The meaning of travel is to put aside the familiar bustle and worldly fetters, and see unfamiliar lifestyles and diverse lives. We come from all over the world, and we are all different. Listen carefully to another voice, which comes from the soul. The cry from the depths brings a spiritual cleansing.
Attitudes, beliefs, and life may not be understood, but respect is the best form of communication.
The Mosuo have only language but no writing, and a population of only 50,000. They cannot be defined by ethnicity. They are the only matrilineal ethnic group in China. They have spoken words, a world of women, a world of men, and the daughter of the East.
With Lugu Lake as the center, surrounded by mountains, the nation has been isolated from the world for thousands of years, mysterious customs and folk customs, and various rumors are covered with unpredictable veils, which makes people marvel, guess and fascinate. .
Silver is cheap, silver easily tarnishes, and silver easily turns black.
Gold and silver jewelry, only ethnic minorities love silverware.
The silver in Lugu Lake is mature silver, known as snowflake silver. Every time I think about it, I always think of a poem that has nothing to do with wind, horse and cow: Three years to clean up the government, and one hundred thousand snowflakes and silver.
Silverware plays an indispensable and important role in the life of the Mosuo people.
Mosuo women all wear a silver belt. Stick to your skin and hide under your clothes. The belt is three fingers wide, just the width of the coccyx. Under three fingers, on the front, is my sister’s uterus, and on the back, my brother’s waist and kidneys. Wear it day and night, while stabilizing your waist bones, it is most important to protect the reproduction of future generations. corner.
The waist buckle will tightly fit the belly button of the pregnant mother for six months. Along the umbilical cord, it will absorb the toxins around the baby little by little, so that it can feel the toxins before it comes into this world. The protection and love of parents.
Take three cooked egg whites, mix them with silverware, wrap them in cloth, and rub them several times along the baby's skin from head to toe without falling off. If the egg silverware turns black, take three more egg whites and repeat one after another, trying three times in a row.
Babies carry poison in their bodies and can easily develop jaundice. But when Mosuo babies were born, their grandmother used this method to eliminate the poison that lurked jaundice.
At this time, the weak sister who has just given birth will be helped back to the room by her grandma. The grandma will collect the silver powder at home, mix it with hot water, and scrub her body. Only in this way can the wound be healed. Heals quickly and is less prone to infection. After giving birth, there is still black blood in the body, which is not conducive to recovery. The grandma will use a silver belt to tighten the top and bottom of the sister's uterus to expel the black blood and use silver jewelry to absorb excess toxins.
Generally speaking, after giving birth, a woman must sit for at least a month without being exposed to wind or fatigue. However, Mosuo women can go to the fields to work and jump around after five days.
Mosuo men do not marry and women do not marry, but they still believe in romance. Both Mosuo men and women have a token of love, a toothed comb, which is said to be white and inseparable. Sister A said that only the night of walking wedding belongs to each other. Just combing your hair quietly is an extremely romantic thing. Quietly, like a lifetime, one comb to the end, two combs of white hair to the eyebrows. Lifting the case and raising eyebrows, looking at the mirror with yellow decals, all carry a kind of aesthetic feeling.
My brother is proficient in handicrafts. From the day of the walking wedding, the clothes on my sister's body are all the warmth of my brother's hands. Clothes, earrings, bracelets, and belts were all made for my sister bit by bit by my brother. This man knew my sister’s shoulder width, waist circumference, and finger length. He carved his love and longing through the cold material. Turn them into craftsmanship and turn them into unique treasures one by one, letting them replace him and accompany my sister for a long time.
Mosuo people don’t remember their birthdays, nor their deaths. They only have the most traditional festival in their lives - Chengding Ceremony.
Cheng Ding, the entry explains that a man reaches adulthood. The Mosuo people have always maintained this ancient and traditional ceremony, which is grand and precious. After the age of thirteen, girls will learn farming from their mothers and aunts, while boys will learn hunting, manufacturing, and handicraft skills from their uncles. After a few years, when the boy and the girl grow up and have their own talents, they can get married if they like each other in a field or alley.
From the beginning of the nomadic people to the final settlement in Lugu Lake, the Mosuo have been isolated from the rest of the world. Even now, they have always been very poor. Most of the time, they only eat potatoes, corn, rice and pork fat. Rarely seen at the dinner table.
But on the day of Chengding Ceremony, no matter how poor the family is, the grandmother will get up early and spread rice grains and pork fat all the way from the threshold to the place where the incense is placed.
It is a short journey, but it is as deep and meaningful as the ten-mile wedding in ancient times. We do not seek wealth and wealth, but only want to be young, well fed, clothed, safe and happy.
