Fisherman Master Ziya Jiang
Originally uploaded by clarkalastair

Yesterday (coincidentally being a Friday) Miao’s mother came across some activities taking place on the Japanese street. (Some houses built in a Japanese style to commemorate something to do with their previous occupation of Dalian) So she called us out to goto see some of these street performances as depicted in this picture.

The YangGe Dance

Part of the activities was a group of people in traditional costumes and makeup dancing the YangGe dance to the beat of some big Chinese formation TangGu Drummers and a whiny instrument called the Suona much like an oboe. These dances seemed to be depicting by dance some traditional stories of China. The picture here shows the story of Ziya Jiang who is said to have fished with a hookless line, in order to let the fishes come to him when they were ready.

According to the wiki, Jiang Ziya was: The last ruler of the Shang dynasty (16th – 11th century BC) was a tyrannical and debauched slave owner who spent his days carousing with his favourite concubine Daji and mercilessly executing or punishing upright officials and all others who objected to his ways. Jiang Shang had once served the Shang king and had come to hate him with all his heart. He was an expert in military affairs and hoped that some day someone would call on him to help overthrow the king. He waited and waited till he was 80 years old, continuing placidly with his fishing in a tributary of the Weihe River (near today’s Xi’an) using a barbless hook or even no hook at all, on the theory that the fish would come to him of their own volition when they were ready.

Other Activities

Among the other activities was a Chinese erhu orchestra with instrumental and singer soloists, synchronized female drummers, a drum marching band, and an exhibition of art in the surrounding houses.

As I was the only westerner around, lots of the performers were nice enough to pose for me (I didn’t ask for that of course), though had I been a good photographer I’m sure I would have made better use of that. I was asked by one of the organizers to participate in the orchestra to ring a bell at a specific time. She was overly optimistic with when this would happen (she said 10 minutes) 40 minutes later still waiting around for this to happen. She did however pull me in front of the stage to take photographs, and had I had a different lens on the camera, this would have been most useful, given my lack of spoken Chinese I tend to keep away from situations where I get told off or told to go away. In a similar vain, I got dragged into this dance by an “old man” performer with his walking stick and cloth to cover his brow from the sun. This produced some interest in the crowd and I felt it quite fun, though a little embarrassed.

The surrounding art exhibitions were interesting because I hadn’t been in these buildings before, so It was nice to see inside. I managed to take some pictures of the art, which in the UK for such a small exhibition, I would have been shouted down for I’m sure. The art ranged from calligraphy and paintings on scrolls, to paper cutting and pottery. All a very positive experience.