Photo: VCG

People in China are resorting to modern technology such as live broadcast, websites and even 5G to pay their respect to deceased family members and friends around this year's Qingming Festival, as the lingering effects of the coronavirus prevented them from carrying out memorial activities in person. 

Many people also took part in online memorial ceremonies for people who sacrificed during the coronavirus outbreak.

China's Qingming Festival, also known as Tomb-sweeping Day, is usually a time when Chinese people visit the graves of the deceased and carry out memorial activities such as sprucing up the graves, burning paper money and making food offerings. 

This year, however, many people can't carry out those activities in person, after Chinese cemeteries limited the number of people entitled to visit the graves at a time when the danger of the coronavirus has not been eliminated. 

Many Chinese cemetery runners sent staff to pay their respects to the deceased on behalf of their customers, holding memorial activities such as cleaning the graves and putting flowers. They showed the ceremony to customers through online livestreams or videos. 

"More than 1,000 customers have entrusted us to do tomb-sweeping on behalf of them on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. That compared to almost zero orders for such services during the past Qingming Festivals," a senior executive member surnamed Shao at a Shanghai-based cemetery Haiwanyuan told the Global Times on Saturday. 

According to Shao, staff at their cemetery would film the memorial ceremony and send them to the customers afterwards. Upon their customers' requests, they sometimes livestreamed the ceremony live using the WeChat live broadcast. 

Many Chinese cemeteries also rolled out the service of "cloud tomb-sweeping," allowing customers to pay their respects to deceased families members online. 

A 58-year-old Shanghai-based resident surnamed Dai told the Global Times that since she missed the time for making tomb-sweeping appointments at Xianheyuan cemetery, where her father is buried, she commemorated her father at online tomb-sweeping platform Fannian through activities like sending flowers and leaving commemoration comments. 

"It's the same tradition but carried out in a different way," she said, adding that she would still visit the cemetery later to do tomb-sweeping in person.  

Some cutting-edge technologies were also used in the online tomb-sweeping services this year. A cemetery in Jiaxing of East China's Zhejiang Province has set up a touchscreen which, backed by 5G technologies, allow mourners to carry out fast memorial ceremonies online, according to media reports. 

Aside from paying their respects to family members and friends, many Chinese people also commemorated those who sacrificed during the coronavirus pandemic on the Internet. As of 2:11 pm on Saturday, the post "commemorating martyrs who sacrificed in fight against COVID-19 and those who died of the disease," on Sina Weibo had 1.1 billion views and 5.68 million discussions, with many netizens saying "paying respect to the heroes." 

Some netizens also blessed those who passed away during the coronavirus by sending online commemorating articles, including candles and flowers at online memorial halls for those who sacrificed their lives during the outbreak. 

Global Times