In Dubai, spread Chinese culture

Source: People's Daily Overseas Edition

In January 2022, Dong Juan played the guqin song "Flowing Water" at the Dubai Talent Show. Courtesy of respondents

Traditional Chinese Baya includes Qinqi calligraphy and painting, poetry and hop tea, and each word represents a way of life of the ancient literati. The guqin is the first of the Eight Yas, and the sound is long, quiet and peaceful. In 2003, the guqin was selected into the world's list of "Representative Works of Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage of Mankind", and the cultural value of the guqin with a long history of more than 3,000 years has been recognized by the world.

"String Bottom Pine Wind v. Ancient and Modern", now the Shuishui Ting Qin Tea House has crossed time and space to play the sound of simple and profound Chinese elegant culture in Dubai, UNITED Arab Emirates.

Bonded with the piano because of the piano

Dong Juan, a overseas Chinese in Dubai, studied under Ms. Yu Qinqin, a guqin player, educator and representative inheritor of the guqin of the Non-Heritage Shu School, and founded the Shuishuiting Qin Tea House in Dubai in 2018. The society is named after Shuishui, which originates from the Tang Dynasty Bai Juyi's "Qin Tea" poem: "Qin Li knows and hears only Shui Shui, and the old tea is Mengshan Mountain." ”

Dong Juan said: "'ShuiShui' was originally an ancient song, and Mengshan is also the hometown, and there is no more suitable name than Shuishui Pavilion. The Qing Dynasty poet Nalan Rongruo also had a water pavilion in his home, which has always been a place where he and the literati and scholars chanted poems and sang and sang. I hope that the Shuishuiting Qin Tea House can also become a gathering place for local piano friends and tea friends. ”

"I don't know what to do, I go deeper." Recalling her encounter with the guqin, Dong Juan said: "More than ten years ago, when I was hanging out in a Shanghai tea mall, I overheard the sound of the guqin coming from the CD player. I still remember that it was a collection of the guqin taidou Gong Yi and the flute player Luo Shoucheng's piano collection "Yunshui Yin". At the moment, I was deeply attracted and could not extricate myself. Since then, Guqin has not left my life. ”

The establishment of the Shuishuiting Qin Tea House stems from Dong Juan's love for the guqin, and also from the strong interest of the Chinese in Dubai in the guqin. Dong Juan said: "There are now more than 20 Guqin students in the Qin Tea Club, the youngest is less than 6 years old, they all learned about the Shuishui Pavilion through word of mouth, and fell in love with the Guqin here. Learn the guqin well, kung fu outside the violin. In class, I often explain to the students the story behind the piano music, the bleakness of 'Jiang Feng Fishing Fire on Sleep', the good story of 'Alpine Flowing Water Seeking Zhiyin', and the high purity of 'Plum Blossom Flying Down and Three Lanes', only by reading the deep meaning can the real piano sound be played. ”

Li Xue, an overseas Chinese in Dubai, has loved the guqin since childhood. In January 2020, she met Dong Juan on the recommendation of a friend and embarked on the road of learning the piano. She said: "Teacher Dong's song "Gull Heron Forgetting Machine" led me to the piano road, from the introductory "Autumn Wind Words" to the famous "Plum Blossom Three Alleys", I have been learning the piano for more than two years, and I have learned many repertoire. The fingering of playing the piano can be consolidated through practice, but how to penetrate the artistic conception of ancient music is the subject of a lifelong study of the piano. ”

Traditional Chinese music conveys Confucian thought and pursues the root of enlightenment. Dong Juan said: "As the oldest plucked instrument in China, the guqin epitomizes the national characteristics of the Chinese nation. Subtlety and elegance are reflected in all aspects of the fingering and pronunciation of the guqin. The afterglow of the chant under the fingers, like the yangyang rivers, brings the ancient thoughts together. 'The heart of the piano is also, and the piano is also chanted, so the heart is also chanted.' The worries of ancient and modern times drifted away with the sound of the piano. ”

National voices The world is connected

"The swordsman looks at the border and thinks of how bitter he is." Many overseas Chinese in Dubai use literary and artistic activities to dispel nostalgia. Shuishuiting Qin Tea House has organized many offline art sets and 2 online art sets. Dong Juan recalled: "Yaji follows the Tradition of Sichuan Guqin and opens with the "Spring Night Feast Peach and Plum Garden Sequence". In the early 1950s, famous Chinese music historians Yang Yinliu and Xia Yifeng sang Li Bai's biansai poem "Guan Shanyue" into the guqin. At an elegant episode, I played this song "Guan Shan Yue" for everyone. After the song, the thoughts were long, which resonated, and everyone talked about homesickness. Although we are in another country, we have always inherited Chinese culture. ”

In January 2022, the 8th UAE Overseas Chinese Spring Festival Gala program "Sword and Guts Qin Heart" participated in the 8th UAE Overseas Chinese Spring Festival Gala program in 2022, and the piano tone of "Flowing Water" was undulating, and the martial arts moves were frequent.

