Taiwan's seventh day of mourning

As relief efforts continued in the wake of Taiwan's most deadly typhoon in 50 years, relatives of the dead — estimated to be at least 500 — performed public grieving rituals Saturday.

Taiwanese media was full of heartbreaking scenes. The Apple Daily ran a photo of mourners in a mountain valley in the south, with the headline "Too late to say 'I love you'." At the former site of Hsiaolin Village, anguished relatives called out to the dead and burned incense and "ghost" money, as Buddhist monks rang bells. (See CNN video footage).

Following local custom, Saturday was the "first seventh" (tou qi) — the seventh day after a tragic death, when relatives call home the wandering, confused spirits of the dead and help them cross over to the afterlife. Such rituals will be repeated every seventh day for several weeks, according to an expert quoted by Kyodo News.

Hsiaolin Village was buried last weekend, after torrential rains pounded mountains. That loosened mud and rocks that swept into the valley below, over villagers, their houses and an elementary school. Some 380 people died, according to the Associated Press.

Elsewhere, others were swept into surging rivers and drowned. The Associated Press said 7,000 homes were destroyed in the typhoon; more than 20,000 residents of mountain areas in the south have been evacuated and another 4,200 remain stranded — cut off by damage to roads.

http://www.globalpost.com/notebook/china-and-its-neighbors/090816/the-seventh-day