The Mosuo ancestors once went to Tibetan areas as nomads. For a long time, they lived a life of slaves, but they also incorporated some Tibetan blood. Later, they were driven away because of their impure blood. The Mosuo ancestors finally came to Lugu Lake and began to settle in Chengju. A horse team was formed to go out to purchase daily necessities, but they were captured by the Miao people in the high mountains. Finally, Sister Mosuo's clothes and top have Tibetan culture, and the pleated skirt on the lower body also has Miao characteristics.
On the Chengding ceremony, my sister will receive gifts from the two most important people.
One is a mother, who was pregnant for ten months and endured many hardships. My grandma gave my sister a pleated skirt, which she sewed with her own hands. It has 365 pleats. The pleats are all filled with love and hope. The 365 days will be perfect and peaceful. The dress remembers the migration path of the ancestors and commemorates the culture and history of the ethnic group.
One is my uncle, my mother’s uncle, and my sister was raised by her uncle since she was a child. My uncle will give my sister her first belt with a silver buckle, all for protection. If it were an elder brother, his uncle would give him a sword and dagger, and from then on, he would learn to stand alone.
Mosuo admires the goddess of the earth. Only women who also give birth to life are worthy of sowing and cultivating the mother of the earth. Therefore, Mosuo formed a unique matrilineal society, where women are respected, work in agriculture, and are in charge of the family. Mosuo people never separate families, and elect a grandmother among all the elders to take charge of the family's money and affairs.
The bed in Grandma’s house was high and narrow. It is about meters high, with a cabinet door underneath it, which is filled with the family's gold and silver treasures and all the family property. As narrow as one person can lie flat on his back, Mosuo's walking marriage lasts a lifetime, but when the grandmother moved from the flower house to the grandmother's house, she could only devote all her time and energy to the family and nothing else.
The grandmother who is in charge of the family's livelihood may be old, but her children and grandchildren use such a right to tell the elderly that you are also the center of the family. If your children and grandchildren make money, you will naturally enjoy the blessings.
My sister said that every morning, before everyone goes out, they go to the grandmother's house to say hello to her and briefly explain her itinerary. Every night, after dinner, everyone would gather around Grandma's bed, chatting and talking until Grandma was tired and then dispersed.
In Mosuo culture, family ties are the most important. The reason why men do not marry women is to dedicate all their time to the family and stay with their closest relatives for a lifetime. Time has proven that companionship is the longest confession of love.
The Mosuo people believe in Tibetan Buddhism, do not commemorate the dead, and believe in cause and effect and reincarnation. The most important thing is the living person. During his lifetime, his children have done everything they can and can give. Respect the old and love the young. In the Mosuo family, children are used to care for, and the elderly are used to care. Delicious, useful, and fun things are given to the elderly first.
During his lifetime, the old man had enjoyed everything he should enjoy, including spiritual, material and family happiness, so when he left one day, he would have nothing to worry about. For those who are alive, there is no regret or regret.
In the mother house, there is a small room, about ten square meters in size. There is a row of pits along the wall. The door is always closed, and there is a black cloth hanging in front of the door to cover it. It is called the door of life and death in Mosuo.
From birth to death, everyone enters this door.
Health.
When Mosuo women give birth, they enter the gate of life and death. The pregnant woman would squat in a horse stance, with her grandmother holding her waist from behind and her grandmother lifting her arms in front. The three of them built a stable triangle in this most primitive way. For pregnant women, this posture saves the most effort and does not waste much. All the energy is concentrated on the uterus, and the birth will naturally go smoothly.
Life is not that simple.
The Mosuo people use the gate of life and death to practice the survival of the fittest.
When the baby is born, the grandmother uses scissors to cut the umbilical cord connected to the mother, and then carefully checks whether the baby is bruised or swollen. They use their experience and oral methods to determine whether the baby has congenital diseases. Disease, if there is any, the pit on the side is where they end up. And this is just the first step of screening.
Babies who pass the grandmother's examination and are healthy will undergo the second screening.
They will stay alone in the Gate of Life and Death for a day and a night, without food or drink.
A newborn baby is extremely fragile, but it has to go through such a lonely and desperate day and night, without hugs, comfort, or milk. In ignorance, it has to overcome the biggest second pain in life alone. A hurdle.
The first one was born smoothly. At that time, he and his mother were one.
The second one is a day and night in the gate of life and death. At this time, you are fragile and tenacious.
The next day, the grandmother will enter the gate of life and death and take out the surviving baby. Only when he is held in her arms, walks out of the gate of life and death, and is illuminated by the sun, does he truly become a member of the family and become a member of the family. The Mosuo people.
It looks very cruel.
But this is a custom that has been carried out by the Mosuo people for thousands of years. Lugu Lake is isolated from the rest of the world, and every Mosuo family is very poor, even down and out. The hard work of a large family cannot support a sick body, and a body that cannot be strong and healthy will suffer not only for the family, but also for oneself. It is impossible to say whether this is right or wrong. I can only say that the Mosuo people use their own rules of survival to prevent bad consequences from the beginning and maintain the continuation of the family. In another sense, he knew about survival of the fittest and natural selection even earlier than Darwin. Looking around now, all Mosuo people are healthy and strong.
