I am the first foreign writer to experience life and interview in Luozhai twice. The first interview with Luo people was completely accidental.
199910 June 2 1 day, after the international Dongba culture seminar in Lijiang, Yunnan, the participants and I came down from Yulong Snow Mountain and prepared to transfer from Lijiang to Kunming. After arriving in Kunming, I plan to go to Qiubei County, Wenshan Zhuang and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, and take the night bus of Wenshan Prefecture in order to complete the data collection and photo shooting of "China Miao Folk Custom and Rice Culture" which I have painstakingly studied for many years. Talking to tourists about Wenshan Miao people, tourists have told me that Malipo County is a county where Wenshan urban and rural areas wear national costumes. So, I immediately revised my plan, bumped over 450 kilometers on the mountain road, came to Wenshan Prefecture, and drove over 80 kilometers to Malipo County without stopping. After learning about my visit, the relevant departments in the county enthusiastically told me that the most distinctive feature of the Miao nationality is Xinzhai Township, which is more than 20 miles away from the county seat/kloc-0, and there is also a branch of the Yi nationality called Luoluo people. Although the road is a little far, and I have trudged more than 1000 kilometers in three days, I immediately said that I would go down to Xinzhai Township to inspect the scenery. The result of the interview excited me for months. Half a year later, I took advantage of the international academic conference on "Chinese and Japanese Folklore and Rice Culture" held in Kunming, and rushed to Luozhai, thousands of miles away, to collect folk songs again.
Luozhai village appears under lush green trees, with an ancient forest behind it. Three or two people can't hold each old tree. It's true: old trees build farmhouses, and the days are shallower and the months are deeper and more lush. Women and children dressed in primitive ethnic costumes play in groups in front of the house. This harmony between man and nature is like a fairy tale.
Luo Ren is a branch of Yi nationality, but its national customs and language are different from other branches of this nationality, and it still inherits many primitive living customs and rice culture. Luo Ren is their own external name, distributed in Malipo, Guangnan, Xichou and other counties in southeast Yunnan. There are Bailuo and Hualuo in Malipo County (some scholars think Hualuo is a black Luo recently). Bailuojia lives in Xinzhai Township and Chengzhai Village in xinzhai village, with 306 households and 1 682 people. Huaduo lives in Mabeng, Li Yong and Zhewa villages in Donggan town, with 85 households and 465,438+00 people. Up to now, Luozhai people do not intermarry with foreigners, but only among Luozhai people. China is one of the few ethnic minorities whose languages and living habits are primitive, complete and peculiar.
Regarding the historical origin of the Luo people, Hunan Tongzhi (Volume 81) and Wu Beizhi Miao Fangyi, reprinted in the 11th year of Guangxu in Qing Dynasty (1885), recorded that "Miao people are divided into Luo, Yao, Tong, Lao, Ling and Liao, and those who live near Guangxi are it". Yao nationality, living in Lingling and Huguang, (History of Local Records of Ethnic Minorities in Hunan Province, page 5, Yuelu Bookstore, September edition, 199 1). In the appendix of "Historical Materials of Ethnic Minorities in Southeast Sichuan", the frontier and development of Sichuan also includes "IV. Population and race: in terms of Han nationality, there are local nationalities and development. Tibetan languages include Tangguta, Xifan, Yiddish, Qiang, Luoyifang and Miao. Luo Yi People Divide Black and White (Sichuan Nationalities Publishing House, 1995). On the outskirts of Malipo County, Lu, director of the county cultural center, took us to visit a Neolithic site called "Dawangyan Rock Painting". I once stood in front of rock paintings and marveled at the wisdom of ancient Malipo ancestors. There are people, cows and other animals in the rock paintings. Now that I think about it, the history of Luoluo people can't be said to have nothing to do with Dawang rock paintings, can it? 1999165438+10, when I visited Nanning Museum, I found the ancient poem The Book of Songs recorded in hieroglyphics was treasured in the museum. Can a ethnic village person with his own hieroglyphics say that his history is not long?
