the second day of the Lunar New Year. In some places, for example, families named Peng and Li only attend the second day of the Lunar New Year instead of the first. Moreover, they have to rush to visit relatives and friends on the morning of the second day of the Lunar New Year, and have to get up in the middle of the night to kill chickens and ducks to worship the community and ancestors. . Those relatives and friends who only celebrate the Spring Festival on the second day of the Lunar New Year and not the first day of the Lunar New Year can go to Shangmeizhujing Village, which is very lively around 14:00 on the first day of the Lunar New Year.
Visiting relatives begins on the second day of the Lunar New Year. The new uncle usually returns to his parents' home on the second day of the Lunar New Year. On the third day of the Lunar New Year, he cleans up the poor and holds a ceremony to send the poor away. This starts from the first to the third day of the Lunar New Year. sweep the floor! Generally, people do not visit relatives on the third day of the Lunar New Year. You can continue to visit relatives on the fourth, fifth and sixth day of the Lunar New Year! Some families spend the fifth or sixth day of the Lunar New Year away from home (buying and killing chickens and ducks, frying rice dumplings, making a big meal to pay homage to the community leader or grandpa) when the children go out to work or go to school. When visiting relatives, the New Year greetings are generally held until the fifth or sixth day of the Lunar New Year. There is still wine and no meat to eat, so the New Year is over.
On the 15th of the first month of the Lantern Festival, we eat glutinous rice balls with sugar water, buy pork, kill chickens or ducks, and cook and fry the chickens, ducks and pork together. Zongzi worships the ancestors in the New Year. Some children have to go out to school early, and those who work do the New Year in advance. Therefore, if you celebrate the New Year in advance, it is okay.
The second day of the second lunar month. During the Spring Society Festival (Prayer Festival), every household in the village pays rice, buys incense paper, candles, and pork head meat to pray for good weather, good harvests, and safety for the whole village. Now they have a long-term gathering next to the community worshiper. Only people in rural areas celebrate this festival. If they have gone out to work or moved outside, some people are too lazy to go home to celebrate this festival. In addition, many people no longer farm the fields, so this festival has evolved into It’s okay now.
During the Qingming Festival, you can kill chickens or geese, make rice balls, cook rice with soup, and visit graves. Yaowang Festival and Buddha Bathing Festival. Eat garbage on the eighth day of the fourth month of the lunar calendar. Some company canteens in Fangchenggang City also sell garbage to employees on this day. It is also the birthday of the God of Pesticides. Shen Nong tastes hundreds of medicines to cure all kinds of diseases, so some women go to the suburbs to pick plants such as vines (chicken vines), Pulsatilla spp., and wild mugwort, wash them and dry them with rice. Dry it, then put the herbs and rice into a machine to make powder, and then take it home to make glutinous rice cakes. You can shape them into fingernail-sized shapes with your hands or cut them into strips and add sugar to boil sugar water to eat. You can also put them into cakes. The mold is made into biscuits and eaten, which is called "La Sa". It is said to be able to cure all diseases. It is also said that this day is the Buddha Bathing Festival. Legend has it that the eighth day of April is the birthday of Sakyamuni. "Jingchu's Chronicles" says that Jingchu bathed the Buddha in fragrant soup on April 8th, and it was said that on the eighth day of the fourth lunar month, he ate glutinous rice cakes made of chicken shit vine and other herbs. Taking a herbal bath can remove the evil spirits of the past, and using the herbal bath to drive away the nuisance of poisonous insects, combined with the consumption of "garbage @", can truly achieve the effect of external application and internal consumption, and protect one's health. People in some places also cook glutinous rice. Feed the cows and let them rest for a day. You can buy some garbage to eat on the eighth day of April, or you can skip this festival.
On the first day of May, pick mugwort leaves and hang them on every window and on top of each door. Then pick some mugwort leaves and rub them with water to wash your face. This can prevent bees and mosquito bites!
During the May Festival (Dragon Boat Festival), every household kills chickens and ducks, buys pork to worship ancestors and communes, and makes rice dumplings (triangular salty red and blue meat rice dumplings, stir-fry rice dumplings if not red and blue) Washed black sesame seeds are applied on the meat strips to make rice dumplings, 4-cornered bean rice dumplings), sweet gray water rice dumplings (cold rice dumplings), and dragon boat racing.
During the Guanyin Festival on June 18th, Buddhist believers buy candies to pay tribute to Guanyin. June is generally not a festival.
