The Ha Festival of the Jing Nationality
The Jing ethnic group mainly lives on the three small islands of Wanwei, Wutou and Shanxin in Dongxing City, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. It is located in the southwestern part of the coastline of mainland my country and faces Vietnam across the sea. The Ha Festival is the most solemn festival of the Jing ethnic group, also known as the "Singing Ha Festival". "Ha" is the transliteration of the Jing language, which means "song". The date of the Jing ethnic group's Ha Festival varies from place to place, either on the tenth day of the sixth lunar month, the tenth day of the eighth lunar month, or the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. There are Ha Pavilions in various places that are specially used for Ha Festival activities. The Jing ethnic group's Ha Festival activities consist of ancestor worship, rural drinking, socializing, and entertainment. There are many folk legends about the Ha Festival. Among them, the more representative legend says: In ancient times, a singing fairy came to the three islands of the Jing ethnic group and mobilized the masses to fight against feudal oppression in the name of spreading songs. Her singing moved many people. In order to commemorate her, later generations built the "Ha Pavilion" and regularly sang and spread songs in the Ha Pavilion, which gradually became a festival custom. The Ha Pavilions in each village are the center of the festival activities. The festival activities last for 3 days, all night long, with endless singing and dancing. People of all ethnic groups around also come to celebrate together. There are three main actors in singing Ha, one male singer, called "Ha brother", who is responsible for playing the piano accompaniment, and two female singers, called "Ha sisters", one holding two bamboo boards and the other holding a bamboo clapper, accompaniment by beating the rhythm and singing in turns. The content of the song includes folk legends, philosophical stories, love stories, etc. Young girls often go on stage to perform dances amid the sound of gongs and drums. The most distinctive of them is the "Head Lantern Dance". The dancers hold porcelain bowls on their heads, with plates stacked on top of the bowls, and candles lit in the plates. At the same time, they hold wine glasses in both hands, each with a candle in the glass. Three candles flicker during singing and dancing. If there are many people dancing together, the eyes are full of flickering candlelight, which is beautiful and moving. After nearly 500 years of development and evolution, the Jing ethnic group's Ha Festival is a concentrated embodiment of the Jing ethnic group's traditional culture.