The best in the world: a house split by an axe
In Luozhai, it is a two-story wooden building with a dry fence, one floor and one bottom, and the second floor is open. The stairs are located in front of the house, and on both sides of the stairs are simple wooden strips or flower fence corridors. The building is divided into several rooms by partition walls, with the whole family living upstairs and livestock and sundries closed downstairs. Bailuo usually doesn't make the bed, but just lays cowhide and straw mats on both sides of the fireplace and lies down. He lays it at night and harvests it early. Now, some young people use wooden squares to build a bedstead about two feet above the ground to make their beds.
The architectural peculiarity of Luo people's houses lies in that besides the "windows" that we just saw as ventilation holes without windows, there are 56 or 66 seemingly simple but beautifully artistic pillars. It is amazing that in Luozhai, no matter how big the building area is, the men in Bailuo actually use an axe to split the whole building materials and make beautifully-made flower gallery walkways without using woodworking tools such as saws, chisels, hoes and trowels. The appearance of each building is different because there are extra cornices on the east and west sides.
Ancient tribes have ancient legends. I learned in the interview that this is because it is said that the ancestors of Hugh people are not mortals, but fairy birds flying from Tianshan Mountain. In order to commemorate the ancestors, later generations built a cornice on the east and west sides of the house when building a house, which proved the wings of the ancestors.
People living in the same place have different architectural styles. People who live in remote places, some people still live in the original "pillar-free herringbone hut", such as Yi Luo Zhi in Mu Na Ji Village, Zhetai Township, Guangnan County. Most of these houses are thatched with half walls and are low and damp.
Primitive National Sacrifice and Buckwheat Festival
The original remains of Luozhai people's life still lie in their unique ethnic and religious sacrificial ceremonies.
Luozhai people worship the sun, believe in polytheism and animism. They think that disasters are caused by ghosts and gods, and wizards should be invited to exorcise ghosts and spirits. Therefore, there is a god room at home and an ancestral temple in the village. On holidays, you should worship your ancestors first.
Although the sacred room of Luo Zhai is very simple, it is a simple shelf, but it is very grand and ostentatious when offering sacrifices, especially during festivals and customs. The sacrificial ceremony was presided over by Zhai Lao. The proverb says: Ga-ah. Zhai Lao is not a concrete figure, but an old man over 60 years old, male. (According to the interview, the average age of males in Luozhai is about 65 years old, and the average age of females is about 70 years old. The oldest old man I saw in Xinzhai was a woman of 9 1 year. The old man in the house presided over feng shui, sending bodhisattvas and offering sacrifices.
The second interview with Luo Zhai was with Dr. Ethan from the Institute of Minority Literature of China Academy of Social Sciences. The Armed Minister of Xinzhai Township is also a Romanian cadre trained by the Party and the government. When he and Lu Xiangguang, the village director, accompanied us into the village, they pointed to the small pile of stones under the towering beech tree in front of the village and said to us, "We worship the sacred tree most, also called the dragon tree. Those stones under the tree are our way of worshipping the dragon tree and ancestors. " For many years, I have been studying the folk customs and rice culture of rice-growing ethnic groups, and I have also studied the tree circle worship of various ethnic groups in the south. Understanding ceremony is a key point of folk sacrifice of ethnic minorities. But the sacrifices of many nationalities are similar. Generally, during festivals, sacrificial food will be sent to trees to burn incense and worship. But like the Luo people, they only pile stones to worship under the tree and worship their ancestors under the tree. They believe that the soul of ancestors is attached to the sacred tree and worships the top of the sacred tree. The way of offering sacrifices is for each family to pile a few stones under the ancient trees of their choice. This is the first time I've seen it.
The sacrifices of the Luo people are very grand. In the sacred room, first, two big cakes are baked in a cauldron, and then put into a fire sieve for offering sacrifices to the square on the table. Then, put a bowl of rice and a bowl of meat dishes, pour three cups of wine, put away three pairs of chopsticks and prepare for sacrifice. Outside, several adult men are blowing beef soup and conch. After offering sacrifices in God's room, people came to the Woods with gongs and drums. Women have used long boards as tables on the ground, filled bowls with rice and vegetables, and put wine on them for men to drink. At the same time, a woman put on a mask of ghosts and gods to participate in the sacrifice. At this time, sacrificial activities have turned to entertainment activities. Sacrifice is the climax of the festival.
