"Bright", "multi-colored", "lively", "noisy" and "breathtakingly crowded",
foreigners here enjoy the temple
fairs during the traditional Spring
Festival, where the fun and energy of Chinese grass-roots culture can be
sampled in the crisp January weather.
"Visually, the most striking thing is the red lanterns
hanging in the trees, and hundreds of them at the gate of the Ditan Park,
marvelous," said Daniel from New Zealand now teaching in the Capital Normal
University.
As a symbol of good fortune, red lanterns are indispensable decorations
during the Chinese New Year. "They are straightforward. I love the bustling and
festive atmosphere they create," said Daniel, who visited the temple fair for
the first time.
Each Spring Festival, temples or places in Beijing
like Ditan, Baiyunguan, Changdian or Chaoyang Park hold various temple fairs.
The Ditan Park Fair in urban Beijing is the busiest. The Ditan Park, or the
Temple of the Earth, is the site of the altar
where sacrifices were formerly offered to the earth god in the Ming and Qing
dynasties after the altar was built in 1530.
The Ditan fair on Tuesday, the third day of the Year of the Dog, was of
course breathtakingly crowded, as some Beijing residents ended their family
reunions and started going on family outings for fun.
"I don't care about the hustle and bustle because there are always a lot of
people in China," said Daniel, "the most important is, it's nice to see happy
faces and a good time to be with family or girlfriends."
As an important part of the Spring Festival, temple fairs in Beijing unfold
with much fanfare this year from Jan. 28, the last day of the Year of the
Rooster, through Feb. 4, when Chinese are supposed to summon up the energy to
start work again.
Daniel favors traditional Chinese craftsmanship and artworks the most. At
Ditan, he lingered over the handicrafts booths and took great interest in a host
of folk art traditions like hand-made cloth tigers
and shoes by local artisans from rural places in north China's Shannxi Province,
Niren Zhang clay figurines from the old city of Tianjin,
paper-cuttings,
block-print New
Year pictures, red lanterns, Chinese
calligraphy and the art of facial make-up in Peking
Opera, or Lianpu.
He adored a series of delicate cloth dragons
at one stall and discovered that the vendor, instead of seeking to sell, was
displaying his collection here only so that people could admire them. "I think
he is very special. Like all genuine collectors, he is very patient when
explaining his exhibits to listeners," Daniel said.
He described the temple fair as "bright, multi-colored, lively and noisy",
"It is full of shapes and colors," Daniel said, "look at those sugar-highs in
the kids' hands, and each time I am stuck in a crowd, I feel worried that the
sugar-high held by the neighboring child sitting on his father's shoulder could
possibly fall on my head and make me a white-haired."
By "noisy" he means those bamboo-made pinwheels joyously held by many kids.
"It's really a 'pleasant' noise," said Daniel, "you see, it's the most popular
thing in the temple fair."
"Four rings spin around the bamboo poles with a noisy whirring sound. You can
see the movement of the sky, the universe and feel the vitality of life," said
Daniel, "they are simple, attractive and lovely, and not expensive; everybody
can have one."
