Chapter 57 Family Worshiping Ancestors (Please collect and recommend)
When the group arrived in the town, they went straight to the market stalls.
There are many people in the town today. Even though today is not a market day, everyone wants to take advantage of this day to make more money.
After taking to the streets, you can hear all kinds of shouting, hawking, and bargaining sounds.
Along the way, the fourth grandfather took the three younger generations to a place selling joss paper and firecrackers at the corner of the street.
Today these things are big, there are a lot to buy.
In the end, I bought two large boxes of firecrackers and a lot of scented paper candles.
People from the mountains go up to the mountains to worship their ancestors. They compete with each other only to see whose firecrackers were set off the biggest and lasted the longest time.
Nowadays, most of the cannons bought on Jishang are native cannons, and they are relatively cheap. Unlike in later generations, where electro-optical firecrackers were sold more often, native cannons have also become very expensive for various reasons.
Grandpa Four took four of the thousand-gun cannon alone.
After buying these things, it’s time to start buying vegetables. Uncle Jianzhong learned to cook, and he often helped other people make banquets in the village.
So whatever groceries I want to buy next depends on his arrangement.
First of all, when we come to the meat stall, we must buy meat. For more than thirty people eating, we have to buy more meat no matter what.
The price of meat is much cheaper now than before the New Year. I bought more than ten kilograms for 3.5 yuan.
Every family grows a lot of vegetables at home, so there is no need to buy the vegetables at home, which saves some money. For example, if you don’t have garlic moss or fungus at home, you need to buy some.
Everyone’s idea is that money should be spent wisely and should not be wasted.
In the end, there was still money left over from the 200 yuan that everyone scraped together.
Originally, Zhang An wanted to buy more things, but this is a collective matter. You can't just buy this or that if you have money. Others will have opinions.
In the eyes of others, appear that you can.
So Zhang An finally bought a box of apples and took them up the mountain as an offering.
Today we didn’t drink wine on the street, because when it comes to liquor, the glutinous rice wine and sorghum wine roasted in the village are better, and many people went to the village to buy them.
A few people came to buy things in their cars, but in the end they were sold out and there wasn’t much in the truck.
However, I met many people from the village on the way, so Zhang An helped them put their things on them and left together.
Arrived at home, Zhang An’s mother Wang Fang and several aunts began to prepare vegetables, wash rice and cook.
Each family brings the rice themselves, because they are all in the village and close to each other. No one needs to tell me this. No one has said that we must bring rice, but everyone brings rice by themselves.
This may be an unwritten rule developed by the older generation when we were still in a large group. At that time, we had to bring our own dry food when we went to other people’s houses for banquets.
So until now, such collective organizations have to bring their own food rations. After so many years, everyone has not forgotten it at all.
I don’t want to be criticized by others because of this.
Zhang An caught two big grass carps from home and brought them to make braised fish. When the uncle on the street wanted to buy them, Zhang An stopped them.
I said I have it at home, so I can just go and get it at home.
Everyone knew that the fish in Zhang An's pond were well fed, so they were not polite.
This big grass carp weighing seven or eight pounds is rare even in the river, and it is not easy to catch when you see it.
A few women were busy at home, and then the fourth grandfather of the family took the men and children of the family to go up the mountain to repair the tomb.
The second grandfather was making paper flags at home.
Because every family member has to get one, and those who split up have to get one, and the requirements are quite a lot, so the second grandfather stayed at home specifically to do it.
In fact, they are sold in town, but the second grandfather still wants to buy white paper to type.
Because the ones sold in the town are too thin, there are only a few layers of paper flags, and only a little bit can be hung.
In fact, after the Chinese New Year, everyone went to practice one.
But no one would think that they have done this too often. This is mainly to express their respect for their ancestors.
Following the fourth grandfather all the way over the mountains and ridges, he repaired his ancestral graves one by one, shoveling the grass and adding soil.
When the adults were repairing the tomb, some of the children would help, and some would look for Yumeko everywhere.
This season there are already some Mengzi on the mountain that can be eaten, such as Baimeng whose fruit is white. Its shape is like a strawberry, but it is much smaller than a strawberry.
The fruit of Baimeng is red when it is not ripe, but turns white when it is ripe. It tastes sweet and is loved by both adults and children.
