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Chen Yun revealed a previously unknown detail: during the decade that Mao led the Chinese revolution from the wartime guerrilla base at Yan’an in Shaanxi province, his personal cooks followed a directive from the Party’s Central Committee to ensure that he ate chicken every day to help maintain his health (see here). The ancient Chinese writer Sima Qian said, ‘Though death befalls all men alike, it may be weightier than Mount Tai or lighter than a feather.’ To die for the people is weightier than Mount Tai, but to work for the fascists and die for the exploiters and oppressors is lighter than a feather. In his 1944 speech Serve the People 為人民服務, a eulogy for a Party martyr, Communist Party Chairman Mao Zedong said:Īll men must die, but death can vary in its significance.

Pheasant rooster wav tv#

(A popular TV adaptation was made on the basis of this story and Liu’s ‘Work Unit’ 單位 by Feng Xiaogang 馮小剛 in 1995.) The title of Liu’s novella is also a reference to the expression ‘Chicken Feathers and Garlic Skins’ 雞毛蒜皮, ‘insignificant things’ or ‘the makings of everyday life’.įor better or worse, the humble chicken also played a leading role in the ultimate success of the 1949 Chinese revolution. Sebastian Veg reminds me of Liu Zhenyun’s 劉震雲 celebrated 1992 novella, A World of Chicken Feathers 一地雞毛 (‘Peaux d’ail et plumes de poulet’ in Veg’s 2006 French translation), a detailed and moving fictional account of life in and the frustrations of a Chinese work unit prior to the 1992 wave of radical economic reform. It plays a role in such films as Ang Lee’s celebrated 1994 Eat Drink Man Woman 飲食男女 (see here for two recipes from the 100 dishes in the film that use chicken) and Meng Jinghui’s 孟京輝 2002 Chicken Poets 像雞毛一樣飛 (for a clip from the film, see here) as well as the Taiwan comic exchange or cross-talk, Chicken Feather Party 雞毛撢/雞毛黨), and in the 2008 play Chicken Feathers and Garlic Skins are No Small Matter 雞毛蒜皮沒小事. In popular culture, however, chicken remains a constant. (It lost further ground in 2003 when it was suspected that the civet cat may have been one of the origins of the SARS epidemic.) As contemporary commentators remark, however, ‘with the spread of more civilised habits and increased environmental awareness’ the dish in its original form is now little more than a fading memory for true gourmands. Said to have originated in Liantang Township 蓮塘鎮, Guangdong province, Dragon Tiger Phoenix Stew is traditionally made with snake 野蛇, cat (or civet) 野貓 and free-range chicken or pheasant 野雞/山雞 all caught in the wild. Dragon (snake), Tiger (civet) and Phoenix (chicken/ pheasant) Stew. Therefore, at the advent of the Year of the Rooster we should not forget the now-rare Dragon Tiger Phoenix Stew 龍虎鳳燴, something reserved for diehard supplicants at the Temple of the Five Viscera 祭五臟殿堂之徒, that is ‘foodies’. Such dishes include squeamish-inducing things like Raw Monkey Brain 生吃猴腦, Multi-course Snake Banquets 全蛇宴, or, just for the gustatory delight of it (since, although fish represents plenty, as in the saying ‘excess every year’ 年年有餘, the prawn is merely tangentially involved with New Year symbolism), the mouth-watering death throws of Drunken Prawns in Shaoxing Wine 紹興醉蝦. Dumplings with egg filling 蛋餃 are also a favourite, moreover, they link this traditional food to the Auspicious Rooster of the first day of the new year.ĭumplings aside, commentators on the groaning bounty of Chinese New Year meals may also refer to more recondite delicacies related to the Twelve Zodiac Animals 十二生肖. Dumplings made in the shape of traditional gold ingots 元寶 also offer the promise of future wealth and, family solidarity is celebrated as relatives and friends usually get together to made masses of dumplings for the meal eaten on New Year’s Eve 年夜飯. A homophone with jiaozi 交子 (‘midnight transition’), the dumpling symbolises the new year replacing the old 更歲交子. The dumpling 餃子, pronounced jiaozi, is one of the main foods enjoyed during New Year celebrations. For all of these reasons, the first day of the lunar new year in China is also known as ‘Rooster Day’ 雞日(the following days are named after the other eleven Zodiac Animals respectively).