Chapter 23 The third part: Festivals and Lantern Watching Section 23 Yunnan Horse Racing Festival in Memories

There is also a unique local horse racing festival, which is held at the foot of Paoma Mountain in the countryside near Kunming, Yunnan.This kind of event that gathers people from four townships within a hundred miles will be full of department stores and arts, and it will be even more eye-opening to foreigners.Not only interesting, but also informative.The horse packs from the four townships carrying shochu often unload the wine jars and racks on the spot, stand aside to attract customers, and use small bamboo tubes to keep scooping wine for people to taste.Some older people, like generals in a military parade, walk around, nodding and shaking their heads. If they don't drink much, they go around the venue for a while, and they will inevitably be staggered by the smell of strong wine. Three minutes drunk.All kinds of sour, sweet, bitter and spicy food stalls are also full of local characteristics in Yunnan, which are rarely seen in other places.What makes the women happy is that the first-class silversmiths in urban and rural areas will bring all kinds of new jewelry, choose a flat and open place to build a small cloth shed, unfold all the scenes, open on the spot, cook, fry, hammer, chisel, blow , Plating, embedding, connecting, it is very lively.Those selling homemade shoe upper pillow handkerchiefs, lace railings, five-color silk threads, and rouge, gouache, and fragrant soap are all specially prepared for female customers.Woodcuts and other old-fashioned primers can often be found at stationery stalls.

Everyone's main interest is naturally horse racing, and they are particularly concerned about the victory or defeat of the village, which is similar to the situation of dragon boat rowing.I'm not that interested in horse racing.Most horses in Yunnan have relatively short skeletons, similar to what the ancients said "get off the horse". They are usually used as mounts, and their waist strength is not bad when climbing mountains and ridges, and they are not easy to stumble when walking at night.Trotting in Pingchuan, the drill steps are well-proportioned and stable, and they seem full of energy.But at that time, I really had other ideas. I just hoped to discover a little "secret" from those horsebacks with different equipment.Because I have a little general knowledge of arts and crafts, there are many unresolved issues in the history of lacquerware processing.Reading the notes of people in the Tang and Song Dynasties, it is mostly believed that the practice of "rhinoceros lacquer" came from the southwest, and it was made by lacquering saddles and rubbing for a long time. "Polo lacquer" is a kind of rhinoceros skin. According to Fan Chuo's "Man Shu", "Polo" is an alias for tigers. From this we can know that the name of "Polo lacquer" is in the south.However, lack of physical evidence, it is still difficult to admit or deny.Because I have lived in the countryside by the Dianchi Lake in Kunming for a long time, and I usually catch the train into the city, I once found various colorful and overlapping piebald spots on the saddle bridge of my horse, which proves that the records in "Yinhualu" and other records are not without reason.The so-called secret is to take the opportunity to explore more carefully on the horses with different equipment from the four towns.It turns out that there are not only rhinoceros skin lacquer cloud spots, but also five-color miscellaneous ox hair patterns, which is the practice of "Qiwen brushing silk lacquer" in the Song Dynasty.As for the iron and silver stirrups of the Song and Ming Dynasties, the old Beijing Grinding Factory specialized in small workshops for carts and horses. There was a craft of chiseling gold and silver for carts and boats.This method is mostly used in Mongolian villages to make small iron cabinets, no bigger than a pair of fists. First, they are chopped into file patterns, then suppressed with silver wires, and then tempered and calendered. , and can be seen everywhere.Copper lacquer was originally produced in Yunnan, and it also has a traditional craftsmanship. The production of harnesses follows an older system, which is very common and natural.But these small discoveries are of great significance to me, because I understand the method of "history from physical evidence", and then apply it to the study of the history of material culture and the development history of craft patterns, and I can get many new discoveries.At that time, I was very satisfied when I squeezed around in the crowd of people and horses. It really conformed to the ancient saying, "A horse is better than a male and a female."But after a while, newer discoveries lured me over, thinking that studying old problems from horseback would be close to foolishness, and it would be far less interesting to listen to the hymns of life from living people.

It turns out that there are many wonderful activities in the Horse Racing Festival. On the other side of the slope, in a relatively secluded area full of small ponytail pine forests and bushes, there are clusters of young men and women singing in antiphonal songs everywhere, which can also be called "emotional horse racing". , the degree of enthusiasm is no less than a horseback somersault.Yunnan is originally a hometown of poetry, and the singing and dancing of Lunan and Yixi have long been famous throughout the country.This time it enriched my knowledge even more. This is a place with different faces, and people with different tunes come from all directions, squatting in the recesses of pine forests and bushes, although they are not far away from each other, they don't meet each other.Most of the songs are love songs for remuneration, but there are various ways, or seeing the scene to make people feel, that is, things rise, using various rich metaphors to compete wit and talent.Or use the method of asking questions and wait for the other party to answer.Or mock each other and praise each other, rhyme with everything, and the cycle is endless.Other stories are also sung, running through ancient and modern times, citing scriptures and allusions, and the parties concerned follow a book as usual, and they come out casually.There are many experts present, and they can see the high and low when they open their mouths, and they can't be vague.So I am not a master, and I dare not speak up easily.That time when I heard a young woman defeat three opponents in a row, forcing the opponent to be speechless, she yelled softly, indicating that the victory was over, stood up from the thorn bushes, cut her hair, and patted her embroidery The ashes on the apron smiled at everyone, as if to say, "Look, I won the song", looking relaxed and happy, and dragging his female companion, walked past the burden of rice wine to quench his thirst.