During the July Festival (Hungry Ghost Festival and Duck Festival on July 14), you can kill ducks, buy incense paper candles, cannons, five-color paper, cut paper clothes and burn them as backs for ancestors, and make sweet potato rice cakes (white mochi). ) to eat. Nowadays, many people don’t like to eat it, or don’t have time to make it. They usually don’t make sweet potato dumplings to eat. I remember when I was a kid, my parents often made it for July 14th. I miss my childhood so much. When I was a kid, every Chinese New Year was celebrated. During the holidays, my parents would make some zhen to eat.
The Lingtou Festival is held on the 10th day of August. Many people in Shangmeizhujing Village do not celebrate the Lingtou Festival. Some people just celebrate it. Even if they celebrate it, it is treated as a small holiday and just a family dinner. The people in Shangmeizhujing Village belong to a small village. Unlike Huangwutun Xixian Village, which is a big village, people celebrate the Spring Festival or hold weddings as grandly as this.
During the Mid-Autumn Festival on August 15th, families gather together to watch the moon at night, eat moon cakes, fruits, and have a reunion dinner. Sometimes they don’t even have a dinner together. August is generally not a festive month.
During the Double Ninth Festival in September, climb to the top of the mountain to eat snacks and fruits. I only celebrated this festival when I was in primary school. Usually, primary school teachers would lead students in teams to climb to the top of a high mountain. They would buy some fruits, snacks and water in advance, and then climb to the top of the mountain and eat while watching the scenery. In their spare time, rural women also make steamed cakes, eat bananas, peanut candies, and biscuits. If you don’t read this section, you will generally fail.
At the end of the year, on December 16th of the lunar calendar, the Winter Society Festival (Blessing Returning Festival) is held to worship the community and ancestors. Like the Spring Society Festival, every household pays the money to buy pig heads, pork, incense paper, cannons and candles, and goes together to worship the community. After the dinner, each person has to take a few taels of pig head meat home to eat, which is called "social meat". Generally, "making a community" is done by three or four people working together. The four "community heads" divide the work and cooperate. Some collect rice and money from door to door, some buy things, some cut community meat, some worship the commune, and some prepare tableware and firewood. Washing things, cooking and cooking, usually three or four households take turns to be the "head of the community" together! Nowadays, it is not like in the past when every household lived in the countryside and farmed the fields, because now there are many young people who have moved to the city and worked outside for a long time. It is far inconvenient to go back during the Spring Festival and the Winter Festival. People live in rural areas, so they generally don’t go home to celebrate the commune festival (not work in the commune). However, if it’s their turn to be the “communist leader”, some people ask their neighbors who have lived in the countryside for a long time to help in the role of “communist leader”.
On the 23rd and 24th of the lunar calendar, we start cleaning, digging ditches behind the house, boiling and washing rice dumpling leaves, preparing fillings for making rice dumplings and buying new year goods to prepare for the New Year.
After the general cleaning, before the 30th night of the year, we go door to door and buy chickens, ducks and pork for three lives, or pig heads for five lives, and then go to pay homage to the commune and ancestors, which is equivalent to returning a wish (returning blessings), because at the beginning of the year After the first few days of the Spring Festival, when they are preparing to go out to work, elderly people from every household like to go to the ancestral hall and communal incense burners to burn incense and pray for blessings and make wishes. Those who go out to work safely pray for a good harvest. Those who have livestock at home pray for the safety of people and animals. , Good wishes such as having a child and getting rich smoothly!
On the 30th night of the New Year (New Year's Eve), make hexagonal long rice dumplings (a cooked large long rice dumpling weighs about three kilograms. Those who have time will wrap and cook the rice dumplings a few days in advance), kill chickens and ducks After paying homage to the community and ancestors, after the New Year's Eve dinner in the evening, parents give new year's money to their children and put them in their trouser pockets before going to bed. At 12:00 a.m., the whole village sets off firecrackers together until the sky lights up.
In summary, in Meizhujing Village, because many people now go out to the city to buy houses or work outside for a long time, they usually only celebrate the following festivals: Spring Festival, New Year's Day, Tomb Sweeping Day, and Tomb Sweeping Day , the Dragon Boat Festival on May 5th, the Ghost Festival on July 14th, and the 30th night of the new year (New Year's Eve). Nowadays, it is popular to celebrate these 3 to 5 festivals. Some young people who have moved out to live outside, or young people who go to other provinces to work, celebrate the Dragon Boat Festival. Some people do not go home to worship ancestors and worship shrines during the Chinese New Year and July Festival. In the local area, not going home to worship ancestors and shrines is equivalent to not celebrating the festival.