This festival is known as the Moon Festival and is held each year on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month (in 2007 this is Wednesday 26 September). Because the lunar month starts on a new moon, it is always a full moon on the festival (and the full moon rises at sunset).
On this day people enjoy sitting outdoors admiring the full moon while eating moon cakes (yuèbĭng) and fruits such as pomelo (yòuzi).
The round shape (ie the full moon) to the Chinese symbolises family unity. Therefore the Moon Festival is a holiday for members of the family to get together wherever possible. On that day children will bring their family members back to their parents' home for a reunion.
During Moon Festival all types of lanterns - and especially colourful, animal shaped paper lantern - decorate houses. Moon Festival alters are adorned with five dishes of round fruits, such as apples, peaches, pomegranates, grapes and small melons - the round shape symbolising both the moon and family unity
For adoptive families a great book to read at this time (or anytime) is 'We see the moon' by Carrie A Kitze, EMK Press. A wonderful way to 'connect' with birth family in China and beautifully illustrated with Chinese Peasant Art.
The Legends
During the Yuan dynasty (AD 1280-1368) China was ruled by the Mongolian people. Leaders from the preceding Sung Dynasty (AD 960-1280) were unhappy at submitting to foreign rule and set out to coordinate a rebellion without being discovered. The leaders of the rebellion, knowing the Moon Festival was drawing near, ordered the making of special cakes. Each cake contained a message outlining the attack. On the night of the Moon Festival the rebels successfully attacked and overthrew the government and the Ming dynasty (AD 1368-1644) was created. Today moon cakes are eaten to commemorate this legend.
The Lady - Cháng'é
There is a legend that thousands of years ago there were 10 suns in the sky and it was burning hot on earth. An archer, Hòuyì, bravely shot down nine of the suns and saved the earth from famine. He was beloved among the people and they made him a king. He was also awarded pills of immortality by the goddess Wángmŭ Niángniang. The pills were for both him and his wife Cháng'é, but Cháng'é was curious and could not resist the temptation of immortality. She secretly took all the pills herself, which not only made her immortal but also floated her to the moon to live forever.
The Man - Wu Kang
Wu Kang was a shiftless fellow who changed apprenticeships all the time. One day he decided that he wanted to be immortal. Wu Kang then went to live in the mountains where he importuned an immortal to teach him. First the immortal taught him about the herbs used to cure sickness, but after three days his characteristic restlessness returned and he asked the immortal to teach him something else. So the immortal taught him chess, but after a short while Wu Kang's enthusiasm again waned. The Wu Kang was given the books of immortality to study. Of course, Wu Kang became bored within a few days and asked if they could travel to come new and exciting place. Angered with Wu Kang's impatience the master banished Wu Kang to the Moon Palace telling him that he must cut down a huge cassia tree before he could return to earth. Though Wu Kang chopped day and night the magical tree restored itself with each blow and thus he still up there chopping.
Showing posts with label Book review. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Book review. Show all posts
Sunday, 23 September 2007
Wednesday, 15 November 2006
The Diary of Ma Yan – the life of a Chinese schoolgirl - a book that had a profound impact on me
The Diary of Ma Yan – the life of a Chinese schoolgirl – transformed (edited and introduced by Pierre Haski, Virago 2002) had a profound impact on me. I came upon it by chance. I hadn’t even intended to go to the bookshop that day but I was passing during my lunch hour and decided to drop in. As usual I decided to browse the Biography section. I am always drawn to author or subject names that appear Chinese. I found a single copy of this book tucked away.
As the back cover says, this is a moving tale of a young girl who wants to overcome her impoverished existence and who prefers to go hungry so she can save for a pen.
By chance her story reached the world. In 2001 a French journalist Pierre Haski was visiting a remote region of north-western China. A peasant woman thrust into his hands pencil writings on seed packets and small notebooks. When he reached Beijing he had the writings translated and found they had been written by a 13 year old girl, Ma Yan, the peasant woman’s daughter. It contained a plea titled ‘I want to study’. Amazingly, although Ma Yan’s mother could not read the diary herself, she realised the importance of it and by handing it to a foreigner set in chain events that would transform her daughter’s and other people’s daughter’s lives.
