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China

In China, Tomb-Sweeping Day Is Booming Business

CHINA TIMES, ECONOMIC DAILY (Taiwan); XINHUA (China)

WUHAN - In a booming economy, even the dead can help you turn a profit.

Friday was Tomb Sweeping Day, or the Qingming Festiva, in China. Set officially as a national holiday on April 4 or 5, this has traditionally been a family day on which people pay respects to their ancestors by cutting the grass, tidying up the graves and conducting an offering ritual.

In the past, burning incense and fake paper money -- also known as Ghost money -- were common practices for venerating the deceased at this special occasion. However, in recent years China has seen more and more multifarious offerings to make sure that their loved ones have lots to enjoy in the realm of the afterlife, the China Times reported. The list of, well, goodies, includes papier-mâché items of consumer electronics, and even paper-girl figurines to symbolize mistresses of the departed.

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Photo by istolethetv

"Basically, the fashion in offerings follows that of the living. We sell whatever goes with the trend,” a shop keeper specialized in funeral ritual equipment said to Xinhua. Apart from the traditional items such as food or paper money, recent hot trends have included paper houses and cars, as well as faux techgadgets such as MacBooks, iPads and iPhones.

Since having a mistress is considered as one's talent by a lot of China's rich and powerful, burning the very imaginative paper-made girls is also one of the preferred new sources of homage by more open-minded family members.

[rebelmouse-image 27086585 alt="""" original_size="499x332" expand=1]

Photo by kanegen

But China's quick-thinking businessmen aren't done yet. Some have also come up with new services of paying respects to the tombs on behalf of the families, according to the Economic Daily.

A deluxe grave-sweeper’s service can include tomb cleaning, lighting incense to burn, putting flowers and paper clothes at the grave, and just some living company. "We'd even do the kowtow as long as you pay!", one valet sweeper assured. According to the Economic Daily, China's major cities are now full of agencies that provide these kinds of services to China's massive migrant worker population who can't make it back home.

[rebelmouse-image 27086586 alt="""" original_size="500x375" expand=1]

Photo by bfishadow

And now the latest addition to the grave economy, as some call it, has a digital-virtual component. With the help of the Internet, the netizens who can't make it to the real tombs can now just log on the online grave-sweepers platform to pay their homage. For as little as 40 Yuan ($6) visitors can set up their own virtual tomb and choose to leave a message, sing a song, light e-incense or candles, or offer pixilated flowers, wine, or anything else they fancy.

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Society

Italy's Right-Wing Government Turns Up The Heat On 'Gastronationalism'

Rome has been strongly opposed to synthetic foods, insect-based flours and health warnings on alcohol, and aggressive lobbying by Giorgia Meloni's right-wing government against nutritional labeling has prompted accusations in Brussels of "gastronationalism."

Dough is run through a press to make pasta

Creation of home made pasta

Karl De Meyer et Olivier Tosseri

ROME — On March 23, the Italian Minister of Agriculture and Food Sovereignty, Francesco Lollobrigida, announced that Rome would ask UNESCO to recognize Italian cuisine as a piece of intangible cultural heritage.

On March 28, Lollobrigida, who is also Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's brother-in-law, promised that Italy would ban the production, import and marketing of food made in labs, especially artificial meat — despite the fact that there is still no official request to market it in Europe.

Days later, Italian Eurodeputy Alessandra Mussolini, granddaughter of fascist leader Benito Mussolini and member of the Forza Italia party, which is part of the governing coalition in Rome, caused a sensation in the European Parliament. On the sidelines of the plenary session, Sophia Loren's niece organized a wine tasting, under the slogan "In Vino Veritas," to show her strong opposition (and that of her government) to an Irish proposal to put health warnings on alcohol bottles. At the end of the press conference, around 11am, she showed her determination by drinking from the neck of a bottle of wine, to great applause.

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