China News Service, Shijiazhuang, June 13th. Title: Visiting Hebei "Intangible Cultural Heritage" Sachets: Making Traditional Customs Healthy and Fashionable
Author Li Xiaowei
The Dragon Boat Festival is here, the sachet is pretty.
As the Chinese traditional festival Dragon Boat Festival is approaching, Wu Xiaoni, the inheritor of the Hebei Provincial Intangible Cultural Heritage Project "Cangxiang Jade Screen Bag", is rushing to make Dragon Boat Festival sachets with his apprentices.
I saw him grind the well-proportioned Chinese medicine finely, put the medicine powder into an empty tea bag, and put it into a colorful bag. Not long after, a few small and lovely sachets were made.
The 81-year-old Wu Xiaoni is the honorary dean of the Jingxing County Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Shijiazhuang City. She has been making "Cangxiang Jade Screen Bags" for more than 30 years.
When the author walked into his studio, the fragrance of medicine was permeated, and the sachets of various colors, shapes and sizes were pleasing to the eye.
Wearing a sachet is one of the traditional customs of the Dragon Boat Festival. The sachet is usually filled with some aromatic Chinese herbal medicines, which have the effects of fragrant fragrance, repelling insects, avoiding pests, and preventing diseases.
In Wu Xiaoni's view, putting sachets on children during the Dragon Boat Festival not only meant to avoid evil and exorcise the plague, but also a little bit of decoration.
"People of all ages can wear the'Cangxiang Jade Screen Bag' all year round, and the effect is better during the Dragon Boat Festival." Wu Xiaoni said, around the Dragon Boat Festival, until the beginning of autumn and the summer, the time is the hottest of the year. It is also the most humid season.
"Cangxiang Jade Screen Bag" can play the role of fragrant turbidity, refreshing brain and resuscitation, relieving heat and dampness, invigorating the spleen and stomach, and helping people to spend this time in a healthy way.
"Cangxiang Jade Screen Bag" is an improvement based on Wu Xiaoni's "scented bag" handed down by her ancestors.
He said that the history of "scented bag" can be traced back to the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, and it has been passed down to 9 generations for more than 200 years.
Since taking over the "scented bag", Wu Xiaoni has made improvements to the ancestral formula by consulting information and painstaking research, and named it "Cangxiang Yuping Bag". At present, the prescription has used more than a dozen Chinese medicines such as Astragalus, Atractylodes, and Mint.
Due to its good medicinal effects, "Cangxiang Yuping Bag" was selected into the fifth batch of provincial intangible cultural heritage list in Hebei Province.
"In Jingxing, almost all adults and children have worn this thing." Wu Xiaoni said. During the day, you can wear it on the Tanzhong acupoint on her chest or on her wrist; take it off at night and put it next to her pillow.
It can also be hung indoors or in a car, and it also has a medicinal effect.
Depending on the age, the amount of sachets will vary to achieve the best results.
In the past, the "Cangxiang Jade Screen Bag" was wrapped in gauze and wrapped in red cloth, which was simple and practical but lacked aesthetics.
In recent years, as people’s aesthetic level has improved, in order to better promote it, Wu Xiaoni meticulously packs it and purchases a variety of small and cute outer bags, which are buckled with five-color silk threads and equipped with tassels to make the sachets become exquisite Crafts, while maintaining the price of tens of yuan each.
"In the past, people bought this sachet purely for disease prevention, but now many people buy it for ornaments and pendants." Wu Xiaoni said with a smile.
In recent years, with people’s emphasis on traditional culture and the rise of "Chinese medicine fever", Wu Xiaoni’s sachets have become more and more popular. People from Shanxi, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and other places also come to buy them, especially around the Dragon Boat Festival. .
Every time she participates in traditional festivals such as the Dragon Boat Festival and intangible cultural heritage exhibitions, Wu Xiaoni can sell hundreds of sachets.
Wu Xiaoni, who has reached her old age, continues to research and develop sachets, and has formulated plans for the next few years, including training more young apprentices.
He said that young people know more about fashion and have more new ideas. "If there are apprentices, they propose to open an online store or live broadcast the goods. I believe they can better pass on this intangible heritage."
The Dragon Boat Festival is an important window for people to experience traditional culture.
Wu Xiaoni hopes that more people can understand and recognize the characteristic Chinese medicine therapy and traditional Chinese culture through the Dragon Boat Festival, so that Chinese medicine can better protect people's health.
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