A peasant family with 3 children they could not afford for all of them to go to school, so Ma Yan had been withdrawn so that her brothers could continue. The book clearly illustrates the life of poorly educated peasants – of the back breaking toil and struggle to provide the barest of necessities to sustain life.
Ma Yan’s burning desire to learn is clearly reflected in her writings. And the chance meeting of her mother and the journalist led to Ma Yan’s and many other being changed for the better.
The journalist published her story on his return to France and together with his readership raised enough money for Ma Yan and many other girls to go to school.
This book had a profound effect on me because it brought into focus just how hard life is for many people in China. The poverty line in China is less than USD$1 a week. It also brought into focus how difficult it for girls to receive an education. Still in this day and age educating a girl is a luxury and when resources are tight it is something that can be sacrificed. But as we know even in the West lack of education perpetuates the poverty cycle.
Education in China is not free – or sometimes it purports to be free but there are lots of extras that families have to pay for in order for the child to be educated.
So after reading this book my husband and I felt driven to sponsor girls in rural China to go to school. We were fortunate that on our return trip last year our daughter’s Chinese godmother helped us make contact with a group in our daughter’s hometown which runs a program for locals to sponsor children. With her help they agreed to allow two ‘waiguoren’ (foreigners) to participate – they had never been asked before.
Initially, we sponsored two girls who had been adopted locally and then when we returned home we found out about 3 girls, from the village that our daughter was found in, who needed sponsoring. So at the moment we sponsor the five girls. We get short letters from them (all in Chinese with the occasional English word) telling us about their lives and their studies. And in addition to the sponsorship money we send them small gifts and clothes.
It is created an amazing sense of connection between us and the area our daughter was from. We continue to support the orphanage through fundraising but this adds an extra dimension to our connection.
So a chance visit to a bookstore led me to a book about a girl desperately wanting to learn, that in turn opened my eyes it helping 5 young girls with the same burning desire.
As the back cover says, this is a moving tale of a young girl who wants to overcome her impoverished existence and who prefers to go hungry so she can save for a pen.
By chance her story reached the world. In 2001 a French journalist Pierre Haski was visiting a remote region of north-western China. A peasant woman thrust into his hands pencil writings on seed packets and small notebooks. When he reached Beijing he had the writings translated and found they had been written by a 13 year old girl, Ma Yan, the peasant woman’s daughter. It contained a plea titled ‘I want to study’. Amazingly, although Ma Yan’s mother could not read the diary herself, she realised the importance of it and by handing it to a foreigner set in chain events that would transform her daughter’s and other people’s daughter’s lives.
A peasant family with 3 children they could not afford for all of them to go to school, so Ma Yan had been withdrawn so that her brothers could continue. The book clearly illustrates the life of poorly educated peasants – of the back breaking toil and struggle to provide the barest of necessities to sustain life.
Ma Yan’s burning desire to learn is clearly reflected in her writings. And the chance meeting of her mother and the journalist led to Ma Yan’s and many other being changed for the better.
The journalist published her story on his return to France and together with his readership raised enough money for Ma Yan and many other girls to go to school.
This book had a profound effect on me because it brought into focus just how hard life is for many people in China. The poverty line in China is less than USD$1 a week. It also brought into focus how difficult it for girls to receive an education. Still in this day and age educating a girl is a luxury and when resources are tight it is something that can be sacrificed. But as we know even in the West lack of education perpetuates the poverty cycle.
Education in China is not free – or sometimes it purports to be free but there are lots of extras that families have to pay for in order for the child to be educated.
So after reading this book my husband and I felt driven to sponsor girls in rural China to go to school. We were fortunate that on our return trip last year our daughter’s Chinese godmother helped us make contact with a group in our daughter’s hometown which runs a program for locals to sponsor children. With her help they agreed to allow two ‘waiguoren’ (foreigners) to participate – they had never been asked before.
