Beijing cemeteries received a record 2.25 million people over the Qingming Festival holiday, 430,000 people more than last year, according to the municipal government.

The tomb-sweeping service headquarters of the municipal government got reports from 75 graveyards showing visitor numbers from March 29 to April 6 were up 23.7 percent over the same period of last year.

The centuries-old Qingming Festival tradition of sweeping graves was a public holiday for the first time this year.

In cemeteries across the country, filial Chinese offered food, flowers and favorite items to the dead, before burning incense and paper money and bowing before memorial stones.

(Xinhua News Agency April 7, 2008)