The Miao minority group residing in the beautiful mountainous area of southwestern China has many interesting festivals and holidays all year round. If you visit them during their holidays, you will see their fabulous silver jewelry the local women wear from head to foot. The famous Fishing Festival held in April is an exciting day for people to go fishing.
The day before the festival, people go to pick up some special leaves and mash them. The mashed leaves can put fish in the river to sleep. Elderly people hold a small ceremony to worship their ancestors by burning incense. Young women get busy preparing food for the next day.
On the morning of the festival, carrying their long, big harpoons on their shoulders, men go fishing. Women follow their men behind. Wearing beautiful costumes and silver jewelry, they carry a bamboo basket with food and wine. After arriving at the river, women wait at the riverside with food and wine beside them.
Men stand on both sides of river, with their big harpoons in hands. A man in the middle of them murmurs a prayer to himself, then puts a handful of mashed leaves into the river. Next the other men all throw their mashed leaves into the river. Immediately a huge black dragon surges in the river, which is in fact groups of fish floating on the surface of the river after they are narcotized by the leaves.
Men cast their huge harpoons to the dragon, and lots of fishes are dead. People get more excited with their achievements. They laugh, shout, and chase after the dragon in the water.
In a few hours, every man has got lots of fish. They bring the fish to the women, who have got everything ready for cooking the fish. Cooked with water from the river, the fish tastes excellent with a natural fragrance.
People eat, drink, and exchange toasts. Some young people even sing and dance to express their happiness.
Fishing Festival originated from a ceremony of praying for rain. Legend has it that a god living in the heaven had a beautiful daughter. One day, the princess got very sick, and no medicine could make her feel better. In a dream, the god was told that a soup cooked with one hundred fishes from a river could save the princess. So he sent people to find fishes and cook them in a soup. After drinking the soup, the princess soon recovered. Feeling grateful to the fishes, the god declared the river from which the fishes came to be under his protection, forbid anybody to catch the fishes in that river. Think that this was still not enough, he also ordered all the rain to be directed to the river, and not to the soil around it.
Without rain, plants withered away, and people couldn’t grow anything on their farmland. So they killed pigs, sheep, and oxen to hold a sacrificial ceremony to pray for rain. But still there was no rain at all. With all the livestock slaughtered, people at last had to kill chubs, carps, and salmon as sacrifices.
Seeing that his fishes were killed, the god felt sad and cried. He cried for three days, which caused thundering and lightning. His tears poured down on earth as rain, which brought the plant back to life.
Since then, the Miao always went to slaughter fishes when they needed rain. This later evolved into the Fishing Festival.
Every year lots of tourists go to the Miao area to discover the local people’s interesting custom, and beautiful silver jewelry.
C. Liu has been studying handmade silver jewelry, for years. She occasionally supports the work of select Miao artisans. Go to her website to view some excellent Miao silver jewelry.