The Mosuo people believe in Buddhism and the reincarnation of cause and effect. No Mosuo people will have abortions. Every life comes with expectations. No matter why it comes or whether it can be tolerated, every life Every life is worth living in this world. But from the moment you open your eyes and see the world for the first time, you need to take on your own destiny, whether life or death, struggling alone in the door of life and death. Therefore, when you grow up, no matter you live a glorious and prosperous life, or you live a mediocre life. , are all heroes, fighting against fate at a young age. ?
Die.
Death is like a lamp going out, cause and effect need to cycle.
After a Mosuo person dies, his family will take off his clothes, remove his hands and feet, and curl up into a ball, just like a mother's womb, with a baby-like posture, which means how to come and how to go to complete the cycle.
(There should be a section about the disposal of corpses here, but I really don’t remember it.)
People who believe in Tibetan Buddhism believe that sky burial is the most sacred burial. However, Lugu Lake is not considered a plateau, and there are no vultures. The five elements of burial are gold, wood, water, fire, and earth, and the Mosuo people chose cremation.
All those who leave will be placed in the Gate of Life and Death for seven or forty-nine days before being cremated.
Find a piece of land, burn it with fire, and don’t pick up the ashes. Let them drift in the wind and fall into the soil and dust until they dissipate, truly disappear, and can never be found in the world again. trace.
There are no portraits, no tombstones, and no memorials for the dead. All the enjoyments during life have been realized, and the meaning of visiting this world has been completed. The living people will not cry, because there is no need to cry. What we have to do is to cherish and treat the people who are still around us, which is the greatest meaning.
The most mysterious and fascinating thing about Mosuo is walking marriage.
If a man does not marry a woman, the Mosuo people will never marry. The love between a man and a woman, when they look at each other rightly, clasp each other's palms three times, meet in the flower room at night, and have a night of spring supper, it is like a one-night stand, no marriage, no responsibility.
Outside the world, people who are accustomed to seeing feasting, bustling and bustling, hearing all kinds of things, are all curious and envious. Isn’t it true that there are many wives and multiple husbands, regardless of whether they are men or women, they can change every night.
Three people become tigers. There are too many rumors, and the flavor naturally changes. One is passed down to ten, but according to the personal thoughts of the narrator, he secretly adds fuel and jealousy and exaggerates it.
After the marriage ceremony, men and women learn their own skills. After two or three years, they can get married. One day in the fields or alleys, or at a night party singing and dancing, if the elder brother sees the girl he likes, and the time is right, he will boldly step forward and, without saying much, gently press the itch in the palm of her hand, once, once, once, No more, no less, exactly three times, and then wait quietly. If the younger sister doesn't like it, she won't throw away her hands and walk away, leaving her brother alone in the awkward situation. She will just look back quietly and make no move. At this time, the elder brother will understand and won't bother, just turn around and leave. If by chance, my sister likes my brother, she will give him three kicks to show my feelings.
At night, after A-mei’s family went back to their rooms to sleep, the elder brother came to A-mei’s flower house with three things in his arms and climbed over the wall.
The three things my brother carried were a piece of pig fat, a dagger, and a felt hat.
Pork fat is the key.
The family all keeps dogs. If they see strangers coming and going in the dark night, they will bark loudly, which will inevitably wake up the family. So my brother bribed my sister's dog with some pig fat meat to prevent it from being born, which would disturb the family's dreams and ruin the owner's life. Good thing.
The dagger is used to climb over walls. It's time to show off my brother's skills. He can climb the rock garden and climb the tall buildings to embrace beautiful things. Sister said that there are stairs in the greenhouse, but brother must climb over the wall. If he can't even climb up the greenhouse, how can he expect other skills even if he is inaction?
The felt hat is a clear indication. If someone comes back in the middle of the night and sees the felt hat outside the flower room window, he will know that the flower belongs to the owner tonight, and something good has happened, so he will not come forward abruptly to disturb them, saving each of them embarrassment and unhappiness.
Early the next morning, Brother will leave early and rush back to his home before Amei’s family gets up. As long as the friendship with my sister is there, if there is nothing important, I will definitely go there every night, walking back and forth between the two families, hence the name, walking marriage. Although there is no name, they are no different from actual couples.
If one day, my sister discovers that my brother has poor conduct or has lost his emotions and does not want to have any contact with him anymore, she will prepare an egg in advance and hide it quietly. When my brother wakes up early in the morning, she will When you put on your shoes and find an egg lying quietly in the shoes, you will understand your sister's feelings and leave in despair, which is the so-called "get out".
