For many native Beijing residents, street vendor cries used to
be an important part of life in their childhood some 50 years ago.
However, this traditional way of life now has become only a memory
of the past and is submerged in the city's modernization process.
Now the municipal government intends to bring the old memories back
again. An official at the Chongwen district government said last
Thursday that traditional Beijing street hawkers' cries would be
performed at the upcoming Longtan Temple Fair, the largest temple
fair in Beijing to celebrate the Spring Festival.
Traditional peddlers' cries used to be a common feature of city
life in Beijing: in a summer afternoon, when beams of sunlight
shone in the courtyard of a quadrangle house, people would hear the
street cries in the distance drifting into their ears -- cries of
hawkers selling peppermint pastries or cold, sweet buckwheat cakes.
The cries displayed a relaxed life of the old Beijing people in the
past. Yet, as more and more skyscrapers loom large in the skyline,
the street hawkers gradually disappeared amid steel and
concrete.
Many old Beijing natives, especially those who had lived
overseas for many years, complained that when they came back to
Beijing, they were disappointed to find that they could no longer
hear such cries any more. Many overseas Chinese urged that
something should be done to save the street cries. Their efforts
aroused the government's attention.
Last year, the Chongwen district government in Beijing applied
to the state to include these street cries as the national
intangible cultural heritage. Many street cries in Beijing
originated from the Chongwen district. Later, a folk culture art
troupe was established by the Chongwen Cultural Center. In a year,
the art troupe had paid visits to over ten folk artists who were
considered as experts on street cries and collected 600 kinds of
street cries. Later, they arranged these street cries and made them
into a stage play.
The folk culture art troupe will make their debut from February
17 to 24， 2007 when the Longtan Temple Fair is being held. During
the temple fair, they will perform their stage play on street
cries. The stage play, lasting for two hours, will be shown twice
in a day and for eight days consecutively.
By then, the folk artists will show how these street cries were
performed in the past. It is believed that their excellent
performance will bring back the memories of many old
Beijingers.
(Chinanews.cn January 23, 2007)
