Culture Highlight : Qing Ming Festival

Qing Ming Festival in Thailand

We have a lot of Chinese people living in Thailand. Well, actually, I'm one of the Chinese who considered myself an official Thai as well as an ethnic Chinese (many Chinese people esp the ones in my generation think that way. We love our country so much.) :-). Every year in early April, there's a very big festival for the Chinese community called Qing Ming (known among Thai person as "Cheng Meng") in Thailand.


The word Qing Ming means Clear and Bright Festival, is a traditional Chinese Festival usually occurring around April 5. Its name denotes a time for people to go outside and enjoy the greenery of springtime and also to tend to the graves of departed ones.

For the Chinese, it is a day to remember and honor one's ancestors at grave sites. Young and old pray before the ancestors, sweep the tombs and offer food, tea, wine, chopsticks, (joss) paper accessories, and/or libation to the ancestors.

Yesterday, I went to Saraburi, a province nearby Bangkok to pray for my ancestors. We left the house at 5 am in the morning to avoid traffic and also the heat from the sun! Our family prefer to start the Qing Ming a bit earlier than the official day to avoid BIG crowd and traffic.

We started off by paying respect to "Pae Kong" and "Tee Ti Pae Bor".


Outside the temple, there were many sellers. This one is the picture of traditional Chinese toy. This festival is for family to gather and have a celebration. In China, it is the official springtime, so people start to dine, sing, and dance.



This is a picture of one of the big graves. The fengshui master determines which location is the best for the grave of your ancestor. The proper location is believed to bring health and prosperity to the family.

People bring lots of food as part of the praying. Some family gathered and sat in front of the grave and ate there, just like a party with everyone in the family including their ancestor!
The stack of the orange and gold paper on the right hand is called "Gold & Silver Paper". People bring this to pray to their ancestor and will later burn it as a way to send money to passed away ancestor. Some people fold the paper themselves while some just purchase it.
People burn the paper to send 'the money' to their ancestors. Other people will also buy paper car, paper clothes, paper house, etc as they want to send those stuffs to their ancestors. We believe the passed away souls are still around so we love to continue to pay respect and take care of them.
My family didn't eat in front of the grave. We came back to the area nearby the temple where the temple provide vegetarian food for all visitors for free. My family donated to the temple to share the cost of the food. They were all delicious (though it might not look that appetizing in the picture :p)


As usual, my mom bought some fruits back home. This year, she bought ripe mangoes. This kind is my top favorite as it's not too sweet and the fragrance is really nice. The price is about $0.99/kilo (or $0.99/2.2Lbs). Cheap, right?

Thanks to wikipedia for being source of my reference.