Waiting for the NEW YEAR – Section 2
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HUNG NGUYEN MANH1
The custom of “Maintaining the Fire”
At Kẻ Rị, Kẻ Chè (Đông Sơn District) as well as at Định Tương Village (Thiệu Yên District), both of them pertain to Thanh Hoá, people used to observe the custom of maintaining the fire (Fig.4) at the kitchen and lighting the lamp throughout the night aiming at keeping the old year’s fire burning when comes the new year, without involving any moment the fire is burned out.
The custom of “Calling Rice”
On the lunar New Year’s eve, people at Phù Lễ (Phúc Hoà Village, Tân Yên, District, Bắc Giang) send all their young man, armed with sticks and lances, to set an ambush in the forest under the command of the patriarch. At midnight, the patriarch fires 2 gun-shots followed by drumbeats, and sound of tocsins and wind instruments resounding everywhere. The young men then return to the village, but, at its gate, they stop and wait for the patriarch who call loudly into the village:
“O rice! O rice! O rice!
A wisp of rice, a bowl of water to prepare sticky rice, O rice!”
When the patriarch finishes his shouting, the young men shout loudly:
Ah! Ah! Then the drumbeats and sound of tocsins and wind instruments resound again from a house, one man gets out, opens widely the gate and gives to the group a bowl of white and fragrant glutinous rice. The patriarch takes the bowl of glutinous rice and pours it into a basket, then he continues to lead the group to other houses to repeat the same activity. Upon reaching the last house, dawn has come and the whole group go back to the forest outside the village to relax. Now comes the time for the old ladies to appear. From the village they go to the place the group of young men is relaxing; then, using the amount of glutinous rice obtained, they cook sticky rice, divide the cooked sticky rice into small parts, wrap it with banana leaves and distribute to each one of the young men a part which he eats with white salt. After that, everyone gladly return to their homes to greet the lunar New year.4
The custom of “Calling Thunder”5
Besides the custom of “calling rice” to awake the paddy, there exists also the custom of “calling back thunder”. This is because people awake paddy just like they wake the earth up to sow, to plough and to plant, but, the earth requires water i.e. thunder is required to produce thunder rain that permits the paddies to grow fastly:
“The fifth month rice crouches in hiding near the edge,
Once thunder is heard, it would wave the flag and grow fastly”.
According to old customs, when proceeding with calling thunder, people display mortars, tocsins to pound, to beat to cause their sounds, along with the sounds of gongs and drums to resound, thus, simulating the sound of thunder at the beginning of the Spring and luring thunder to come back bringing rain along with it. With regard to this custom, we haven’t been able to determine the exact time yet (end of old lunar year or beginning of new lunar year).
The Sacred minutes
The Eve of New Year is the most sacred time of the year when earth and sky commune with each other, sending off the old and welcoming the new. However, he who lives in the countryside in this sacred minute can see a woman with a lamp in one hand and a stick in the other looking for her debtor, and can realize what a hard time a well-off woman has!
The lamp pertains to the kind of bottle lamp i.e. petroleum lamp with its lamp-shade made of a sawn bottle trunk. The person holding the lamp is described by the writers as an old hag of a fat woman with a stick on her other hand for leaning on and also for driving away the dogs. This realistic image denotes and denounces an extremely cruel feudalistic society. In such a dark situation rendered darker by the 30th Tết night when all the families have carefully closed their doors, “the thieves” can dig around trying to riffle a few square glutinous rice cakes, a stick of pork paste, a pot of frozen meat … ending the pre-Tết month in which a close watch is necessary namely the Chạp or last lunar month of the year in which thieves and robbers are countless as clam worms (Fig.5).
And the man who has to leave his native place to earn a living and now cannot return home is truly sad! Now and then a firecracker is heard as if to welcome the new administrator – the belief is that twelve Administrators take turns to look after world affairs from the year Tý (Mouse) to the year Hợi (Pig) a cycle of twelve years. Each Administrator has a reign title of Genius of the year and has an aide. The Administrator is good or bad. The bad one addresses a request to Heaven to cause disasters: drought, flood, bad harvest, hunger, epidemics… to punish ill-behaved and ill-bred Kings and high officials.
NOTES:
1 Associate Professor HUNG NGUYEN MANH, Doctor of Phylosophy in History.
4 According to the work entitled : “Địa Chí Hà Bắc” Monography of Hà Bắc – Information and Culture Service – Library of Hà Bắc 1982 – p.538.
5 According to LÊ TRUNG VŨ – Traditional Tết of the Vietnamese – quoted book – p.99.
BAN TU THU
01 /2020
NOTE:
◊ Source: Vietnamese Lunar New Year – Major Festival – Asso. Prof. HUNG NGUYEN MANH, Doctor of Phylosophy in History.
◊ Bold text and sepia images has been set by Ban Tu Thu – thanhdiavietnamhoc.com
SEE ALSO:
◊ From Sketches in early 20th century to traditional rituals and festival.
◊ Signification of the term “Tết”
◊ Lunar New Year Festival
◊ Concerns of PROVIDENT PEOPLE – Concerns for KITCHEN and CAKES
◊ Concerns of PROVIDENT PEOPLE – Concerns for MARKETING – Section 1
◊ Concerns of PROVIDENT PEOPLE – Concerns for MARKETING – Section 2
◊ Concerns of PROVIDENT PEOPLE – Concerns for Dept payment
◊ In SOUTHERN PART of the COUNTRY: a HOST of PARALLEL CONCERNS
◊ The tray of Five fruits
◊ The Arrival of New Year
◊ SPRING SCROLLS – Section 1
◊ The Cult of The Deities of the Kitchen – Section 1
◊ The Cult of The Deities of the Kitchen – Section 2
◊ The Cult of The Deities of the Kitchen – Section 3
◊ Waiting for the NEW YEAR – Section 1
◊ The custom of RECELEBRATING TẾT
◊ Vietnam Lunar New Year – vi-VersiGoo
◊ etc.