Qing Ming Festival (清明节), also known as Tomb Sweeping Day is similar to All Souls’ Day observed in the Western world. It is typically observed by ethnic Chinese around the world. Filial piety and ancestral worship are emphasised during Qing Ming. Visiting cemeteries and columbaria with food and other offerings 🎑 for deceased relatives marks this important period of remembrance.
In line with traditional practice, visits to ancestors’ graves, niches or tablets can be made within 10 days before or after Qing Ming (清明). On the day itself, the likelihood of traffic congestion, especially around cemeteries and columbaria, motivates families to set off early. For those visiting graves, sao mu 🪦 (扫墓), meaning to “sweep the grave” is undertaken before worshipping begins. This process includes trimming the grass and removing the weeds that have grown on the site, as well as cleaning the tombstone and repainting faded engravings.
Descendants buy or make offerings before paying homage 🙏 to their ancestors. These offerings vary but may include meats such as chicken, duck, pork and fish, and other varieties of food and drink such as cakes, fruits, vegetables, rice, wine and tea. If the ancestral tablet is placed in a Buddhist columbarium or temple, the offerings presented will be vegetarian in nature. We bought Vegetarian Food (斋饭) of which sis chose sweet & sticky mock pork ribs, broccoli & cauliflower stir-fry and mock char siu plus two packs of steamed rice and two hot beverages. ☕
Albert Tay’s family business may be the last of its kind in the Lion City. Young Singaporeans have no interest in the craft, while Covid-19 could land the killer blow.
Bent over a wooden table, Albert Tay, 61, picks up a plastic knife – the kind that comes with a McDonald’s takeaway order – and gets to work.
His hands run down a winding log of reddish-brown clay that is shaped like a dragon without features. Using the knife, he deftly carves out small, protruding scales, one after another, until they eventually form a dense pattern across the dragon’s body, which dresses up a 2-metre-long joss stick.
With more twists and flicks of the wrist, he works on the dragon’s head, sculpting its eyes, nose and beard. The dragon comes to life, almost.
Tay is in the business of making giant joss sticks by hand – one that has been passed down from his grandfather, who moved from Guangdong, China, to Singapore in the 1930s, to his father, and now him and his brothers.
But in a modern city, it is a vanishing trade. Tay believes that his shop, Tay Guan Heng, could well be the last of its kind in Singapore. A competitor shut down in January.
“This is not a way for the kids nowadays to make a living. You cannot survive,” he says, adding that neither his nieces, nephews, nor even his own children are interested in taking over the business.
“They are better educated, and they are doing very well. So we’re happy for them. This traditional work is for us old people. This cottage-industry kind of thing, especially our trade, will not last long. It’s a different period now, a different time.”
Tucked away in the industrial part of suburban central Ang Mo Kio, and surrounded mostly by automobile repair shops, Tay Guan Heng’s small and unassuming workshop belies its rich, 80-year history.
He brought with him a skill he had picked up back in Guangdong – making handcrafted joss sticks – and sold them for a living. Joss sticks are a type of incense fundamental to Chinese rituals, often burned as a form of offering and worship. The giant ones are typically used during the birthday celebrations of Chinese gods and the Hungry Ghost Festival.
Eventually, his son Tay Yong Poh, Tay’s father, took over and set up his own shop in Little India, an ethnic enclave at the heart of Singapore.
The ingredients for the handcrafted joss sticks are simple: a mixture of cinnamon tree wood powder and water, which come together to become pliable, dough-like clay. Tay Guan Heng imports its powder from Malaysia.
This clay is rolled out and shaped into giant joss sticks, which are adorned with anything from dragons to deities to Chinese characters. They are then dried in the sun for two to four days, before being painted with bright colours.
The standard 2-metre joss sticks, which are decorated with a three-dimensional dragon each, are sold in sets of three for S$150 (US$105). Customised ones can cost more, depending on the designs.
In its heyday during the 1990s, Tay Guan Heng was making joss sticks as tall as 5 metres – massive, towering structures that required four to five people to set up.
“Making those joss sticks was a group effort, we had to mobilise everyone in the family. You can’t do it on your own,” says Tay, the sixth of nine children.
“So my dad and I would build the joss sticks, my youngest brother would carve the dragon, my second and third brothers would do the painting. We even roped in friends to help carry and deliver the joss sticks. That was the fun part.”
Tay’s fondest memory of his childhood is growing up around the business with his big family. His father had taught him and his brothers the craft to keep them off the streets in Little India, where gang fights were rife back in the day.
Whenever it rained, the brothers would dash out of their shophouse (which served as both the Tays’ shop and living quarters) to save the joss sticks they had laid outside to dry. They even built a makeshift barbecue pit indoors to “grill” the sticks and dry them in time for the orders to be fulfilled.
But the family was dealt a blow in 1998, when the elder Tay died. To make things worse, official restrictions on the height and dimension of joss sticks that could be burned kicked in, sending revenue tumbling by 80 per cent.
“Everybody [in the industry] started to panic, and they stopped work. We didn’t know what to do. But it was either we try, or we give up. So we tried,” Tay says.
Of the nine children, it was Tay, his fifth brother and his youngest brother who stepped up to take over the business. He had to learn the ropes of running the shop, from doing the accounts to handling day-to-day operations, and looking for new business ideas.
Tay Guan Heng took small steps to diversify. On top of the regular orders from temples and clan associations, it started to make customised figurines for foreign tourists – be it Chinese mythology gods and goddesses, nativity sets, or Star Wars characters – and held workshops in schools.
Tay’s youngest brother, Amos Tay, known for his workmanship, participated in cultural festivals and exhibitions, including the London Cultural Olympiad in 2014. He died in October 2019 from cancer at 58 years old, but had continued working and visiting the workshop even as his condition worsened because he felt comfortable there, Tay notes.
“This is a gathering place for everybody,” he says. “My brothers always drop by. But it would be very difficult if I didn’t have this shop. That’s why if this shop has to go, life will really change.”
Today, Tay Guan Heng faces a different set of challenges: dwindling demand, tightening regulations, a lack of space and manpower, and perhaps the hardest hit it has taken in recent times, the Covid-19 outbreak.
The workshop has stopped running since Singapore introduced “circuit breaker” measures aimed at stemming the spread of the virus on April 7. These mandated that all non-essential businesses stop operations at their physical workplaces.
“Even before that, the temples were being shut and most celebrations halted. All our orders were cancelled, so totally zero business. We don’t know when this will end,” says Tay, who is preparing for demand to remain low even after the virus subsides, due to the economic downturn.
There are no plans for anyone to take over the business.
“Our age is catching up. I don’t know how long I can go on, but I would like to keep the shop going for as long as possible. We just have to do our best,” Tay says with a smile.
Outside the workshop, footsteps shuffle quickly as the sound of falling rain becomes louder and heavier. Tay leaps to his feet and rushes out to carry the giant joss sticks that were being sunned back into shelter, the same way he did in his younger days.
I just came across the blog of @elsewheregreen where the correct Chan Luen Hing joss stick label is shown in great quality and in full height. And of course I wanted to share it with you all! =D
Isn’t this awesome???
Thank you @elsewheregreen! =)
Here again the appropriate screencap of the pages from S08E12 - As Time Goes By:
New haul - some red candles and new joss sticks. I’ve never used Sarathi / Tulasi sticks before, they smell really good. Anyone know if they are ritually pure? I wonder if the gods will like them?
Bai Tian Gong (拜天公), or "praying 🙏 to the Heaven God", is a major Hokkien tradition celebrating the Jade Emperor's (玉皇大帝) birthday on the 9th day of the Lunar New Year. It serves as a thanksgiving ritual 🎑, often involving sugarcane offerings to symbolize protection and gratitude for saving ancestors during wartime.
Hokkien people believed that the Jade Emperor was instrumental in rescuing them from their plight, which is why Hokkiens celebrate Bai Tian Gong. The sugarcane as well is commemorated as it kept them hidden and safe when the bandits were searching for them. In Hokkien dialect, the sugarcane plant is pronounced as ‘kam jia’, which sounds very familiar to ‘kam xia’, the word for gratitude. Thus, in Hokkien Chinese New Year, Sugarcane Stalks are often placed on either side of the offering table 🎑 or the front door of the house. This symbolizes the appreciation and gratitude of the Hokkien people to the Jade Emperor for protecting their ancestors all those years ago and hopes that he would continue to give them his blessings.
Typically, the ceremony 🎑 commences on the eve of the 9th day, typically starting at 11pm on the 8th day of Lunar New Year. But due to mum’s advanced age, she preferred not to jostle with other families burning the joss papers at the public bins. So, she Bai Tian Gong (拜天公) on the actual day at about 6am in the morning then send me down to the bin to do the burning.
Qing Ming Festival (清明节) is a Chinese festival honouring ancestors that is celebrated on the 15th day after the spring equinox, generally falling in early April. The main activity of the Qing Ming Festival is the cleaning or sweeping of ancestral tombs, and thus it is sometimes referred to as “Tomb Sweeping Day.”
My brother drove mum, me, my sister and youngest brother to Kong Meng San Phor Kark See Monastery (光明山普觉禅寺). There were already plenty of worshippers. The picture below shows just a corner of the temporary prayer area which is on the ground floor of the multistorey carpark. One can also engage one of the monks to come chant and pray for the deceased.
Mum bought Vegetarian Food in a tingkat, two boxes of steamed rice, fa gao (发糕), a cup each of black and milk coffee since the temple encourage worshippers to go vegetarian or fruits only. If you would like to donate the fruits used in the prayers, there are donation boxes around too.
Today is the ninth day of the first lunar month and we Hokkiens celebrate the birthday of the Jade Emperor or Tian Gong Dan (天公诞). The Hokkien people pay homage to the Jade Emperor and to give thanks for their salvation from a massacre that occurred during the Ming Dynasty. Bai (拜) means to pray, and Tian Gong (天公) refers to the Jade Emperor, hence Bai Tian Gong (拜天公).
According to legend, a group of Hokkien villagers were fleeing from a bandit raid during the Ming Dynasty. They hid in a sugarcane field, where they were pursued by the bandits. The bandits searched the field for days, but they could not find the villagers.
On the ninth day of the first lunar month, the bandits gave up and left. The villagers emerged from the sugarcane field, grateful to have been spared. They decided to celebrate this day as a day of thanksgiving to the Jade Emperor.
Bai Tian Gong (拜天公) is celebrated with a variety of rituals and customs. One of the most important customs is the offering of prayers and food to the Jade Emperor. This is usually done on the eve of the ninth day of the first lunar month from 11pm onward.
Qing Ming Festival (清明节), also known as Remembrance of Ancestors Day or Tomb-Sweeping Day 🪦 takes place on the 15th day after the Spring Equinox. This means it usually takes place on April 4th or April 5th in the western calendar. As done annually, my family visited the temple to pray to my father and ancestors with offerings of vegetarian food and joss papers.