When Zhang An was a child, every time he saw Bai Meng on the mountain, he liked to pick it and take it home to eat together. He was reluctant to eat it when he was on the mountain.
There is another kind of dream that is bright red all over and looks similar to Bai Meng. It is called Snake Dream. This thing cannot be eaten. Adults say it is poisonous. Zhang An doesn’t know how to eat it anyway. What will happen if you eat it? Just don’t eat it.
Most of the children go up the mountain to play, but more often they come to recognize the land.
Otherwise, when the old people are gone, they won’t even know their ancestral graves, which will make people laugh out loud.
This kind of thing has happened before. In later generations, many young people in the village have been working outside. When I returned to my hometown to hang the paper, I went to the wrong grave and hung it on someone else's ancestral grave.
In the end, the two families fought over the ancestral grave.
In addition to the tombs of Zhang An's grandparents, other ancestral tombs of Zhang An's family are scattered throughout the country.
So you have to run from one place to another.
We were all in the mountains. After one lap, it was already afternoon.
On the way home, everyone picked a lot of young bracken, which can be taken home to make a dish.
By the time Zhang An and his party who went up the mountain came back, all the ingredients at home were ready.
The young ferns picked by everyone were cut out immediately, and Uncle Jianzhong was in charge of the cooking.
Finally, the big pot brought from each house was filled with the vegetables cooked by the uncle, and the rice steamed in several steamers was put in it, and tied with ropes, each person picked some.
Because this meal is not to be eaten at home, but to be eaten on the graveyard.
This year we spent time at Grandpa Zhang An’s tomb, so the adults picked up prepared meals.
The children help carry the dishes and chopsticks, and the rest have to bring incense paper as offerings.
After worshiping all the old people and setting off cannons, they finally arrived at Grandpa Zhang An's place.
Today's weather is very good. Although it is still gloomy, it does not rain, so everyone can have a collective picnic on the mountain.
This is a local custom. Firstly, it expresses the longing and respect for the ancestors. Secondly, it also means a family outing.
But if it rains, then you can't go. You can only go to the mountain with a few people to worship and then return home to eat.
In the morning, Zhang An and his team had already cut out the grass dam here. Now there is a flat land here, which is very convenient for everyone to have a picnic.
The old man and the men gathered around a table, while the women and children gathered together at the same table.
Everyone had a great time eating, which completely diluted the gloomy atmosphere of the Qingming festival.
This may be the main meaning of the rise of this custom at that time. It is to remember without being sad, so that the deceased and the reborn can witness the rise and fall of the family together.
By the time everyone had finished eating, it was getting late.
Everyone helped pack away the pots and pans, kowtowed to their ancestors one by one, extinguished the mountain fire, and checked that there was no fire starter before the whole family went down the mountain to go home.
There have been too many accidents caused by mountain fires due to ancestor worship during the Qingming Festival, so in the past few years, various places have been focusing on forest fire prevention.
As the saying goes, set fire to the mountain and sit in jail.
Back home, everyone gets together in the morning and disperses again in the evening.
The hostesses of each family will wash the pots and pans, and then sort out their own things together.
After buying things with everyone’s share of the money in the morning, they have to settle accounts with each family in the evening.
Everyone should make up the missing parts, and divide the extra parts.
As a result, there are still more than twenty yuan left today, and each family only gets more than one yuan.
So Zhang An suggested that we either separate them and leave them at Fourth Grandpa’s place, and then get together to buy things together next year.
Anyway, each family doesn’t have much.
After everything was settled, everyone went back to their homes.
It is more convenient for Zhang An's family to be in the village.
There are many families in the village, and some branches have moved out to other villages, but every year they bring their families and their families.
This is probably the day that everyone pays most attention to at the end of the year.
Even though Tomb-Sweeping Day was included as a legal holiday in later generations, fewer people organized ancestor worship.
As soon as the Qingming Festival has passed, the rapeseed flowers all over the mountain have begun to bloom.
Many of the cherry trees on the mountain have already entered the flowering period and have produced small cherries. A few days ago, the mountain was still white, but now there are not many cherry blossoms in full bloom.
In more than a month, the cherries will be on the market.
When I have a car this year, it will be easy to deal with the cherries in the space.
Zhang An has always felt that so many things are wasted in space.
We still have to find time so that more people can enjoy such a good thing.
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(End of this chapter)