The most lively festival of Luoluo people is "Qiao Cai Festival". Qiao Cai Festival is also called "Qiao Nian Festival" locally. That is, the first dragon day in April of the lunar calendar every year is Buckwheat Festival. The buckwheat festival of Luoren people is regarded as the New Year in China, and it is a grand national festival to sacrifice ancestors and entertain gods and people.
Sacrificing ancestors is called "beautiful drop" in Romanian, which means sacrificing ancestors of men and women. Ancestor worship and buckwheat festival originated from an ancient folk story. Legend has it that there was a fire in the stockade where the ancestors of the Luo people lived. The whole stockade was burned to ashes, and all the houses, furniture, farm tools and grain were spared. The grief-stricken people are at a loss. A man found an upside-down bowl on a garbage foundation. When he opened it, it was covered with some buckwheat seeds. People were surprised to plant buckwheat seeds in the field, and the wind grew stronger after buckwheat emerged. It matured in April and May, which helped Luozhai people survive the famine. Therefore, in order to thank Joe, the first dragon day in April was designated as Qiao Cai Festival. This holiday custom has been handed down in this way. Every day on this day, people in later generations will organize people to call Joe's soul home in the vegetable field and send it upstairs so that Joe can spend the holidays with his ancestors.
Women and children in Luozhai, who are usually clever, can enjoy the joy of the festival with men on Buckwheat Festival. All the men, women and children in Luozhai will put on their own hand-sewn beautiful and colorful national costumes, lean out of their homes and spend the New Year in the ancient forest. The man waved a strong hand and sounded a huge bronze drum; Girls are standing on cheerful drums, waving their hands, twisting their waists and dancing gracefully; Children chirp and jump in the crowd like swallows; Old people are busy talking about their families and sacrifices. The joy of the festival lasted all night, day and night. Obviously different from other places, people in Luozhai are happy in the world, and people, gods and ghosts are happy at every festival. The masks worn by its ghosts are not only strange in shape, but also brightly colored like African zebras, and most of them are dressed by women. The reason is worth studying. Judging from this primitive national sacrifice ceremony, Luozhai people are a very old tribe.
Women in Luozhai: Internal Aesthetics
Being in Luozhai twice always gives me a strong feeling, that is, the beautiful and harmonious hand-woven dresses of women and children in Luozhai. Into the Luo Zhai, there is no Chinese New Year, and there are no festivals. The women and children we met in Luozhai were all dressed in embroidered clothes with strong ethnic customs, and their lower parts were all beautiful skirts. Moreover, seeing someone makes you feel very comfortable and beautiful. After careful observation, it is found that the lace color of their dresses is so harmonious and has a strong aesthetic feeling. To my amazement, women over middle age are rarely literate and can't even speak a few words of Chinese, but when it comes to the charm of beauty, I think a college student in the Academy of Fine Arts may not have their knowledge and theory.
The women in Luozhai are very hardworking. During the day, they have to work in the fields and go up the mountain to cut wood. They carried firewood home with their heads instead of their shoulders. If it weren't for the festival, they would have run barefoot all over the mountain to meet the guests. At home at night, except for a woman who cooks, other women and girls will naturally pick up a needle and thread, carry a brazier with a small fire burning charcoal, come to a "balcony" or front of a house made of several bamboo poles, unfold a self-woven white cloth, and burn melted wax on the fire with a needle, so that flowers can be placed straight on the cloth without drawing or referring to a template. Under the setting sun, a beautiful ancient village is formed, which makes people intoxicated.
Luozhai is a beautiful tribe. Whether a family is well dressed or not is the standard to measure whether the women in this family are smart or not. As a result, the girls in Luozhai began to learn embroidery and needlework with the mothers of five or six families.
