Society

Burial traditions blasted after fire kills 2

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2011-04-05 22:29

QINGDAO - People used to crowd the city of Qingdao's Hushan Mountain in east China's Shandong Province to pay homage to deceased loved ones during the annual Tomb Sweeping Festival. But not on this year's Tomb Sweeping Day, which fell on Tuesday.

Several local government employees patrolled the road to the mountain and persuaded passers-by not to climb it. Hectares of charred woods could be seen from the hillside.

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A joss paper fire in a cemetery on Hushan Mountain, Licang District, went out of control and was spread quickly by strong winds at around 10:30 am Sunday, the first day of the Tome Sweeping Festival.

Ji Yuhua, 59, a member of the forest patrol, was killed in the fire, which was put out at around 2 pm that day. Another man was seriously injured. "What a pity. Ji was just about to retire," said Wang Jiaqing, head of Hushan Street Office.

Undeterred by the tragedy, mourners caused another fire in Hushan Mountain at 3 pm.

Ji was not the only one who died in cemetery fires that day in Qingdao. Another person was killed in a fire at Funing Cemetery in Shinan District, according to Qingdao's municipal fire department.

"My colleagues and I have always been on high alert during the Tomb Sweeping holiday," said Qu Lixi, a fire fighter stationed near Hushan Mountain. He says burning joss paper is an element of folklore that will not be given up anytime soon.

Local resident Yang Jinhai says burning joss paper is virtuous. "It is how we send our regards to the departed."

"If some family's tomb were not covered with ash, people would say the family's descendants were not filial, if there were any descendants at all," Yang's mother said.

During the holiday, smoke shrouds parts of China as people burn paper replicas of houses, sedans and other luxury items for the dead.

"Think about the amount of paper burnt wastefully each year, the foul air we are breathing and the lives taken by the fires. Culture is no excuse to keep the ugly tradition," posted "Huangyuan Zhiding" at Sina Weibo, a Twitter-like microblogging website.

"It's time we stop the bad tradition. The government should ban it," posted Internet user "Mini-BB."

In fact, both the central government and the Shandong provincial government have announced regulations to ban joss paper burning. But the tradition is so deeply engrained in the culture that enforcing the bans could cause unrest, said Guo Kehuang, an official with Qingdao's Bureau of Civil Affairs. COLD SHOULDER TO LAND-SAVING BURIALS

In addition to smoke and fire hazards, runaway grave prices in China became a point of public concern in the lead-up to this year's Tomb Sweeping Festival.

China has been trying to solve the problem by promoting "green burials" for years. The Ministry of Civil Affairs named 2011 the "Year of Green Burial."

"Green burial" describes the practice of burying bone ashes without establishing tombs or graves to occupy the land. A green burial could be carried out various ways, including burying ashes under trees or scattering them at sea.

However, the idea of land-saving burials has not been received by the public as warmly as experts and officials had expected. People have swarmed to buy graves despite rocketing prices.

Graves with auspicious locations can cost more than 20,000 yuan per square meter in China's larger cities, becoming more expensive than apartments.

In the most extreme case, a grave in the city of Xiamen in east China's Fujian Province was priced at 8 million yuan ($1.2 million).

"Some unfilial people might buy expensive graves for their parents just not to 'lose face,'" said Cui Zike, head of the Research Center for Folklore Culture in northeast China's Jilin Province.

Expecting further price hikes, people across China have started buying graves in advance. "I don't like the idea, but I would buy one to avoid burdening my children in the future," said Wang Jun, 52, resident of Jinan City of east China's Shandong Province.

As the land supply for graves will remain very limited, promoting land-saving burials, thereby cutting demand, is the key to bursting the grave market bubble, experts say.

Shanghai has about 666 hectares of cemetery land, over half of which has been used. The land will be used up in about ten years as over 110,000 people die in the city annually, said Wang Hongjie, head of Shanghai's Burial Industry Association.

"Then there will be a real crisis," Wang said.