Initially, we sponsored two girls who had been adopted locally and then when we returned home we found out about 3 girls, from the village that our daughter was found in, who needed sponsoring. So at the moment we sponsor the five girls. We get short letters from them (all in Chinese with the occasional English word) telling us about their lives and their studies. And in addition to the sponsorship money we send them small gifts and clothes.
It is created an amazing sense of connection between us and the area our daughter was from. We continue to support the orphanage through fundraising but this adds an extra dimension to our connection.
So a chance visit to a bookstore led me to a book about a girl desperately wanting to learn, that in turn opened my eyes it helping 5 young girls with the same burning desire.
Sunday, 12 November 2006
River Town - Two years on the Yangtze - Book Review
In 2002 when we were waiting for our first daughter, the first book I bought and read after our file was sent to China was River Town by Peter Hessler. Little did I know that the red thread had drawn me to this book.
The River Town in question turned out to be my daughter's birthplace.
In 2004 I wrote this book review. Naturally enough this book is one of my favourites but having visited the town both for the adoption and again last year, it certainly in no longer the quiet little back water it was in this book - it is a town on fast forward.
River Town, Two Years on the Yangtze Peter Hessler, 2001 Harper Collins
We were travelling down the motorway from Chongqing airport to our hotel and our guide was describing Chongqing to us. She confirmed that on Sunday we would be heading to Fuling to collect our daughters from the orphanage. She asked, what did we know about Fuling, had we read River Town?
Had I ever! In fact it was the first book I read after our file requesting a child was on its way to China. With our quest for a daughter from China came a thirst for more information about China, and I started to read autobiographies set there. Most of the personal stories I was drawn to had been written by Chinese women, many of whom had endured harsh and difficult lives but survived. So when I came to River Town it had a different voice. It was male and it looked at China, or at least the life in this isolated small (at least in Chinese terms) town on the Yangtze River, through Western eyes.
At first I was slightly annoyed by this "male, western voice", but then I realised that the problem was with my mind set, not necessarily the authors, so I made a conscious decision to set aside my concerns about the voice and just enjoy.
And enjoy I did. While reading it I harboured a secret fantasy that our daughter might come from Fuling, an absurd notion really, but of course that fantasy did come true.
River Town is by Peter Hessler, who travelled to Fuling as part of the US Peace Corp in 1996 and as the title suggests worked there for two years. Peter now lives in Beijing and works as a freelance journalist. His articles on China have been published by Time, National Geographic, and the New Yorker, among others.
The book covers his life in Fuling, his teaching experience at Fuling Teacher's College, and his travels up and down the Yangtze River and other parts of China. It details his trials trying to learn the language, of which he had little when had arrived, and finding their place in the college and the society. It also touches upon social and environmental issues that he is aware of (for example the high rate of suicide, and of course the negative consequences of the Three Gorges Dam). It does not, however, mention child abandonment or adoption.
In particular, it gave me an insight into being a minority in a relatively insular society. At the time that Hessler lived there Fuling had little contact with Westerners. Most of the time he was one of only two foreigners living in the town. Hessler and his friend, Peace Corp worker Adam Meier, had a large degree of novelty value for some locals. They were isolated by lack of language and lack of understanding of the prevailing culture and looked physically quite different from those around them. (I was reminded of this aspect of the book when in Chongqing and as the only two westerners on the street, my hulking 6'61/2" husband attracted stares and much laughter, and then a very inquisitive crowd. Later my husband "caused' a bus accident when the driver braked to get a better look at him and two other buses rear-ended him. no one seemed to mind. There were no injuries and all the passengers got a good long look at my husband, but I digress).
