Qingming Tomb-Sweeping Service Gains Popularity: 25-Year-Old Woman Bows a Hundred Times Daily.

With Qingming Festival approaching in mainland China, it is also the busiest time for tomb sweepers. Recently, a video titled “Post-2000s girl becomes a professional tomb sweeper after graduating from university, bowing hundreds of times a day and earning 4,000 yuan a month” has sparked attention. In the video, a young girl dressed in a black suit is seen wiping tombstones and bowing to offer flowers at a cemetery.

According to a report by “Beijing Youth Daily,” on April 2nd, several practitioners offering “tomb-sweeping service” were interviewed. The practitioners include post-2000s cemetery etiquette staff and post-2000s funeral shop owners.

One of the cemetery etiquette staff, Keke (pseudonym), provides free tomb-sweeping service at the cemetery where she works, but charges for flowers and offerings. Leading up to Qingming Festival, she sweeps the tombs of over a dozen deceased individuals every day, bowing hundreds of times a day. The 20-year-old funeral shop owner, Boss Mao, started receiving tomb-sweeping orders 15 days before Qingming Festival, charging based on distance and customizing offerings according to clients’ needs.

Keke, 25 years old this year, majored in Chinese Language and Literature in university. After graduating in 2023, she worked in cultural tourism planning. In October 2024, Keke joined the Eco-Memorial Park in Luoyang Fenghuang Mountain as a cemetery etiquette staff, responsible for tasks like “tomb-sweeping on behalf of family members.”

After joining the job, Keke found that she earns about 4,000 yuan per month.

Keke is part of a six-member tomb-sweeping team, all young people around the age of 25. In addition to sweeping tombs on behalf of family members, their daily work includes organizing and hosting burial ceremonies, guiding family members to consult on burial plots, and visiting the cemetery, among other tasks.

Keke admitted that initially, her family and friends were concerned about her job, fearing it might affect her marriage prospects. However, Keke herself is not worried about not being able to get married.

Keke’s colleague, Zhou Jingyao, was born in Luoyang in 2002, previously studied directing, and is currently a member of the tomb-sweeping team.

Regarding tomb-sweeping services on behalf of family members, different netizens have different opinions. Some believe that tomb-sweeping should be done personally to be meaningful, while others feel that this service indeed meets the needs of some people.

In recent years, with the accelerated urbanization process, many young people living away from home are unable to return to their hometowns to sweep tombs themselves, leading to the gradual rise of the tomb-sweeping industry in various parts of China. On social media platforms, posts offering tomb-sweeping services have been made not only in Luoyang and Tangshan but also in cities like Beijing, Wuhan, Dalian, and Xiamen in recent days, with fees ranging from hundreds to thousands of yuan. Most of the posters are young people engaged in the funeral industry.

Boss Mao, a 20-year-old who runs a funeral shop in Tangshan, has been in the funeral industry for two years. Boss Mao stated that his team currently has over ten members and also provides services such as tomb sweeping, arranging offerings, and more. “Our clients are mainly family members who are unable to personally visit and sweep the graves of the deceased due to being away from home.”

Boss Mao mentioned that he has faced criticism for being involved in the funeral industry, with some relatives questioning his abilities due to his young age. However, he has not given up. Despite the modest current income of his shop, he is still willing to stay in this line of work.