'they use the graves of people's ancestors to decorate their hats'

On the eve of Lunar New Year and first day of the New Year, local residents began to rebuild their ancestors’ graves. However, local governments keep warning the villagers over loudspeakers that they must dig up the graves again or else they will be slapped with a fine of 500-1000 yuan and the government will forcibly dig up the grave.

Involving as it does grave robbing, unaccountable power, justified cynicism, and, sadly, a gangnam style parody video involving people dressed as zombies, I should have covered the Henan province grave reclamation protests before. However, it was rumbling on for a while and I never quite got round to disinterring it from the to-blog list.

I’m pleased to say that Global Voices has now done the necessary.

Local irony: Our neighbourhood graveyard here in north Manchester was dug up four years ago and replaced by our local Tesco, to no more than a murmur of opposition. There’s a little plaque in the corner of the car park and a couple of benches where the staff eat their lunches and smoke.

Comments

[Brynley]

A bit more on the graveyard-to-Tesco please. It resonates.

[ajay]

It turns out that it was built on an ancient Mancunian burial ground! ...no, doesn't have quite the same ring.

[dsquared]

"This plaque and these benches were put here to placate the ancestral spirits. The man who unscrews that plaque does so at the risk of a fate worse than death!"

[Richard J]

"Lest the shade of Sydney Scroggins (1912-1982), beloved father, friend and husband, rise up from the unquiet grave and tut loudly at you for swearing on the bus!"

[Alex]

"This is not a place of honour. No highly esteemed deed is commemorated here."

[jamie]

*brushes dirt and twigs away to reveal inscription in ancient language*

"What does it say, professor?"

"...a curse...something about meat and horses"

[ajay]

"This is not a place of honour. No highly esteemed deed is commemorated here."

FTW.

The reference, for anyone who doesn't recognise it:
http://prod.sandia.gov/techlib/access-control.cgi/1992/921382.pdf

[Richard J]

I do now kind of want to erect a plaque over a patch of urban wasteland reading 'This space left intentionally blank', though I fear that's stepping into Banksie territory.

[Chris Williams]

Banksie Cargo Cult Planning: leave a wall and some spray cans handy between a mall and a police station. One day he grace the city with his presence, and artisan cupcakeries will sprout in his wake.

[johnf]

“Concerned about their future in the afterlife, a number of old age pensioners started taking their own lives in Jiangsu Province, China, in April 1993. According to Chinese tradition, the dead should be buried, so they arrive whole in the otherworld, but the Provincial Governor decreed that anyone dying after 1st of May should be cremated. More than a hundred old people killed themselves to ensure burial, using sleeping pills, drowning, hanging and jumping off bridges. One pharmacist reported that a group of pensioners invaded his premises demanding sleeping pills, because they had to beat the deadline. When he told them they had sold out, they head-butted his drug-cabinet before rushing into the street and throwing themselves in front of a passing lorry.”

South China Morning Post, 21st May, 1993.

I did a version of this story as a radio play for the World Service in the 90's. Essentially their dilemma was die now and be buried whole and see your ancestors including parents and grandparents), or live past the deadline, continue to see you children and grandchildren, but then die forever and see no one.