For a Fuling parent, the rich description of daily life in Fuling and of the surrounding countryside is worth its weight in gold. Fuling barely rates a mention in most guide books. But Fuling does come across as a dirty, polluted and noisy town (the constant honking of car horns). Hessler vividly describes the steep streets, laneways, and the "stick stick" men (the men with the bamboo poles for carrying goods on. We saw many stick/stick men in Chongqing). He gives us a picture of the changing seasons on Raise the Flag Mountain and White Flat Mountain and the significance of White Crane Ridge (which unfortunately is lost from sight forever due to the rising waters cause by the Three Gorges Dam). The only thing I think it could have benefited from was some photographs of the area, rather than just leaving it to the word pictures. (This is a purely personal. I love to read biographies and travelogues and thumb through the pictures; also it would have been a valuable additional "resource" for our Fulingers).
Hessler's book also made me realise that despite the veneer of an emerging capitalist society, China is (was) still at its heart a communist country and as such there is still a reluctance to speak out on some issues, particularly to westerners. The college administration has strong Communist party allegiances (if not membership). Hessler provides a vivid description of the students "joy" (which to this reader appear by some to be heartfelt but on another level orchestrated) at the return of Hong Kong to the motherland and their mourning the death of the Chinese leader, Deng Xiaoping (who had grown up to the northeast of Chongqing).
I eagerly acknowledged to our guide that I had read River Town. In a slightly embarrassed tone she responded that Fuling was not like that. Did she mean not anymore? "Chongqing [of which she considered Fuling to be part, the whole area being a municipality] is very modern. The government has spent a lot of money here."
It was clear that from the way that she carefully chose her words--in the way that many Chinese people can, saying so little but meaning so much - that she found book slightly embarrassing, perhaps a slight on her "home town" and she did not want us to get the wrong impression.
And with that comment I readjusted my thinking slightly on River Town. Yes, it is a fantastic read but it does describe a Fuling of nearly seven years ago. Not a long time you might think, but China is rapidly changing. To take assume Hessler's depiction is still completely accurate would be like looking at 1960s USA (or any other western country) and saying that is how it still is now, when infact it is a "generation" later. The Fuling of the book is isolated --to get to Chongqing took 6 hours by boat --and thus has very little contact with Westerners. Now you can zip down the motorway in less than two hours. This is also pre-Three Gorges Dam Fuling. Physically Fuling has been changed by this massive project. Dykes have been built and low lying areas are being flooded. At the same time there has been increased investment and building. Before there were no traffic lights, now there are. Then there was no overseas adoption, now there is.
So read this book and enjoy this "historical" insight into a remote Chinese town, but don't assume that this is exactly how it is now.
The River Town in question turned out to be my daughter's birthplace.
In 2004 I wrote this book review. Naturally enough this book is one of my favourites but having visited the town both for the adoption and again last year, it certainly in no longer the quiet little back water it was in this book - it is a town on fast forward.
River Town, Two Years on the Yangtze Peter Hessler, 2001 Harper Collins
We were travelling down the motorway from Chongqing airport to our hotel and our guide was describing Chongqing to us. She confirmed that on Sunday we would be heading to Fuling to collect our daughters from the orphanage. She asked, what did we know about Fuling, had we read River Town?
Had I ever! In fact it was the first book I read after our file requesting a child was on its way to China. With our quest for a daughter from China came a thirst for more information about China, and I started to read autobiographies set there. Most of the personal stories I was drawn to had been written by Chinese women, many of whom had endured harsh and difficult lives but survived. So when I came to River Town it had a different voice. It was male and it looked at China, or at least the life in this isolated small (at least in Chinese terms) town on the Yangtze River, through Western eyes.
At first I was slightly annoyed by this "male, western voice", but then I realised that the problem was with my mind set, not necessarily the authors, so I made a conscious decision to set aside my concerns about the voice and just enjoy.
And enjoy I did. While reading it I harboured a secret fantasy that our daughter might come from Fuling, an absurd notion really, but of course that fantasy did come true.
