Kaifeng Iron Flower: When Millennium Sparks Bloom in the Night Sky

Late spring in Kaifeng is still a bit chilly. On the training ground of Wansuishanwuxiacheng, crowds of people are craning their necks in anticipation. Clutching my CNY 30 ticket, I mingled in the bustling crowd, watching the twilight gradually devour the clouds on the horizon, waiting for a romantic encounter with a thousand-year-old intangible cultural heritage. As the first drumbeat tore through the air, the performers, dressed in gray-blue traditional costumes, filed in. The flower sticks in their hands glowed bronze in the light of the bonfire. As the sticks moved up and down with the rhythm of the drums, sparks burst out at the moment of collision, like silhouettes of ancient ancestors dancing around a stove. This is the prelude to the performance—a tribute to the fire. The sound of ironware colliding gradually became more intense, and the sparks changed from sporadic jumps to a prairie fire, as if the torch of agricultural civilization had traveled through thousands of years, illuminating the land reclaimed by the ancestors, and also illuminating our awe of traditional skills. The climax came when night completely fell. The molten iron churning in the melting furnace had reached a high temperature of 1,000 degrees Celsius. Under the beating of the flower sticks in the hands of the craftsmen, it poured into the night sky like a golden waterfall. At the moment when the 1,600°C molten iron met the night wind, it burst into millions of brilliant sparks, like a meteor shower passing through the Milky Way, and like a fire tree blooming in the night sky. When the iron flowers fell, they gave off tiny golden lights, turning into fireflies on the ground, reminiscent of the poem, "When drunk, I don't know that the sky is in the water, and a boat full of clear dreams presses the Milky Way." Amid the exclamations from the audience, I heard an old man beside me muttering to himself: "This is what the older generation called 'a night sky of fire trees and silver flowers'." The firelight illuminated the bronze faces of the performers. Their bare arms were muscular in the firelight, and every swing of the stick carried the weight of a thousand pounds. This skill, which originated in the Northern Song Dynasty, has been passed down for thousands of years, and is still blooming with vitality in Kaifeng. As a national intangible cultural heritage, Iron Flower is not only a visual feast, but also a flowing history of civilization—it has witnessed the romance created by ancient craftsmen in iron smelting, carries the auspicious wish of "the more flowers are struck, the more prosperous they become", and embodies the craftsmanship of generations of craftsmen who are not afraid of high temperatures and strive for excellence. Practical information tips: The performance is located in Kaifeng Wansuishanwuxiacheng. There are two shows every day at 19:30 and 21:00 (it is recommended to go to the 21:00 show because there are fewer people and it is easier to find a seat). You can watch the show with a ticket of CNY 30. Remember to enter the venue one hour in advance and choose a location in the center of the venue to feel the shock of the iron flowers passing over your head. It is cool at night, so you can prepare a light coat to allow your senses to be fully immersed in comfort. When the last iron flower was extinguished in the night, the residual warmth still lingered in my heart. This half-hour performance is a poem of iron and fire, a dialogue between ancient and modern times. Those sparks blooming in the night sky not only illuminated the night in Kaifeng, but also allowed us to see that traditional skills have never grown old. They are rejuvenated in the perseverance of craftsmen and continue the legend in the exclamations of viewers. If you ask me what Chinese romance is, I think it is probably this iron flower that travels through thousands of years, using the hottest way to write the grandest blessings to the world in the night sky.