156
In recent years, mass emigration to the cities has further weakened the lineage tradition at some villages. Only the Mos at Mok Ka and the Los at lower Shek Lau Po seem to have maintained the status of their lineages. As the strongest lineage in Tung Chung, the Mos managed to rebuild their ancestral hall, the Mo-yu-t'ang, and continue to visit the graves of their focal ancestors collectively. As for the Lo lineage at lower Shek Lau Po, the reconstruction of their ancestral hall, the Lo-yu-chang t'ang, in the 1970s, as a centre for ancestor worship, contributed to the reinforcement of lineage identity. Nevertheless, the majority of Tung Chung's villagers worship their ancestors inside their family halls.
The worship of the earth god in Tung Chung also occurs on a small scale. Symbolically, the earth god stands for the spirit of the village at which he is located, and is represented usually by a rock at an open-air shrine or by an old banyan tree. Variously known as Ta-wang (great king) or Po-kung (lord or paternal great-uncle), the earth god guards a village at its entrance or rear. As a guardian deity at the basic level of rural organization, the god helps to mark the territorial line between villages. In Ngau Au, for example, four Po-kungs are located there at both the entrance and the rear of the village. Three of them, as a village elder confirmed, are more than three hundred years old. At Mok Ka, earth gods are enshrined, two by the stream and one at the village entrance, and one at the rear of the village. As the oldest village, Shek Mun Kap has the largest earth god, represented by a giant boulder.
On the 1st and 15th of every lunar month, during the major festivals, and on the earth gods' collective birthday, Ta-wang or Po-kung are offered sacrifices. On auspicious days of their choice, villagers also come to pray for the god's blessings and repay his protection. The ceremonies concerned include the display of wine and animal sacrifices in front of the shrine, the spraying of the wine on the ground, the burning of paper offerings, and kowtow to the god. Compared to ancestor worship, the earth god worship functions more directly to enhance the village identity, especially among individual members of a mix-lineage community. In Tung Chung, however, the ceremony has never taken the elaborate form of the tso-she (doing the she), i.e., special collective rituals and celebratory activities consisting of a feast in honour of the neighbourhood god at various times of the year. Being