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Kat Hing Wai and Wing Lung Wai terminated their own independent Jiao but continue to participate actively in the Jiao of the whole Kam Tin community. Still others, like Tai Wai and Tin Sam, celebrate their own Jiao festivals on the one hand but also participate as members in the Jiao celebrated by the Sha Tin Kau Yeuk (Sha Tin Village alliance). Reasons such as the Japanese occupation or economic recession given by villagers themselves cannot explain the diversities found in the New Territories. All villages experienced the Japanese occupation. With regard to economic constraints, a community like Ping Shan, though as prosperous and powerful as Kam Tin and Ha Tsuen, stopped the celebration for some unknown reason. Therefore, the continuity or discontinuity of the Jiao festival depends on the effectiveness of the festival's communal structure and organization. In Lam Tsuen, the Jiao festival is a means to reconfirm the roles of its alliances (the Luk Hap Tong |Lui He Tang] “Hall of the Six [Sc. Village Clusters} United"). In Kam Tin and other single lineage communities, the Jiao plays an essential role in re-establishing the structure of the segmented lineage as well as in re-confirming membership in the branches. The question of whether Jiao festivals will survive after the 1997 take-over is in fact a question of whether or not there is a need to preserve such a tradition in the community.

NOTES

Liu Zhi-wan, "Taiwan Taibeixian Zhonghexiang Jianjiao Jidian" Bulletin of the Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica 33 (1972): 135-64.

I

Tanaka, Issci, Chugoku Kyoshon Saishi Kenkyu: Chihogeki no Kankyo [Village Festival in China: Background of Local Theatres] (Tokyo: Tokyo Univ. Press, 1989), 799. Some fishing villages in Hong Kong like Kau Lau Wan, Tap Mun and Kat O name their Jiao festivals "An Long Qing Jiac" meaning the Jiao celebrated to pacify the earth dragon.

1

Tanaka claimed that originally "Qi An Fiao" was celebrated only when there was need to pray for peace (Ibid., 799). However, evidence in Hong Kong, at least, shows that the festival is celebrated in a regular cycle. The shortest cycle is the Jiao of Cheung Chau where it is celebrated yearly. The longest is Sheung Shui and Shuen Wan where the Jiao is said to be celebrated once every 60 years. In some fishing villages in the New Territories, it is celebrated once every two or seven years. A five-year cycle is also practised in some agrarian communities like Tai Hang. However, a ten year cycle is the most popular in agrarian communities. Nonetheless, the method of counting also differs from one community to another. For instance, Lam Tsuen claims to celebrate the Jiao once every ten years but they actually celebrate it once in nine years. Their Jiao festival was celebrated in the following years: 1963, 1972, 1981, 1990).

4 Mr. Cheung Chi-fan (Zhang Zhi-fan), JP, and Mr. Chung Chi-leang (Zhong Ji-liang), interviewed by author, Lam Tsuen, Dec. 1, 1990. According to Dean, about 80,000 Chinese yuan was spent on the Jiao in a village in Zhangzhou, Fujian in 1986. See