Fengshui (Geomancy)

Luck/Fortune/Superstition & Taboos

     This particularly Chinese concept may take some getting used to. Again, the younger generation isn't as attuned to older Chinese cultural traditions and are also more knowledgeable about Western culture so you may encounter this practice less and less in the future, but it is interesting and worth understanding.

      The concept of Fengshui (which literally means 'wind water') refers to the mystical belief in the geographical positioning of material objects in the physical life in such a way as to be harmonious with the spiritual life as well. In other words, if your bedroom doorway faces a bathroom at the end of the hall, this may be bad 'fengshui' or bad luck because of geographical superstitions dating back to a period when  some period of famine, drought or disease in Chinese society led some to try less practical or objective ways of belief as a means to cope with the uncontrollable forces in life and the world.

   Although there are too many taboos or superstitions to list here, another example of bad luck or superstition relates to renting an apartment where someone has recently passed away. A Taiwanese family, in general, will never occupy or rent an apartment or room where someone has recently died. You may wonder, well people die all the time in their apartments or homes, but people are still living in apartments all over the city. Basically, either the room is vacated for a period of months or years, or it is cleaned, renovated and re-rented/sold to a new family who is unaware that a death took place recently in that location. Furthermore, if one's business or health is failing, they may consult a 'geomancer' or kind of Chinese 'witch doctor'/fortune teller who, for a fee, will rearrange one's work/living space to make it more harmonious and to reveal any taboo behavior in one's current arrangements which may (most probably) be unknown to the owner/person hiring the geomancer.

     Death is a particularly unlucky or taboo subject, and is seldom talked about in a joking manner. Ghosts, evil and misfortune are all topics of deadly seriousness and respect and even the simple act of placing one's chopsticks in an upright, vertical manner in a bowl of rice (which has the appearance of the religious practice of placing upright incense sticks in an incense burner at funerals or ceremonies) will receive a quick response from anyone seated near you and a helpful correction to a horizontal position across the top of the bowl. The holiday 'Tomb Sweeping Day' even celebrates the cleaning of one's relative's tomb and is widely celebrated in Chinese society.