In Hong Kong, the Hungry Ghost Festival is a major Buddhist and Taoist event. Hungry ghosts are the restless spirits of people who did not have a funeral. There is no one visiting their graves and they do not receive the gifts that Chinese people would take to their ancestors to pay respects. They miss out on food and spirit money.
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Huge paper mache models of clothes for ghosts. It will be burnt at the end of
the festival.
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| Hungry Ghost festival |
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During this festival, many shops are selling paper items to be burnt and offered
to the wandering hungry spirits.
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| Paper chest |
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Shop, located on Queen's road, selling incense and paper funeral offerings.
This shop sells miniature paper representations of everything that an ancestor might need in the
afterlife, i.e. three-story villas and household help, handbags with matching shoes,
electric fans and fine cognac.
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| Shop selling paper funeral offerings |
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The Hungry Ghost festival in Abderdeen street is noisy, colourful and
stands in sharp contrast to sophisticated and superficial SoHo.
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| Hungry Ghost festival in Abderdeen street |
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Food is offered especially whole roasted pig and colored cakes.
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| Food offering |
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To drive away the wandering spirits, roast suckling pig and fruit are offered, along with paper offerings.
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Paper offerings depicting the Eight Immortals can often be seen in the temporary
matsheds built for the Festival of the Hungry Ghosts.
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| Paper offerings |
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The culmination of the event is the burning of the paper offerings in the evening, to keep the ghosts away for another year.
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Huge, fiery and striking paper effigy representing Taai Si Wong sitting on a temporary altar.
Each dialect group has his own style of paper sculpture. Blue-faced Taai Si Wong is made by
the Chiu Chow people.
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| Taai Si Wong |
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People believe it rains every year until rice is distributed to the elderly.
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Except for the food, which is distributed later, everything else is burned, i.e. paper clothing and spirit
money...
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| Food offering |
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An old man makes the paper effigy of the Hungry Ghost king on Staunton Street from scratch. This paper-craft master has now found new premises for his business. Chan Kwei-chow, who has been in the trade for more than 70 years, is well known for making larger-than-life paper idols and lanterns. He is to relocate his shop to the nearby Elgin Street.
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Many return to pay respects to their ancestors because their
ancestral altar is still here.
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| Ancestral altar |
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Elderly women spend hours folding gold and silver paper into bars of gold.
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From time to time, Buddhist monks or Taoist priests come in turns to chant their liturgies.
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| Taoist priests |
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Popular other venues are King George V Memorial Park in Kowloon and Moreton Terrace Playground in Causeway Bay.
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Buddhist monks or Taoist priests chant their liturgies.
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| Taoist priests |
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