Tomb-sweeping Day
By admin on 2015-03-06

Qingming or Tomb-sweeping Day (meaning Pure Brightness) is one of the twenty four solar terms. After Qingming, temperatures rise and rainfalls increases, marking the best time for sowing in spring. However, as a holiday, Tomb-sweeping Day contains certain customs and memorial significance. Tomb-sweeping Day is a traditional festival as well as an important day of sacrificing for ancestors and sweeping tombs. Sweeping tomb is generally known as visiting a grave, an activity to honor and memorize the dead. Most Chinese visit graves of their families on the Tomb-sweeping Day.

The Qingming Festival, also known as Tomb Sweeping Day or Ching Ming,is a traditional Chinese festival on the first day of the fifth solar term of the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar. This makes it the 15th day after the Spring Equinox, either 4 or 5 April in a given year. Other common translations include Chinese Memorial Day and Ancestors' Day.

The festival is called Qīngmíng Jié in Standard (Mandarin) Chinese (清明節 / 清明节; Wade-Giles: Ch‘ing Ming Chieh), literally "Pure Brightness Festival" or "Clear and Bright Festival". The name suggests a time for people to go outside and enjoy the greenery of springtime (踏青, tà qīng, "treading on the greenery"), but it is mostly noted for it connection with Chinese ancestral veneration and the tending of family graves. The Chinese characters are read Cing1-ming4 Zit3 in Cantonese, and Chheng-bêng-cheh or Chhi?-mia-choeh in Min.

Qingming has been regularly observed as a statutory public holiday in China. On Taiwan, the public holiday is now always observed on 5 April to honor the death of Chiang Kai-shek on that day in 1975. It became a public holiday in mainland China since 2008.

On the mainland, the holiday is associated with the consumption of qingtuan, green dumplings made of glutinous rice and barley grass. On Taiwan, the similar confection is known as caozaiguo or shuchuguo.

The holiday is often marked by people paying respects to those who died in events considered sensitive.The April Fifth Movement and the Tiananmen Incident were major events in Chinese history which occurred on Qingming. When Premier Zhou Enlai died in 1976, thousands visited him during the festival to pay their respects. Many also pay respects to victims of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 and Zhao Ziyang.

Foods:

Activities: