On November 15th, October 16th of the lunar calendar, Matang Village, Yushan Town, Pan ‘an County became a gathering place for Taiwan tea farmers. Early in the morning, the ancient tea garden in Yushan was filled with gongs and drums and colorful flags, and many people came to attend the annual “tea garden” feast.
“Catching tea garden” is an ancient Han folk custom and folk religious cultural activity with profound cultural connotation, which is mainly spread in Yushan, Pan ‘an County. Xu Xun, a Taoist priest in the Jin Dynasty, made great contributions to the development of tea production and marketing in Yushan mountain area when he was practicing in Yushan, and was deeply respected and loved by local people. The people feel their kindness, respect him as the “tea god” of the true emperor, build a temple for him, and worship and commemorate him all the year round. In Song Dynasty, tea plantations and tea plantation temples were rebuilt, and the fair activities centered on tea trading-Spring Club and Autumn Club were formed. Since the Ming and Qing Dynasties, it has gradually evolved into a “tea garden” temple fair. In the Spring and Autumn Festival, while tea trade, there was a grand ceremony to worship the tea god, which gave birth to a large number of traditional folk arts. On this day every year, tea farmers in Taiwan will spontaneously hold a grand temple fair, one to commemorate the true king Xu Xun, and the other to pray for a bumper harvest and prosperity in the coming year.
Dragon and tiger flags fly together.
Before the “tea drive” began, there was a sacrificial ceremony of “worshipping tea gods”, and then it was the highlight of “tea drive”-“building a banner”, which has a history of more than 900 years. This year, four villages participated in the “Tree Banner”: Linggan Village, Zhongxinzhuang Village, Shang Hu Town, Guangyang Village, Jianshan Town, Sanshuitan Village, Jiuhe Township, and a total of six flags were set up, including the mother flag. At 9: 30 in the morning, after the mother flag in Linggan Village was put up, 120 strong men put the 35-meter-high flagpole high in the air with the shouts of unity. The nearly 600-square-meter flag with dragon and tiger patterns as the main content suddenly burst into majestic posture and fluttered in the wind, and the square suddenly burst into cheers. Ni Youmu, who was praised by the villagers as “the banner of tree” in qiwang, said: “To build this banner, we should pay attention to the unity of all people, work together, and the degree of cooperation between everyone. This year, I am just 60 years old. Every year, I will come to participate in the flag-raising activities of the temple fair, and I will never fall. Every time I see my own flag flying in the wind, I always feel extremely proud. “
Wonderful programs to entertain.
After the six-sided dragon and tiger banners were erected, all kinds of wonderful entertainment programs appeared on stage. I saw more than a dozen old ladies dancing with flowers in their hands. They were all agile and even did difficult movements well, which attracted cheers from everyone. Chen Xianghua, the captain from Huzhai Village, said with a smile: “Our dance name is Twelve Flowers. As the name implies, it is composed of twelve people, each with different kinds of flowers in his hand, and the rest four people beat gongs and drums at the end of the team. The reason why we chose twelve flowers is because there are twelve months in a year, and each flower represents..A month, the moral is that every year every month can be prosperous. Knowing that there will be a performance today, I was so excited that I couldn’t sleep all night. I arrived here at 6 o’clock this morning. “
Different from last year, this year, a particularly eye-catching program was added-“Jiu He Shang Yu Da Liang Umbrella”. Fu Dazhong, the person in charge of the program, said: “Our program has been handed down from the Qing Dynasty and has a long history. The purpose is to ask Buddha for rain. Each umbrella is made by ourselves, weighing about 30 kilograms. The umbrella is carved with exquisite carvings, and the umbrella frame is painted with the zodiac, which represents the peace of the year. For this day, our team has been practicing for three months. This time, 40 people came and brought 28 umbrellas. A large number of young people in the team used to work outside. After learning that they were going to participate in the temple fair performance, they all rushed back, and everyone was very active. “
In addition, programs with Han cultural characteristics, such as “Luohan”, “Lifting the Eight Immortals”, “Camel Class”, “Brass Whip” and “Dahuagu”, are also splendid, each with its own characteristics, which makes the audience feast their eyes. According to Zhou Yueming, secretary of the Party branch of Matang Village, “The people who came to the tea farm this time basically came from the platform and surrounding counties, cities and towns, and about 20,000 people came to watch.”