Filial ... whaaaat?

If we're going to rant on the subject of filial piety and what it means in the modern setting, there's literally endless things to say. Certainly, Chinese people have institutionalized the idea of taking care of your elders in their infirmity into a religion. With the current fashionable movement to be 'innovative,' to 'break the mould,' to be against any and all institutions regardless, in addition to the ideology of democracy eroding into the Chinese tradition of age hierarchy, it's not surprising that people occasionally slip up and yell at their Grandpas. All the more appropriate to discuss the topic, with the timing near Ching Ming Festival, in which ritual tomb/grave sweeping and offerings of food, money and incense are made. (Well done Pilar, right on time!)

I just learned from my maternal grandmother that if you've relatives that are fresh in the grave, you have to visit them first, before Ching Ming day, in order to demonstrate that you haven't forgotten them so quickly. You visit the relatives that have been in the grave longer later, either on the day of, or after. The term for the newly dead isn't actually 'newly dead' - it's literally 'new mountain,' and 'old mountain' for the long buried. This is a nice way of pointing to the practice of having graves situated on hillsides or mountainsides, mostly for Feng Shui reasons. I think that if I were dead, I'd like a spot on a hilltop with a nice view too, frankly. (Pilar can you teach me how to insert Chinese characters? Ta.)

And, it all makes a lot of sense to me. If you've been dead for ages, you'd forgive your kids and grandkids for wanting to visit the people they remember more freshly, right? Though, with how intractable old people generally are, it's also difficult for me to imagine them being less than absolutely stubborn and demanding in the grave as they are in life. I have this strange image of a bunch of old dead people elbowing each other out of the way, to get the dibs on the freshest and best food offerings, just like I've seen real old folks do in the Hong Kong wet markets. (Chinatown NYC, Pilar?) Honestly, if you're that old, and that dead, no shame in giving your fellow ghost a shove, eh?