A traditional ceremony and housewarming is nothing simple nor easy. It took my parents a month to prepare.
First, a “lucky” day for moving in the new house should be chosen based on “Yi Jing”, an ancient Chinese semi-scientific book of “Feng Shui”. My parents consulted an experienced senior in “Lin” family and decided December 23rd, 2006 as the “lucky” day for housewarming. Another reason they chose December 23rd was that I would be in town to attend the ceremony and housewarming. According to the custom of the village, my parents should invite their relatives, friends, and colleagues to have lunch and dinner that day.
Second, my parents need to make a decision on who they have to invite, who they should invite, and who they want to invite. For the last several years, my parents were invited to a few weddings, housewarmings, etc. They kept all the invitations! Those invitations were the importation source that they based on to invite people. In addition, close relatives were ones who they have to/should/want invite. The list included 42 families!
Then, my parents had to write invitations and send them out to each family. Since housewarming is a good lucky event, red invitations should be used. My mother is quite good at calligraphy. She hand-wrote all the invitations. My father was responded to send out all the invitations. At the same time, menu needed to be decided. Chinese are in favor of event numbers, therefore, event number of dishes are preferred. My father chose eight dishes for a table with 10 people. As there were so many people would come to have meals at my parents’ house, my parents hired chefs and waiters and waitresses from a restaurant to make lunch and dinner on the day of housewarming. I was told that the restaurant would buy and prepare all the materials needed, including all vegetables, meats, tables, chairs, chopsticks, rice bowls, etc. Chefs would cook everything fresh at where housewarming was held. This is a kind of service offered in quite a lot of restaurants in Zhongshan.
Conventionally, moving to new house also should move one’s ancestors together with. Therefore, ceremony of inviting ancestors to move in needs to be done. In the village, Guan Ying, god of earth, god of heaven, god of front door-guard, and god of cook are worshiped. They also should be invited to the new house. Overall, the ceremony of moving into new house includes three parts: moving the person and family, their ancestors, and all the gods and goddesses they worship to the new house. For moving the person and family, my parents prepared the required items, such as new red water buckets, new red washbasins, new dishes, new bowls, new chopsticks, etc. Special items for moving one’s ancestor and gods and goddesses include hundreds of paper-made mountain-shape gold and sliver, paper-made new clothes, shoes, and hats. To worship the ancestors and gods and goddesses, scents need to be prepared. In addition, a whole cooked rooster, a whole cooked fish, a big chunk of pork, some tofu, etc need to be arranged. Guan Ying is said to only have vegetarian food, so special vegetarian food is prepared. As my parents didn’t have experience doing ceremony, they invited my father’s two older sisters to help. Since there were too many things to prepare, my parents couldn't have everything ready until the midnight of December 23rd.
Finally, it was the housewarming. I was waken up by my mother by 5:30am! My two aunts had started preparing for more than one hour by then! According to the experienced senior of “Lin” family, the good time to have ceremony was early morning on December 23rd, 2006.
The traditional ceremony
Six o’clock, the ceremony started. First water buckets and washbasins needed to be filled with water. Additional items such as lucky money, etc (I couldn’t remember what other items were) were added to the buckets and washbasins. Then, my dad holding a huge rice cake, my mother holding pictures of ancestors, and I holding “Guan Ying” were walking in line to the door of the new house. Scents for ancestors and Guan Ying were lighted. Worship items were presented in front of the door. Two big chains of firecrackers then were lighted. The first part of the ceremony was done: my parents officially moved to the new house. Before starting the second part: inviting one’s ancestors to move in the new house, requesting protection of god of heaven had been carried out by praying to the god of heaven. Then inviting one’s ancestor to move into the new house started. Paper-made mountain shape gold and sliver, and paper-made clothes, shoes, and hats were burned. My parents and I each prayed in front of the ancestors. Then, one of my aunts used a pair of wooden items by their landing patterns from throwing them into air to indicate whether ancestors have moved into the new house. Similar processes were done for inviting gods and goddesses. By the time the ceremony was done, it was around 8:30am.
Cooking for Housewarming
Four male chefs and about five waitresses from the restaurant came around 9 o’clock with all material in a truck. It seemed the crew knew what to do well. They didn't need to talk to each other much. Five stoves were set up just outside my parents' house in a very short time. Some crew members started washing vegetables, and meats. Two of the chefs responded for chopping and cutting. Two other chefs responded for cooking. They were so organized. Tell you the truth, I haven't seen anything like that before. By noon, a feast of ten tables were ready!
As for the people who were invited to the housewarming, I have to say that I only know half of them. Since I have only gone back home during the vacations for the last nice years, I haven't seen some of my relatives for almost ten years! It was nice to see them again. It was also interesting to meet those people who are my relatives but I haven't met before.
It was a very long day on December 23rd, 2006. At the end of the day, both my parents, my two aunts who help us, and I were very tired. We were very glad that all the guesses enjoyed the feasts including lunch and dinner, as all the dishes were finished! The chefs prepared more than enough, but the dishes were so good that people took the leftover home.
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