Flowers are seen at Jinbaoshan cemetery in Kunming, capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, April 3, 2008, one day before the traditional Qingming Festival. The Qingming Festival, which falls on April 4 or 5, is an occasion for Chinese people to pay homage to their ancestors and deceased beloved ones. (Xinhua Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

How will people spend China's 1st Qingming Festival holiday?

   BEIJING, April 3 (Xinhua) -- The upcoming Qingming Festival on Friday will be the first time that a Chinese solar term festival has become a national holiday.

   The festival is known as tomb-sweeping day. But apart from tomb sweeping, modern Chinese are left a little bewildered as to how tomark their first holiday for the 2,500-year-old Qingming Festival. Many hope the first Qingming Festival holiday would help restore along-lost joyous sentiment to the solemn tomb-sweeping day. Full story

Descendants honor Confucius ahead of tomb-sweeping day

Kong (back,C),daughter-in-law of one of the descendants of Confucius attends a memorial ceremony for Confucius at the Confucius Tomb in Qufu, ancestral home of Confucius, in east China's Shandong Province, March 30, 2008. (Xinhua Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

    QUFU, Shandong Province, March 31 (Xinhua) -- More than 130 descendants of Confucius from across the world gathered in his hometown on Sunday to pay tribute to the sage ahead of the traditional tomb sweeping day.

    The descendants, all of whom bear Confucius' family name "Kong", followed their master of ceremony to kowtow and serve offerings and incense sticks to his tomb in Qufu, eastern Shandong Province. Full story

Cross-Straits charter flight sets off for Tomb-sweeping Day

China Eastern's flight MU5005 from Shanghai's Pudong to Taipei is ready to set off at the airport in Shanghai of China, April 2, 2008.(Xinhua/Ren Long) Photo Gallery>>>

    SHANGHAI, April 2 (Xinhua) -- A China Eastern flight left Shanghai for Taipei on Wednesday, kicking off a series of seasonal cross-Straits charter flights for the traditional Chinese tomb-sweeping festival.

    Altogether 146 passengers, mostly Taiwanese working in Shanghai, were on board China Eastern's flight MU5005 from Shanghai's Pudongto Taipei on Wednesday, sources with the airline company said. Full story

Special bus lines opened to public cemeteries for Qingming

People queue up to get on the bus at the temporary stop to visit relatives' graves, in Suzhou, a city of east China's Jiangsu Province, March 22, 2008. The Suzhou city government has opened special bus lines to public cemeteries to meet the needs for people's spending the Qingming Festival, which traditionally observed as a festival for worshipping ancestral graves in China. The Qingming Festival falls on April 4 or 5. (Xinhua/Hang Xingwei) Photo Gallery>>>

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