Times have changed: Qingming Festival and paper iPads and iPhones

The Qingming festival, also known as Tomb Sweeping and Pure Brightness festival, marks the beginning of spring in China and is also celebrated by visiting ancestors' graves.  Traditionally, Chinese offer flowers, food, and paper money to their departed relatives.  This year, it will be held on the 4th of April.
 
A colleague of mine in Shanghai said that today's updated version of visiting the graves also includes offering up paper cutouts of girls, and paper iPads and paper iPhones.  If anything, this reflects the influence of the cult that is Apple in the great Middle Kingdom.  Everyone is enamored with the iPad and iPhone (surprisingly, she didn't mention the iPod).  Both are so revered that today's generation believe that the earlier generations (up to more than five decades ago) would appreciate owning one in the next life as well.


iStore, East Nanjing Road, Shanghai

 
She told me that one of the more popular jokes being tossed around was someone asking how their grandfathers and great-grandfathers would know how to use the fabled Apple device.  The punchline?  Steve Jobs will teach them.