Page 272 - A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols BIG Book

A-Z 265
It stands alone and does not change,
Goes round and does not weary.
It is capable of being the mother of the world.
I know not its name
So I style it ‘the way’.
(Tr. D. C. Lau, Penguin Books, 1963, p. 82)

Onion

cong

The onion often serves as a symbol for ‘clever’ (cong). There is one particular kind of
onion known as ‘stag-onion’ which a pregnant woman should wear at her waist if she
wants a son. Chinese vegetarians do not eat onions. If onions are put under the bridal bed,
the husband is unable to deflower his bride. The fingers of a woman are compared to
green onions. Women who go to the onion field on the 15th day of the 1st month and dig
out onions, will get good husbands.

Open, To

kai

‘Opening’ and ‘concealing’ are related concepts in Chinese. Anything that runs counter
to good moral custom should be ‘concealed’. One of the key concepts of Confucian
ethics is chi = shame (the basic meaning of the character is ‘to stare hard or fixedly at
something’).
Sexual matters are neither openly displayed nor described in plain language: they
are nei-bu = ‘belonging to the interior’. Pictures and metaphors may, however, reveal
what language prefers to veil. Thus ‘breaking the seal’ refers to defloration; going with a
prostitute is ‘opening the heart’; an orgasm is described as ‘opening of joy’. If you make
love twice in the same evening ‘the plum blossom is opening for the second time’.
‘Opening thrice’ refers to three very specialised ways of making love.