Memory of a Tomb Sweeping Day

The tomb-sweeping excursion continued with us walking for quite some time and finally arriving at the foot of the hills. It was late afternoon, so very few people were within our vision. A vendor stood on the roadside in front of his truck.

My father stopped and bought what we needed for tomb sweeping-joss paper, a lighter, some plastic garlands because that was the only option.

"We should have gotten some real flowers downtown," I said. "These are so ugly and overpriced. Look at all the plastic flowers on the tombstones. I bet they'll go up there at night, take down the flowers, and sell them again tomorrow."

He was quick to respond. "They have to make a living. And anyway, it is environment-friendly to recycle them, isn't it?"

After entering the cemetery grounds, it was another long excursion and thousands of stone steps to go uphill, with tombstones and shrubs terraced thickly and neatly on both sides. It was truly a necropolis, a city for the dead. Just when I thought it was the last flight of steps we needed to climb, there emerged yet another even higher slope, providing resting places for hundreds.

We finally arrived at my grandfather's grave, a marble headstone with a small picture of him in the top middle, his name, the year of birth and death engraved in black paint, and another few lines stating his ancestors. A metal bucket was already at the front with burned paper inside, to which my father explained that our relatives had paid a visit.

"Wait a minute. Why is grandmother's name carved there as well?" I was appalled, because she is still alive and well.

"That empty pit nearby is your grandmother's. We bought it in advance. And her name is painted in red. That means this person's not dead," my father answered almost nonchalantly.

Then he took out a bottle of black paint and started carefully tracing the characters of my grandfather's name, parts of which were fading in color.

He draped the garland on the tombstone, put some joss paper money in the bucket and set them alight. White smoke mixed with tiny pieces of golden paper arose into the sky and dissipated into the misty air.