Dong Juan said: "Dubai is a miracle city in the desert, and water is even more precious in the desert. As a classic guqin song, "Flowing Water" expresses the philosophical idea of the fusion of man, nature and the universe in traditional Chinese culture. As the soul and essence of Chinese music, it was engraved on the gold record of the Us Voyager probe, and it reverberated in the vast space day and night, looking for the companionship between the universes. The sound of the piano is like water, sometimes like a mountain stream, sometimes like a torrential wave, turning into a waterfall and a spring from the East, just like the Dubai Chinese, but it can be rigid and soft, self-improvement, inheriting the East and creating miracles. ”

Recently, Dong Juan was invited to shoot a cultural series organized by the Dubai Ministry of Culture of the United Arab Emirates, elegant Hanfu and ancient piano sounds, fluttering in the high-tech Dubai Museum of the Future. Dong Juan sighed: "The filming staff of the program are all foreigners, and they give the most original and direct feedback on the guqin. The director from Albania was impressed by the sound of the guqin and excitedly said to the museum guide, 'I was amazed by the sound of this instrument, which is simply unparalleled.' If you hear it, it will be very memorable. At that moment, I felt very proud, and I realized even more that the nation is the world. ”

Tea friends are in the same vein

In addition to the guqin, tea is also an indispensable part of Dong Juan's life. She studied under Lin Zhi, a well-known tea culture expert in China, and carried forward what she learned in Dubai. Dong Juan said: "The Shuishui Tingqin Tea Club has set up tea art classes in phases, with 12 lessons and four or five students in one session. From tea culture to the brewing and tasting of the six major tea categories, the pavilion has attracted 7 students to participate, including many from Russia, Tajikistan and other countries. ”

The Chinese tea ceremony has a long history and has always pursued the four realms of "harmony, tranquility, ease and truth". At one of the tea parties, these four words of truth are vividly reflected. Dong Juan explained: "The tea ceremony arrangement pays attention to the 'consistent placement of the real seat inside and outside', and pursues sincerity, truthfulness and true knowledge. 'Pleasant and also, pleasant also, paddle also. 'A pot, a cup, a flower, a self-consistent tea party can make the originally standing tea soup flow in the space. After class, I will ask students to reset the tea party at home, and everyone will follow the norms and show their characteristics. ”

At this year's Women's Day tea art activities, Dong Juan and four students brought a four-season tea exhibition with the theme of spring, summer, autumn and winter. Dong Juan said: "The four students brewed representative teas in spring, summer, autumn and winter, according to the tea picking time, spring like green tea, summer white tea, autumn drinking oolong, winter partial ripe Pu. For foreign friends, several teas on the scene are almost unheard of. They took to the stage to taste tea and explore the different charms of the four seasons of tea. ”

Xu Ting, a student in charge of the autumn tea exhibition, said: "In the autumn high season, a cup of oolong is more solemn. From the leaves of a tree to the aroma coming from the teacup, the color and fragrance of the tea made the audience linger. They took turns tasting the tea of the four seasons, asked about the precautions for making tea, and said that they would personally brew tea after returning home and taste the charm of their own tea leaves. ”

"The seven strings are good friends, and the two ears are confidants." In the Shuishuiting Qin Tea House, the Qin tea tastes the same way and accompanies it. Dong Juan said: "The matter of the Qin tea book, the way of the Qin is also the way of tea. The only way for Chinese tea ceremony cultivation is to cultivate oneself and pursue oneself, and 'the purpose outside the taste, the meaning outside the rhyme, and the sound outside the string' is the essence of the profound artistic conception of the guqin. In the future, I hope that more people will understand and fall in love with the Chinese guqin and Chinese tea ceremony through the Water Pavilion. (Yang Ning, Li Wenjie)

People's Daily Overseas Edition ( 2022-08-29 Issue 06)