The elder brother and sister who are walking away from each other will not have much contact during the day, will not go to each other's homes, and will not be involved financially. As an uncle, the elder brother is raising the children of his own family, and the elder sister is not involved in the financial affairs. As a woman, bear the responsibilities of your own family.
If my sister gives birth to a child, she will take the child to recognize her parents, just to let her brother know that she has a child and let the child know who the father is, so that her brother does not have to bear the responsibility of raising his own child. Responsibilities and burdens, children, raised by Uncle Liberty. ?
The walking marriage of the Mosuo people has the solemnity of the Mosuo people. There are many people, and if you meet the right person, it will be a lifetime. Walking marriage, for a family like Mosuo who never separate, is more about companionship, a lifetime of companionship to relatives, and a lifetime of companionship to thank the mother for the ten-month pregnancy and to thank the relatives for raising her to adulthood.
The Han people have to divide their families, brothers and sisters are separated, the elderly are raised separately, and no one even fulfills their filial piety. Gu Yun once said that a married woman throws away water, but in fact, regardless of men or women, after marriage, they all become small families. The focus and energy are more on the husband, wife, and children, while the parents ? It's just a very small amount of care. Years of raising her are just to send her to another family. The hard work of most of her life is too late to be repaid, so her time is running out.
There are three hundred and sixty-five days in a year, excluding work, socializing, and the family, how many days are left for the parents who have worked hard for many years? However, in just a few decades of life, how many days are left to accompany you?
When you grew up and were on your own, did you see the vicissitudes of life on your parents’ foreheads, did you see the white hair hidden in black silk stockings, did you feel that your back had become bent and your hands and feet had slowed down? But after sighing, I still walked farther and farther without hesitation, and it was difficult to look back. But one day, after experiencing it, I realized that the tree wanted to be quiet but the wind continued. It was full of helplessness, but there was no regret.
The Mosuo people use walking marriage to perfectly interpret the profound meaning of companionship. Whether it is silverware, walking marriage, or various customs and cultures, they are the crystallization of the wisdom of generations of Mosuo people. , showing its unique charm.
We may not be able to understand all these things, just like they can’t understand our birthdays and memorials, but it is precisely because of the differences that life is wonderful. There is no need to force understanding, as long as we always respect it. .
On the graduation trip, the four of us struggled for a long time, so we decided to join a four-day tour. Lugu Lake in Liangshan is not very close, but it is the farthest you can travel.
It took a whole day of driving from Chengdu to reach Lugu Lake. During this period, I climbed a small mountain with an altitude of more than 3,000, and I suffered from some mild altitude sickness. There are eighteen bends on the mountain road along the way, constantly weaving through the bends and passing through numerous mountain obstacles.
Unlucky, I was caught up by the rain. The tour guide said that he had taken many groups to Lugu Lake, but it rained wherever we went. In the past, the group had just visited the next scenic spot, and the rain caught up with the previous scenic spot, so both sides were correct.
On the Walking Wedding Bridge and by the Lugu Lake, we were all driven away by the rain. It didn’t rain one moment or the next. Only at this moment, the raindrops came as they came.
The tour guide warned us that when we go to walk on the wedding bridge, we must not come to the end. No matter whether love, friendship or family, we should not come to the end. Leaving a little room for it is the best state. If you walk on the Marriage Bridge from the beginning, I wonder if it is just like the joke says, lovers who agree to walk on the Lover's Bridge together end up breaking up.
Attended a Mosuo people’s party in the evening. There are very few programs, but they are all carefully prepared by Mosuo people and presented to tourists with all their strength. They used dance to silently tell the story of wedding ceremony and walking marriage. Although they couldn't quite understand it, they felt a sense of respect and piety in their half-guessing. The last program of the party was a group dance around the bonfire. While dancing, I let go of my restraint and immersed myself in the carnival atmosphere. Looking at the smiles of others, I was filled with a more comfortable smile.
On the second day in Lugu Lake, a special lady took us to their home as guests, and went to the grandmother's house to tell us about their culture and customs. This is how we got the material for this article. They still belong to the cooperative model. Each family does collective work and earns cents. Being chosen to be the sister who tells the story of Mosuo culture is a responsibility and an honor.
The once isolated ethnic group became known to the world through tourism. Their culture that has been passed down for thousands of years collides with the impetuous world outside. I don't know whether this is good or bad for them. It is true that the quality of life has been improved, but will their walking marriage, their door of life and death, and their customs be subtly changed?
When a group is closed, it may be a paradise and a law of freedom, but when the gap is opened, new things and various ideas pour in, will it be like Pandora's box, causing unpredictable consequences? .
It’s not that I think Mosuo culture is too fragile, but that society is too strong and too much traditional culture has been crushed by the grinding wheel of time. Between the remaining lines, there is a vague glimpse of the glory of the past, but only regrets remain.