{"id":141,"date":"2026-05-23T08:39:39","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T08:39:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cloudlanddao.xyz\/wenhua-zhai\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T08:39:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T08:39:39","slug":"wenhua-zhai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cloudlanddao.xyz\/en\/wenhua-zhai\/","title":{"rendered":"I did this overseas because I owed a \"cultural debt\""},"content":{"rendered":"

People often ask me:\"Do you make money by doing traditional culture overseas? Is the track too narrow?\"<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

To be honest, most of the friends who ask this question have good intentions. But every time I hear it, I am reminded of that late night ten years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The question that makes me sleepless<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

When I first arrived overseas ten years ago, I was like many Chinese - busy adapting to the new environment, working hard, and learning the language. Life is fulfilling, but I always feel like something is missing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until one time when I attended a friend\u2019s gathering, a second-generation Chinese kid stood in front of me and asked me in fluent English:\"My grandma said that our family has to worship Tai Sui every Spring Festival. What do you believe? Why do you Chinese worship everything?\"<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I opened my mouth and found that I couldn't explain it at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s not that English is not good enough. yesI don't know myself<\/strong>\u3002<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know that red envelopes are given out during the Spring Festival, paper is burned during the Qingming Festival, and my mother said that I should wear red in the year of my birth year - butWhy<\/strong>? What's the rationale behind these things? I have no idea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At that moment I suddenly realized something:Our generation of overseas Chinese is experiencing a silent cultural eradication.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is \"cultural debt\"?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Later I started to study systematically. From eight-character numerology to Ziwei Dou Shu, from Feng Shui to Liu Yao, from Taoist classics to folk rituals. The more I learn, the more I discover\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It turns out that behind each of these \"old rules\" passed down from generation to generation, there is a complete philosophical system.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tai Sui is not a \"superstition\", it is the product of ancient astronomical observations - the period of Jupiter around the sun is about 12 years. The ancients called Jupiter the \"year star\", and its movement in the direction of the earthly branches every year formed the concept of \"Tai Sui in the new year\". Worshiping Tai Sui is essentially a reverence for the laws of heaven and earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Burning paper during Qingming Festival is not simply \"burning money to the dead\". Paper money is a substitute for \"silk\". The whole ceremony includes the Confucian ethics of filial piety, the Taoist worldview of yin and yang, and the folk attitude towards life that \"death is like life.\"<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eight-character numerology is not a trick of fortune tellers. It was born out of the yin-yang and five-element theory of the \"Book of Changes\" and has the same origin as traditional Chinese medicine - traditional Chinese medicine treats the body and fortune telling uses the same underlying logic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our ancestors have studied these things for thousands of years. By our generation, almost all of it has been lost.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I'm not being alarmist - just find an overseas Chinese friend around you and ask him:<\/p>\n\n\n\n