A clever woman in Luozhai can embroider anything she sees on the handkerchief on her head. The embroidery on the flower girl's clothes reminds me of the rock paintings on the Neolithic king's rock paintings. Under the example of my mother and grandmother, I grew up to be a skillful craftsman from generation to generation. The girl I saw, Bai Luo, drew wax thorns on the things she knitted at home, which were so delicate with stitches and threads. More interestingly, women in every village are most nervous at the "Qiao Cai Festival" held in the Year of the Loong on the first day of the fourth lunar month every year. Because Qiao Cai Festival is equivalent to the city clothing exhibition festival, the model is herself, every member of the family, and the judges are from all over the world and neighbors. In this grand and grand national festival, even the old ladies will have fun. They will wear their own elaborately embroidered brocade clothes and show their "unique skills", which will make young people full of praise.
Girls in festivals are more nervous. On this day, they will put on their best embroidered dresses, show their intelligence through them, and "attract the phoenix and attract the butterfly" like blooming flowers.
There is another phenomenon worthy of academic study in Luo Zhai's innate aesthetics, that is, Luo Zhai produces beautiful women. Because Romanians don't intermarry with foreigners, the scope of mate selection is very narrow. However, I haven't seen many idiots in Luozhai. And the reason why I feel beautiful is because I have seen not only Luo Zhai men with fine eyes, but also Luo Zhai women who are not pleasing to the eye, not beautiful.
The primitive custom of "adult"
From the beginning to the end of our field trip in Luozhai, there was a feeling of walking into a mysterious primitive tribe. The reason is that the peculiar customs of Luoluo people still retain many traces of primitive life.
When I interviewed Luo Zhai for the first time, I seldom saw the families of strangers, and most of them hid when they saw us. Occasionally, I saw a few little boys almost shaved their heads. Interestingly, there was a lock of hair on the back of their heads. The little girls put on headscarves and wanted to ask, but the family just laughed and didn't answer. Because of the time, I regret leaving Luozhai. This time, I went to Luozhai again and showed them my stories about Luozhai published in Southern Weekend and China Guobo. Luozhai people's feelings for me suddenly became close. The interview also went well. The clever little boy and the beautiful little girl also took the initiative to take off the handkerchief on their heads and let me take this precious customized shot.
According to the interview, children in Luozhai have to shave their heads before 10, indicating that they are underage and can't be sensible. Boys have a pinch of short hair at the back of their heads, while girls have a pinch of long hair on their foreheads. After the age of 10, both boys and girls began to grow their hair. The labor force that shows that they are beginning to grow can help adults do some work within their power. The bar mitzvah ceremony of Luozhai people 10 is obviously an ancient custom passed down from history. At the same time, it also shows that Luozhai people are a hardworking ethnic tribe in history.
Luozhai has many strange customs. This custom of preserving primitive nature is reflected in many places. For example, the marriage customs, clothing, diet, production and holiday customs of Luozhai people are very mysterious and novel, which has great research value and development and utilization value. For half a century, the state has made great efforts to install electricity in Luozhai, ensuring the harvest in drought and flood, and every household has a TV. Despite the wonderful world on TV, the Luo branch of the Yi nationality still inherits too many local primitive customs, the most direct manifestation of which is that it still does not marry foreign branches, including the Yi nationality and other branches of the Yi nationality. Only the marriage between Luo people. Even those who have left Luozhai now, have jobs and become national cadres can only consciously marry their own branches. Whether this folk custom phenomenon has an impact on the national economic development is of great research value.
Today, with the development of the cultural connotation of regional economy, I think if the ancient and excellent folk culture of Luo Ren, a branch of Yi nationality, is sorted out and processed, isn't Luozhai's peculiar customs and natural scenery another way to make money for the development of national economy?
During 1995, less than ten young people went out to work in Xinzhai and Chengzhai. In the last year of the end of the 20th century, 1999, seventy or eighty Luozhai people finally left Zhaimen to work in Guangzhou and Shenzhen. They will not only bring back their wages, but also bring back the colorful world outside.