Your Ancestors Will Also Need Masks and Hand Sanitisers When You Visit Them During Qing Ming Festival This Year

Remember the looming fear when you step outside your house breathing eeriely fresh air, only to realise you’ve forgotten to wear your mask?

Well, you can now spare your ancestors from that fear with an express delivery of masks before they come back to Singapore from, well, the afterlife.

In light of the upcoming Qing Ming festival—the traditional Chinese occasion to honour the dead, Geylang Thian Huat Siang Joss Paper has rolled out a “pandemic package” you can burn to help your ancestors fight the coronavirus.

Just in case they are slapped with a 14-day quarantine before they can return to their happy eternal life.

The package, set to cost around $3, includes joss paper lookalikes of pandemic essentials like masks, hand sanitisers, and even infrared thermometers. 

Good move, Thian Huat Siang, but you forgot TraceTogether tokens. Vivian Balakrishnan is not pleased.

According to Lianhe Zaobao, the store owner hopes to boost sales with the “trendy” new products and make up for the loss of revenue last year, when the Circuit Breaker forced them to halt operations during the festival.

Novel tributes abound

This is not the first time joss paper has been made into creative tributes to be burnt. 

Back in 2019, Ban Kah Hiang Trading, another manufacturer of joss paper items, unveiled effigies in the shape of Mao Shan Wang durians, in case your ancestors miss the taste. For the full gastronomical experience, they even smell like durians.

Maybe burn some extra money in case there are fines in heaven too.

Other indulgences our ancestors get to enjoy include seafood steamboats and teppanyaki sets, which they can happily Instagram with the iPhones or Samsung Galaxies their descendants fillially purvey.

User manuals are not included for these digital items—because, according to the storeowner, “Steve Jobs [probably] has a company in the afterlife”.

As Zaobao reports, these products are especially popular among younger customers, who are “usually more curious” and willing to try these novel offerings. Older customers, meanwhile, still prefer conventional paper effigies, like paper money or bullions.

Safe distancing measures during Qing Ming

While we rush to deliver much-needed supplies to our ancestors so they can avoid long queues in their heavenly Fairprice, it is important to remember that COVID-19 still exists in our mortal world.

That means observing safe distancing measures as we would elsewhere, as the new NEA guidelines emphasise. Since columbaria and cemeteries are likely to see throngs of visitors, each visiting group will have to abide by the following guidelines:

• refrain from having more than two visitors per household, and eight visitors per group;
• avoid crowding around designated areas for joss paper burning, and maintain safe distancing from other visitors at all times;
• not bring the elderly or young children, since they are at a higher risk of infection;
• avoid eating or drinking, as well as staying for an extended period of time.

The NEA will also institute a booking system for visitors who travel to Mandai Columbarium by car on these peak days, where only vehicles with valid appointments can enter the facility:

• March 2021: 20, 21, 27, 28
• April 2021: 2, 3, 4, 10, 11, 17, 18

To compensate for the reduced capacity at the facilities, government-managed columbaria will be open 24 hours daily. 

In case your ancestors need late-night food deliveries and their only choice is McDonalds.

Featured Image: Facebook (Ban Kah Hiang Trading 萬家香貿易)