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IF YOU SAW graves decked with fruit and other food while visiting the cemetery, chances are you were looking at the grave of someone of Chinese ancestry.
Setting aside food for the living and the dead is a Chinese tradition highlighted on the Christian observance of All Souls? Day and All Saints? Day.
In Cebu, however, the Chinese tradition of leaving food for the deceased is dwindling, although majority still practice it.
One such traditional practitioner is businessman Bhen Chua, whose great grandparents migrated to Cebu from mainland China in 1902. They are among those buried in the Chinese Cemetery in barangay Careta, Cebu City.
?Chinese traditions also evolve from time to time. The new generation Chinese in the Philippines already adopt the way Filipinos do it,? Chua said.
The differences are in the details.
The Chinese light incense sticks instead of candles. Two sticks for the dead, and three for God, are planted into urns in front of a dead relative?s tomb. It was also customary to leave a model house, toy car, or kim ? Chinese money ? at a dead person?s tomb for the prosperity of the deceased in the afterlife.
Some Chinese also use red candles with a design of a gold dragon emblazoned on them, symbols of luck.
Then, there?s the food. Top choices when commemorating the dead are fish, meat, hopia, siopao, pancit canton, fried chicken, monay putok, siomai, and lechon.
These are offered alongside the incense. After prayers, the visiting family then eats together at the grave of their deceased loved one.
For fruits, those visiting a grave traditionally bring five different kinds.
These five can be anything, though popular choices are papaya, banana, lanzones, orange, pear, apple, and caimito. In fact, all other fruits are fair game, except one: Pomelo.
?In Chinese, the word for ?pomelo? can also mean ?come forward and back?,? Chua said. ?The pomelo is only offered to God.?
Over the years, gifts of fruit have evolved. Chua said it was now acceptable to bring canned fruit cocktail, in addition to bringing the dead loved one?s favorite fruit.
Still, one has to be careful about what fruit to bring. There?s a particular menu appropriate for birthdays, and another for death anniversaries. Bringing the wrong kind of food may be considered blasphemous, Chua said.
To make sure the dead are appeased, it was also traditional to burn kim at the gravesite. This Chinese tradition goes back several centuries, based on the belief that the dead also have financial needs in the afterlife. In return, the Chinese believe, the dead would also give the living good luck and success.
One Chinese tradition sure to jolt mainstream Filipino tradition is to put the names of surviving relatives below the name of the deceased on the gravestone.
?We find it interesting. Whenever we visit the cemetery, we get to read the names of those who were alive when a particular ancestor was buried,? Chua said.
But there are strict traditionalists as well.
Luo Yi Zhou, 28, a Chinese woman who married a Filipino and has been staying in Cebu for three years, said she does not observe All Saints? Day and All Souls? Day.
?I know some (other Chinese) who do it, but I don?t,? Zhou said.
She said the Chinese commemorate their dead during The ?Qing Ming? Festival, also known as ?Ancestors? Day? or ?Tomb Sweeping Day,? celebrated every April 5.
