Life Stages
Birthday celebration
| PLACE | Sheung Shui |
| DATE | 1965-03-13 |
| OBSERVATIONS | Although for ritual reasons everyone needed to remember the exact time of their birth and the animal sign they were born under, it was rare for individuals to celebrate their birthday anniversaries. Generally everyone added a year onto their age at new year. But in later life longevity was sometimes marked, and the photo shows my next door neighbour’s wife and a kinswoman preparing food in my house for a party feast to mark her husband’s 52nd birthday. More than twenty people attended. Generally of more significance in Sheung Shui were the ages 41, 51, 61, 71 and 81, but my neighbour had no other explanation for celebrating 52 than that “We celebrate 52”. |