This is an old ritual made new in modern cities.
At 6 a.m. one Saturday morning,
I joined a group of Buddhists
who I’d met on Chinese social media
at a Shanghai fish market.
By 10 a.m., hundreds of the city’s inhabitants
had gathered to liberate 3,000 euros worth of fish
that we bought that morning.
The traditional East Asian Buddhist practice
of freeing captive animals has flourished in recent years
with the rise of social media and the ease of online money donation.
Mountains of fish are now being thrown into the city’s waterways,
creating a new economy for fishermen
and a sense of meaning in a city of 25 million people.
I grew up 5,700 miles away in Birmingham,
the second largest city in the UK,
which is now home to over 187 different nationalities.
I was the only white child in my nursery class,
and our school calendar was rewritten with religious rituals
celebrating the diverse cultural and religious roots of my friends,
and bringing new ideas, fun, food, and art into the classroom.
I grew up to be a photographer,
and over the last two years,
I’ve been observing such ritual celebrations of life
in the world way beyond my classroom.
My journey took me to France, Italy, Scotland, America,
and in 2013, I moved to China.
By the middle of 2009,
the number of people living in urban areas
surpassed the number of people living in rural areas.
And since then, the world has become even more urban.
Every year, an area the size of Britain disappears under concrete.
Studying how city life is changing
is key to understanding our past and our future.
Today, I would like to share with you
how religious rituals are booming in Shanghai,
one of the fastest-growing cities in the world.
Living in Shanghai for the last three years,
I’ve witnessed how, through ritual,
people are breathing art into sterile urban structures,
and creating meaning in the dense urban spaces.
This is a Shanghai subway map in 1993;
and this is it just 20 years later.
It is now the largest metro system in the world.
This network exemplifies the immense and dramatic growth of a city,
and how it’s changed dramatically its economic, geographical structure
and connected its inhabitants.
Shanghai is known
for its economic dynamism and architectural daring.
Super Brand shopping mall is the largest shopping mall in Asia.
The Thai company that owns the mall
established a Buddhist shrine outside the front door.
The passers-by who come past the mall
perform rituals
that bring meaning to this sterile urban landscape.
This international business area was farmland before the 1980s.
The regular rituals were said to have improved the mall’s business.
Rituals in China are officially restricted to five:
Daoism, Buddhism, Protestantism, Catholicism, and Islam.
In recent years,
traditional Chinese practices have seen a growth
with the encouragement of the state,
and people search for meaning in new urban environments.
I celebrated my first Chinese New Year with the Zhang family.
They laid a table of the best wine and foods for the ancestors.
Many people in China have chosen to bring back these traditional customs
after Chairman Mao tried to stamp them out.
During the Cultural Revolution,
many different religious buildings were used for other purposes,
such as laundries or hospitals.
Today, the re-established Shanghai Daoist Institute
is one of the three learning centers in China.
The 50 students from rural areas around Shanghai study for six hours a day
and meditate in a specially ventilated and climate-controlled room.
Despite religions in China being officially restricted to five,
alternative spiritualities, popular beliefs, and practices,
as well as unofficial expressions of the same five recognized religions,
are all flourishing, bringing new experience to city-dwellers.
Easter 2016 –
I joined, in the Russian consulate, the Orthodox community
which is not an official religion in China.
This is the first time
that both Chinese and foreigners were allowed to attend.
Throughout Shanghai’s rich history,
migrants from China and afar have brought new ideas
that weave into the urban fabric.
On the coldest day in Shanghai for over 40 years, last year,
I joined a group of migrant workers
to eat a bowl of hot soup after the Protestant service
that there was held in a factory.
The dedication to their faith, and commitment to the community,
as well as the promise of a hearty bowl of noodle soup,
fueled them to stand for two hours in minus eight degrees.
The new Shanghai Disneyland development
meant that the factory would soon be destroyed,
and the community was looking for a new factory
to hold their services in.
Rituals show how in urban spaces people are infusing meaning
despite when space is constantly destroyed, rebuilt, and repurposed.
Pastor Dai is 99.
She’s the oldest woman priest in Shanghai.
In 1981, she was the first woman to be ordained in the city.
Pastor Dai’s one-room home next to the church
is full of most of her life’s possessions.
It is a place of regular gathering and feasting.
The meetings in her room preserve the whole history she is part of
and inspire young followers.
Fu Shou Yuan is one of the main cemeteries in Shanghai.
The company that owns and maintains it is listed on the Hong Kong stock market.
A tall tower in the middle of the cemetery houses rooms and rooms upon cabinets
that are sold at a high price to contain people’s ancestors’ ashes.
At the main Chinese festivals,
people bring ornaments and food for the ancestors
that are represented in each cabinet by a photographic portrait.
Rituals are at the heart of what it means to be human:
they mark the passing of time and bring art to everyday life.
They often allow us to express without words,
just as photography transmits through images.
Ritual – the passing of ritual from country to country,
enables newcomers to make home.
In a luxurious compound, Indian women take it in turns
to host celebrations of the major Hindu festivals in their apartments.
The community chose this compound
due to its close proximity to the Huangpu River.
Here Hindus say their daily prayers to this majestic view,
mirroring the pivotal role of the holy Ganges river to Hindus in India.
Indian yogis lead a fire ceremony for Chinese devotees on Chongming Island.
The growth of yoga has encouraged many different Chinese
to follow different practices such as this.
Rituals have enabled the transmission of various faiths and ideas
throughout this huge city throughout its history.
New and old practices are unfolding side-by-side
for the very first time alongside each other.
Based on long-standing roots,
new spiritual practice is growing in the dense urban spaces
that are home to most of the world’s population.
What I’ve discovered on my journey from Birmingham to Shanghai
is that people are helping to make our super-diverse cities
a web of creative communities.
From the fish market to the factory,
Shanghai’s residents are transforming the urban experience.
Rituals reflect contemporary life, desires, and fashions.
They enable new ideas and traditions to be passed
from country to country and from generation to generation.
They introduce new ideas, breakdown cultural and social boundaries,
and carve out private, sacred space in the flux of everyday life.
Thank you.
(Applause)
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