Here we are on a piece of flatland surrounded by rolling mountains, which local ethnic Yi people believe are sacred. Members of three families belonging to the same Jingu Rensuo Lineage of the ethnic Yi gather here for a religious ritual which begins with the men building an improvised stove and the women placing money on a piece of cloth. When everything is ready, a family elder counts the money, saying, “Three thousand yuan. Good.”
    That sum is enough to buy an ox, a pig and a chicken to be slaughtered for the ritual to help 16 drug addicts in the extended family rid themselves of drugs. The money, which is collected from the families, will be paid to the owner of the animals after the ritual. Then the ox and pig were slaughtered. Wearing ceremonial costumes embroidered with the Chinese character shou, meaning longevity, the lineage chieftain, Jingu Wuqian, announced that the Tiger’s Day ritual had begun. We notice that the chieftain has the animals’ gallbladders in his hand, and were told that these are regarded as auspicious.
    One by one, the heads of the families speak to the crowd, vehemently denouncing the evils of drugs. After that, the Bimo (sorcerer), the most respected in the lineage, made his appearance. Holding the chicken in his hands, he begins reciting ancient prayers that were totally beyond our comprehension.
    While the ritual is in session, the family’s 16 drug addicts sit on the ground, apart from the rest of the crowd. Four of them came back home the previous evening from a rehabilitation center. They say they are happy to be with their own folks. Some 100 drug addicts are in the center receiving compulsory medical treatments while leading a highly disciplined life. “On learning that we’re going back home,” one of them tells us, “all of them envy us.”
    It is now time for the drug addicts to take blood oaths against taking drugs again. The Bimo kills the chicken, and puts a few drops of the blood into 16 bowls that are full of wine, and then gives a bowl to each of the addicts.
    “Are you to take that evil thing again?” he asks them, one by one.
    “Never” is the answer from all.
    “Drink this blood wine,” the Bimo orders. “I hope after that you will be firm like rocks and your eyes will be brighter than the sun.”
    The addicts drink the blood wine, all at one gulp. One of them throws his bowl on the ground and breaks it into pieces. The others follow suit in the traditional way of vowing never to do a thing.
    Ethnic Yis are bound to their lineages throughout their lives, wherever they live. Jiari Muji, a doctoral student studying under Professor Zhuang Kongshao, has been living in Beijing for more than ten years. Despite that, he married an ethnic Yi woman at the request of his family in Yunnan Province. Blood oaths taken before one’s family oblige one to abide by them forever.  In the case of a drug addict, if the person picks up drugs again after taking a blood oath this way, the person will be an outcast in his family and live in humiliation until death. “Oaths are the most solemn, most serious commitments one makes, and therefore can never be changed,” Jiari Muji says. Moreover, oaths taken by the chieftain are binding for the entire lineage. Back in the 1930s, Communist-led Red Army troops passed through an ethnic Yi area in south Sichuan Province during the Long March - in fact a strategic retreat from their base in Jiangxi to northern Shaanxi, covering a distance of more than 12,500 kilometers. To win the confidence of the ethnic Yi people, Liu Bocheng, the Red Army’s chief of staff who was to become one of the ten marshals after the People’s Republic of China was founded, and Xiaoyedan, chieftain of the local ethnic Yi lineage, became sworn brothers after taking blood oaths in a ceremony. With the support of Xiaoyedan and his people, the Red Army troops were able to pass through the area without difficulty, and the enemy’s attempt to use the ethnic Yis against the army came to no avail.
   Before the Tiger’s Day ritual ended, a group of lineage elders begin carving crosses on rocks and painting the crosses red with chicken blood, supposedly to reinforce the execution of the oaths that have just been taken. While carving the patterns with hammers and chisels, they kept chanting impromptu verses to reaffirm their resolve to fight drug abuse to the end.