Jiangwan Folk Temple Fair debuts, visit the temple fair, appreciate intangible cultural heritage, and experience folk culture on the eve of the Dragon Boat Festival
The rice dumpling leaves are fragrant and the ancient town has a new charm. On June 7, with the performances of Fengzhen No. 1 Primary School and Jiangwan Town Street Dance Team, the Jiangwan Town Street "Our Festival·Spiritual Home" Dragon Boat Festival and Jiangwan Temple Fair kicked off.
On that day, a street performance team voluntarily organized by the people gathered in Jiangwan Living Room, including traditional dragon and lion dances, stilt walking, etc., as well as modern fashion teams and Tai Chi performances. Dragon and lion dancers wear bright costumes, hold giant dragons and lions in their hands, and dance to the rhythm of drums. Artists on stilts walk lightly on high wooden stilts, performing various difficult movements from time to time. . The street folk band led the audience into the poetic Jiangnan with small bridges, flowing water and green wind curtains with a flute solo "Gusu Love".
In addition to traditional performances, there are also fashion teams and Tai Chi performances full of modern style, the poem recitation "It's Nice to Know You" brought by the Street Poetry Society, and the ethnic dance "Sweetness" presented by the Street Meimei Xinjiang Dance Team are all unique feature. Residents at the scene also actively participated in the temple fair, singing a song or joining the dance team, enjoying the traditional folk customs of Jiangwan Town with the performance team. At the temple fair, residents also tried various traditional activities such as making clay figurines, knotting, straw weaving, sugar painting, and fishing for rice dumplings to feel the charm of traditional culture.
Jiangwan Town was named after the Qiu River bent into the country. It had become a market in the Song Dynasty. Since the opening of the port, with the north-south connection of the Songhu Railway, Jiangwan's market has been revitalized. At that time, Jiangwan would hold the Sai Shen Festival every year, which was very popular. , became a major event in Shanghai. According to historical records, Jiangwan Saishenhui is also known as Zhajiangwan and Jiefuhui. In 1925, at the Saishenhui, the honor guard set off from Dongyue Temple and sounded gongs to clear the way. It was very lively. Crossing the main street to West Street, there were a sea of onlookers. In addition to normal transportation, the Songhu Railway will run special trains to and from Jiangwan every half hour starting from 9:50 a.m., with 19 trailers each time, until 10 p.m. A total of 10 special trips were made and more than 8,500 third-class tickets were sold. Because of the overcrowding, people at the time described it as "an evacuation situation during the war between Jiangsu and Zhejiang." During the 1926 Saishen Meeting, the railway operated special trains 11 times to transport more than 10,000 people. More than 3,000 people boarded the train from Tiantong'an Station. In 1934, rehearsal honor guards from Taicang, Jiading, Baoshan and Nantong counties came to Shanghai to participate, with an audience of 500,000.
With the development of the times and the passage of time, the ancient town has gradually drifted away. Farmlands, dirt roads, stone bridges and other old places no longer exist, but many unique cultural folk customs still remain in the memories of the older generation of Jiangwan people. The relevant person in charge of Jiangwan Town Sub-district said that temple fairs are an important platform for inheriting and promoting traditional culture. They are also an important place for community residents to enhance communication and enjoy festival joy. The streets mine cultural resources and activate traditional intangible cultural heritage projects while inheriting traditional temple fair customs. On the basis of this, we strive to recreate the jubilant scene of "going out" in Jiangwan area and recreate the grand scene of the ancient town, so as to promote the construction of the "Three Cultural Places", enhance regional attraction and influence, and promote and inherit the unique culture of Jiangwan Town.
