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September 2, 2015

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Life goes on in tribute to China’s martyrs’ sacrifices during war

Most mornings, Zhang Dingguo, 63, shadowboxes in a small square in the Martyrs Cemetery in Ya’an, a city in southwest China’s Sichuan Province.

Zhang, who’s retired, chooses that place because it is downtown and close to markets and the cultural center, which he often visits after his morning exercise.

The cemetery, one of 4,151 martyr memorials in China, is quiet and full of trees. It is the final resting place of 342 Chinese Red Army and People’s Liberation Army soldiers. Zhang says he regards them as silent friends, and sometimes sweeps fallen leaves and dirt from their graves. “Maybe the martyrs know I come here every day,” he says.

Other retirees play Chinese chess in a pavilion or fish at a lotus pond in the cemetery, while their grandchildren play in the square. In the evening, fan dancers move to soft, slow music in the square. “We try to dance without disturbing those buried here,” says one.

In many Chinese cities, martyrs cemeteries incorporate squares, exhibition halls and trees. They are not just memorials for past heroes, but places for the living. Local people relax in them — quietly.

For decades, local governments asked public institutions and schools to organize traditional “tomb-sweeping” ceremonies in martyrs cemeteries every year, mostly ahead of the Qingming Festival in spring or October’s National Day.

The event in Ya’an Martyrs Cemetery is much smaller than the grand ceremony at the Monument to the People’s Heroes in Beijing’s Tian’anmen Square, but it’s just as moving.

When Zhang’s 32-year-old daughter Zhang Xiaojia was a primary school student she made paper flowers to wear for the ceremony.

At the ceremony, students would stand in line in front of the monument in the center of cemetery. A representative would deliver a speech to express their gratitude for the martyrs.

They would put white flowers on the graves or hang them on trees. In China, white is the dominant color in funerals or tomb-sweeping ceremonies.

After the ceremony came the “free activity,” when the children would play in the cemetery for the rest of the day. Roller skating in the square, hide-and-seek ... all the fun of a holiday as long as they kept away from the tombs.

Snack vendors would gather at the cemetery gates, but most of the students would eat home-made treats at the lunchtime picnic.

Before the end of the day, they were expected to finish a composition on the theme of “A day to be remembered” or “Reflections on tomb-sweeping”.

Zhang Xiaojia recently began going to the cemetery again to bring her father an umbrella if the weather changed.

The local government has a website for virtual tributes.

However, old habits die hard, and local people still prefer to visit in person.




 

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