The Tomb-Sweeping Festival(Qing Ming Jie) is a time to pay respects to ancestors and to tidy their gravesite. The date of this festival was set as the third day of the third lunar month during the period of the Wei-Chin Dynasties. In recent years it has been moved to April 5th. As the name of this holiday suggests, the main activity of Tomb-Sweeping Day is for the whole family, young and old, to go to the graveside of deceased family members to burn incense and perform a ritual offering, while at the same time clearing away plant overgrowth from the gravesite.
According to the folk religion, the spirits of deceased ancestors still live under the ground and look after the family; the tombs are said to be their houses, thus it is very important to keep the tombs clean.
The Qingming Festival is spent by honoring the dead. On this day, people visit their family graves to remove any underbrush that has grown. They would uproot weeds near the gravesites, wipe the tombstones and decorate the tombstones with fresh flowers. And then they will set out offerings of food and paper money.
Burning Paper Treasures
Part of honoring the dead is to make sure that they are well-provided for -- even after death. Not only are food offered to the dead, but also, as some people figure, material goods are needed in the land of the dead.
Nowadays, paper gifts to the dead may even include paper money, houses, lawn furniture, TVs, VCRs, stereo systems, refrigerators, and even cars.
Tomb Sweeping in Malaysia
Last Sataturday, I followed my parents, grandma, auntie & uncle to pay a respect to our two ancestors in Malaysia, although I had never seen the late ancestors before when they were alive. One was my great grandma who passed away in 1961, the other one was my late grandpa's brother who passed away when I was very young.
The adult prepared alot of offerings to respect our ancestors. We set up early in the morning as the custom is jamming nowadays. This was my 2nd to tomb sweeping in Malaysia. The last time was when I was quite young with little memorise of it. I prepared myself to shield the UV by putting on a cap and applying sunblock lotion.
The journey to the tombsite was quite a driving distance. We have to climb up the small hill to reach the tombsite. There were alot of plants overgrown at the tombstone, the adults had prepared full equipments to clean the tombstone.
We started the activity soon after we found our ancestor's tombstone. Everyone started cleaning the tombstone together. Plucking the wild weeds, sweeping off the dry leafs on the tombstone, wiping the offering area, puting coloured paper on top of the tombstone, repainting the wordings on the tombstone, and I also get to repanit the lotus statues at the side of the tombstone . After the cleaning, grandma started placing the offerings such as snacks, kuays, burning joss stickes and candles. Everyone has to offer incenses too.
Two coins have to be tosed to invite the ancestor up to enjoy the offerings. After the coins were tosed three times until the the coins appeared a tail and a flower means positive. We waited for a while to burn the offerings to the ancestor. The waiting is normally in the time of the joss sticks are burning low ends.
After about the joss sticks were burning low, the coins have to tosed again to invite the ancestors to collect the offerings while we burn them infront of the tombtone. The name of the assentor has to be written on the offerings so that the ancestorsis able to get the offerings at the other end. The types of offerings has grown more and more trendy and technology nowadays. Besides the traditional hell bank notes, Gold Bars, accessories like clothings, shoes, cars and houses, there are even high end 3-G cell phone.
In Malaysia, some family memebrs even putting fire crackers at their ansestor's tombstone, making the usually quiet tombsite with more lively sound.
After all offerings has been burned off. the last thing we have to do is to tose the coins to inform the ancestor that we are leaving before we left.
Tomb Sweeping in Singapore
We went thomb sweeping on the next day at Lim Chu Kang, paying respect to our late grandpa. As it was a Sunday, we got stucked on the road for over and hour even though we set up early to prevent traffic jam and crowd. We ended up started the activity late. Tombstomes in Singapore are well organised in rows and well kept by the caretakers. We just need to wipe the offering area, putting the coloured papers on top of the tombstone and started offering joss sticks, candles, fresh flowers and food. Same procedures goes.
Visiting tombstone in Malaysia and local, we can see quite a number differences.
As the area in Malaysia is big, there are numerous tombsites in Malaysia while Choa Chu Kang and Lim Chu Khang is the only place we visit for tombsweeping.
The tombsite in Malaysia is very wide and un different shapes and sizes. There are tombstone built like a mansion with gate while, while all tombstone in Singapore looks the same and built neatly in rows.
Offerings can be burnt infront of the ansector's tombstone in Malaysia while offerings has to be burnt in a common area in Singapore's tombsite.
Fire crackers can be put in Malaysia's tombsite while not in Singapore's tombsite.