River Town is by Peter Hessler, who travelled to Fuling as part of the US Peace Corp in 1996 and as the title suggests worked there for two years. Peter now lives in Beijing and works as a freelance journalist. His articles on China have been published by Time, National Geographic, and the New Yorker, among others.
The book covers his life in Fuling, his teaching experience at Fuling Teacher's College, and his travels up and down the Yangtze River and other parts of China. It details his trials trying to learn the language, of which he had little when had arrived, and finding their place in the college and the society. It also touches upon social and environmental issues that he is aware of (for example the high rate of suicide, and of course the negative consequences of the Three Gorges Dam). It does not, however, mention child abandonment or adoption.
In particular, it gave me an insight into being a minority in a relatively insular society. At the time that Hessler lived there Fuling had little contact with Westerners. Most of the time he was one of only two foreigners living in the town. Hessler and his friend, Peace Corp worker Adam Meier, had a large degree of novelty value for some locals. They were isolated by lack of language and lack of understanding of the prevailing culture and looked physically quite different from those around them. (I was reminded of this aspect of the book when in Chongqing and as the only two westerners on the street, my hulking 6'61/2" husband attracted stares and much laughter, and then a very inquisitive crowd. Later my husband "caused' a bus accident when the driver braked to get a better look at him and two other buses rear-ended him. no one seemed to mind. There were no injuries and all the passengers got a good long look at my husband, but I digress).
For a Fuling parent, the rich description of daily life in Fuling and of the surrounding countryside is worth its weight in gold. Fuling barely rates a mention in most guide books. But Fuling does come across as a dirty, polluted and noisy town (the constant honking of car horns). Hessler vividly describes the steep streets, laneways, and the "stick stick" men (the men with the bamboo poles for carrying goods on. We saw many stick/stick men in Chongqing). He gives us a picture of the changing seasons on Raise the Flag Mountain and White Flat Mountain and the significance of White Crane Ridge (which unfortunately is lost from sight forever due to the rising waters cause by the Three Gorges Dam). The only thing I think it could have benefited from was some photographs of the area, rather than just leaving it to the word pictures. (This is a purely personal. I love to read biographies and travelogues and thumb through the pictures; also it would have been a valuable additional "resource" for our Fulingers).
Hessler's book also made me realise that despite the veneer of an emerging capitalist society, China is (was) still at its heart a communist country and as such there is still a reluctance to speak out on some issues, particularly to westerners. The college administration has strong Communist party allegiances (if not membership). Hessler provides a vivid description of the students "joy" (which to this reader appear by some to be heartfelt but on another level orchestrated) at the return of Hong Kong to the motherland and their mourning the death of the Chinese leader, Deng Xiaoping (who had grown up to the northeast of Chongqing).
I eagerly acknowledged to our guide that I had read River Town. In a slightly embarrassed tone she responded that Fuling was not like that. Did she mean not anymore? "Chongqing [of which she considered Fuling to be part, the whole area being a municipality] is very modern. The government has spent a lot of money here."
It was clear that from the way that she carefully chose her words--in the way that many Chinese people can, saying so little but meaning so much - that she found book slightly embarrassing, perhaps a slight on her "home town" and she did not want us to get the wrong impression.
And with that comment I readjusted my thinking slightly on River Town. Yes, it is a fantastic read but it does describe a Fuling of nearly seven years ago. Not a long time you might think, but China is rapidly changing. To take assume Hessler's depiction is still completely accurate would be like looking at 1960s USA (or any other western country) and saying that is how it still is now, when infact it is a "generation" later. The Fuling of the book is isolated --to get to Chongqing took 6 hours by boat --and thus has very little contact with Westerners. Now you can zip down the motorway in less than two hours. This is also pre-Three Gorges Dam Fuling. Physically Fuling has been changed by this massive project. Dykes have been built and low lying areas are being flooded. At the same time there has been increased investment and building. Before there were no traffic lights, now there are. Then there was no overseas adoption, now there is.
So read this book and enjoy this "historical" insight into a remote Chinese town, but don't assume that this is exactly how it is now.
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