There are many young women of this kind in the villages near Kunming.He has a bright and lively personality, hard working hands and feet, a black face with red dates and white glutinous rice teeth. He wears wool blue cloth clothes and pants, a green cloth apron full of small silver buttons nailed around his waist, and a pair of Yunnan The embroidered perforated shoes unique to the countryside, and the glossy braided hair on the head.Not only is he very good at singing, but he and his companions went to play on swings in various villages on the first day of the Lunar New Year. They made three-foot-long swings out of horse hide and hung them on tall trees. As if nothing had happened!

In the countryside of Kunming, you can hear all kinds of beautiful and affectionate singing in the morning and evening all year round.From Chenggong to catch a train into the city, Xiang Li rode an old horse and walked slowly for ten miles.Sometimes the original rider has to be returned if it is too late.This road has to pass through some fruit forests, oak forests, bamboo forests and several small hillsides that are full of flowers for half a year.Immediately admiring the pink-blue primroses on the edge of the ridge, nodding in the light and breeze, it always makes people suspect that the blue color seems to be intentionally imitating the sky.On the one hand, I listened to all kinds of mountain birds calling for friends and couples, and all kinds of local sweet folk songs sung by girls driving horses around me.Sometimes, beside the road three or five steps ahead, a fluffy hoopoe suddenly appeared, with a corolla crown on its head and bright eyes staring, as if it had become interested in singing. I asked for my opinion, and after a drink from a horse-driving girl, , before flapping its wings and flying away.This kind of bird is usually very silent during the day, but every morning in the twilight, it happily sits on the ridge of other people's houses, calling "Guo Gong Guo Gong" repeatedly.The most interesting thing is the skylark, which often takes off from the grass not far in front of it, soars and circles up, singing continuously, and goes into the blue sky.As if to drill through the blue sky all the time.The group of larks crouching in the grass responded to each other with a little encouragement.After being blinded by poor eyesight, it suddenly fell into the grass at a very fast speed like a small meteor, and joined other companions, so the other larks took off again.The girls who drive horses are only fourteen or fifteen years old, and their voices are usually untrained, and some are hoarse and sandy, but in this kind of environment, they speak naturally, and no matter what they sing, they are full of simplicity and beauty.

Everyone sang the most lively one called "Jin Man Dou Hui". Once it was held by the villagers. At that time, more than a hundred men, women, old and children from the village gathered on the second floor of the living yard and under the corridor of the long house. Sitting around a table, there are more than 30 low square tables, and each table takes turns singing "December Flowers" and other local songs in a low voice.Although the voice is extremely soft, it is like a piece of pine waves, unwinding and relaxing in the breeze, a bit like dragons singing and phoenixes whistling.The singing alone is extremely interesting.Singing and singing continued, and it lasted for three days before the show ended.Most of the women who came to the meeting were like New Year's and festivals. They were neatly tidied up, and their heads and hands were full of silver glitter, which made people dare not recognize them.As a guest, I looked around the tables, and many people looked like Mian Shan, but I couldn't name them.Then I remembered that this one was selling sour pickled pears at a small stall at the entrance of the village, that one was carrying water and washing clothes by the city gate, there were also craftsmen who forged iron hoops, stewards of small grocery stores, country doctors and capon makers, and more. Most of them are girls driving horses, farmers of different ages, and old women who are wandering around the countryside and selling needlework at fairs. It turns out that there are quite a lot of acquaintances!On the surface, the meeting said to prevent epidemics and disasters, but its main function was to spread songs.The old generation passes on all the things full of wisdom and enthusiasm in memory to the next generation.Sing it repeatedly until everyone is familiar with it.Therefore, the young people present were very excited and active, and often took turns walking around each table.Since the main function is to pass the song according to the rules, there is no taboo to sing without asking.Among them, the most outstanding one is a drummer. He is over seventy years old and has lost all his teeth, but he can sing the whole set with great enthusiasm.Apart from love stories, he is also good at mocking smokers and scolding rich men. He is really like a "song bank" (this kind of person is called a song master in our hometown).When I was a child, I often heard the old lady saying "It's rare to meet a golden man in ten years", which means that the grand event is rare, and I didn't know it until I participated.

It's the same singing, but there is also a lyrical atmosphere, and the background is also very clear and beautiful, that is, the kind of meeting songs held at the foot of the Happy Horse Festival during the Horse Racing Festival. Southwest was originally the hometown of poetry, and what I heard was only a small part of it.After the founding of the People's Republic of China, people's lives are getting better and better, and their mood must be extraordinarily joyful. The new generation of singers must be more lively and enthusiastic than they were 30 to 50 years ago.