The spring breeze blows on the apricot branches
——A Xinghua Village in the eyes of Chizhou people
I know that Xinghua Village is from a poem that was sung in my childhood. The poem is catchy, but I don’t know its deep meaning. Riding on the back of a cow, I had a particularly good impression of the sentence "The shepherd boy points to Xinghua Village" because I knew that the "shepherd boy" refers to our children who herd the cows.
When I was older, I read this poem and the explanation in the book, and realized that Xinghua Village is in Guichi, Chizhou. Although the authentic Xinghua Village is still some way away from our village, I always feel a sense of pride when reading this world-famous "Qingming" poem. After all, Xinghua Village is in Chizhou, and I am also from Chizhou.
In every village in the south of the Yangtze River, there are always a few apricot or peach trees in front of and behind almost every house, showing the splendor of spring. Some trees are not specially planted. If you throw away the apricot or peach pits that you eat in the summer, they will sprout and grow in the next year. No one will cut them down, and they will grow taller, bloom and bear fruit on their own. So, you can see it everywhere.
Every spring in March, the spring breeze blows in the south of the Yangtze River, and the flowers are red and the willows are green. At this time, the apricot blossoms bloomed in the misty rain, and every village and village had pink and red apricot blossoms. It is not unusual for apricot flowers to appear in the south of the Yangtze River. They can be found everywhere, so it is not surprising to see them in abundance. And why is our Xinghua Village in Chizhou famous all over the world? The reason lies in the fame of the famous poet Du Mu in the late Tang Dynasty and the popular "Qingming" poem he wrote when he was an official in Chizhou. This poem can be recited casually in the mouths of dignitaries, literati, or village women, and has been passed down to children from ancient times to recited from generation to generation.
In the 1990s, when I was working in Hangzhou, my boss asked me where I was from. I answered that I was from Chizhou, Anhui. He said he didn’t know Chizhou. I casually recited the poem "Qingming" and said that my hometown was Xinghua Village in the poem. The boss laughed and said that I knew this poem. Xinghua Village should be a good place, but it’s a pity that I have never been there. I also smiled and said: If you have time, you can go there and take a look, I will be your guide. The boss even said that he must go.
It can be seen that Xinghua Village is more famous than Chizhou because of the poem "Qingming".
Precisely because of Du Mu’s poem "Qingming", later generations of literati came here to look for the beautiful Xinghua Village and the intoxicating Huanggong wine in the poem. Appreciating the apricot flowers, drinking from the fragrant spring, and reciting poems, one after another, the reputation of Xinghua Village is passed down from generation to generation. Poems describing Xinghua Village one after another have made Xinghua Village known as "the most poetic village in the world". In the Qing Dynasty, some people from Xinghua Village searched for poems, customs and allusions describing Xinghua Village. They searched for archaeological sites, beautiful mountains and rivers, etc. and compiled it into "Xinghua Village Chronicles", which was fortunately included in the "Sikuquanshu" of the Qing Dynasty.
This further established Xinghua Village’s name and position in Chizhou.
With these more than ten centuries of historical and cultural accumulation, Xinghua Village has created the "Twelve Scenes of Xinghua Village" with charming scenery and rich humanities. What is hateful is that when the Japanese invaded China, , Xinghua Village was also brutally massacred by the Japanese invaders and indiscriminately bombed by planes, causing Xinghua Village to suffer unprecedented destruction. For a time, many angry souls and ghosts appeared in the village to claim the lives of the Japanese invaders... After liberation, the people of Xinghua Village cultivated fields, planted apricots, and rebuilt their homes. The spring breeze and spring rain turn into fragrance. Not long after, Xinghua Village once again had the picture of a peaceful rural life with cocks crowing and dogs barking, fields untouched, and flowers fragrant everywhere. However, many of the "Twelve Scenic Spots of Xinghua Village" have been destroyed by the war. Famous scenic spots such as the "Zhaoming Academy," commonly known as the West Temple, which once enshrined Chizhou's "Ghost Master" Prince Zhaoming of the Southern Dynasties; the legendary "Iron Buddha Zen Forest" and other temple buildings are hard to find... But this cannot be erased People who go to Xinghua Village have memories of Xinghua Village. The Huanggong Well, which is "fragrant like wine, inexhaustible", still exudes the mellow fragrance of thousands of years, and the wine-rich poems are still floating in the sky of Xinghua Village. The spring rain of apricot blossoms falls in people's hearts, lingering in people's minds for thousands of years. Thus, in the spring breeze of reform and opening up, Xinghua Village was reborn. Thanks to the great attention and decision-making of successive Chizhou Municipal Party Committees and Municipal Governments, Xinghua Village has advanced and ambitious plans, vigorous publicity, and significant investment attraction... Only then has Xinghua Village continued to restore its ancient scenery and appearance. , intoxicating landscape gardens, and the beautiful scenery of spring branches all year round... Xinghua Village, which was bombed during the bloody invasion of the Japanese invaders, quickly regained its vitality and full of spring.
In the early 1990s, in order to commemorate the martyrs who sacrificed their lives bravely in the fight against the Japanese aggressors and the War of Liberation, the former Guichi Municipal Party Committee and Municipal Government built a large-scale martyrs cemetery in Xinghua Village. On the green hills of pines and cypresses, a monument to the revolutionary martyrs towering into the sky stands. Every March, apricot blossoms bloom inside and outside the cemetery. Are the red petals dyed with the blood of the martyrs? Every year when Tomb Sweeping Day comes, many people in Chizhou flock to the Martyrs Cemetery in Xinghua Village. They lay flowers for the martyrs, bow affectionately to the martyrs who are forever buried in Xinghua Village, and pay the highest salute to the martyrs. What can comfort the martyrs is that they exchanged their lives for our happy and beautiful life today; the apricot flowers they watered with their blood bloom magnificently every year. And Chizhou will also forever record the great achievements of the martyrs in the annals of history; the heroic spirits of the martyrs will also forever exist in the hearts of every Chizhou person.
It is against this background that the beautiful twelve ancient sceneries of Xinghua Village unfold its infinite charm. You see "Pingtian Spring Rise" is like a charming fairy, dressed up and graceful under the caress of the spring girl; the Huanggong wine in "Huanggong Jiulong" makes tourists from all over the world drunk, even one of the Eight Immortals The Tieguai Li is also lingering on; the "Iron Buddha Zen Forest" welcomes the worship of faithful men and women with its majestic posture; the sunset glow of "Santai Sunset" sprinkles on the apricot branches, blooming with an intoxicating red... Some scenic spots and cultural landscapes are being restored and constructed. I believe that in the near future, the twelve scenic spots in ancient Xinghua Village will be presented with a new look and feel, and there will also be new highlights waiting for tourists. Waiting Appreciated by guests and friends from all over.
"The spring breeze blows on the branches of apricot blossoms." The vicissitudes of the history of Xinghua Village prove that only when the country is prosperous, the people live in peace, and the society is stable, Xinghua Village, which has gone through disasters, will shine with its bright colors. At the new starting point, the inspiring spring breeze makes the apricot blossoms bloom to their fullest again and again. It shows visitors from all over the world the beautiful picture of "Ten Miles of Smoke Village One Color Red".
As a citizen of Chizhou, I sincerely feel that the future of Xinghua Village will be infinitely better!