The official reason for Cora’s visit today is the first day of Zhongyuan Jie, the hungry ghost festival. Auntie Zeng says it’s when all the ghosts take a vacation from hell to visit earth for a month. The living are supposed to feed them and pray for them and make them offerings of things ghosts almost certainly don’t need anymore, like clothes and jewelry. But that’s only what Cora has seen from Auntie Zeng. Everything Cora knows about China has been filtered through her, so sometimes she’s not sure if something is true or if it’s just the way her aunt is. Cora imagines if she herself were
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