Mid-Autumn Festival - Hong Kong, October 6, 2006

David and I checked out the Mid-Autumn Festival celebrations Friday October 6, 2006. Very cool. The Festival falls on the 15th day of the 8th lunar month of the Lunar calendar which is full moon. The Mid-Autumn Festival is one of the two most important holidays (Chinese New Year the other) and it is legal holiday in several countries. It was a holiday here on Saturday (thanks for nothing) because people traditionally work Monday through Saturday.
Farmers celebrate the end of the summer harvesting season. Asian family members and friends will gather to admire the bright mid-autumn harvest moon, and eat moon cakes and pomeloes together. Moon cakes are made of ground lotus and sesame seed paste, egg-yolk and other ingredients. They sell these moon cakes everywhere (even Starbucks). We tried many varieties and did not care for any of them unfortunately! Along with the cakes, shops sell colored Chinese paper lanterns in the shapes of animals, and more recently, in the shapes of airplanes and space ships. Other customs include burning incense, planting sweet-olive trees, lighting lanterns on towers, and fire dragon dances which we saw!
Moon worshipping dates back to the ancient Xia, and Shang Dynasties (2000 BCE-1066 BCE). The festival also commemorates a 14th Century uprising against the Mongols. Because the Mongols did not eat moonckaes (and I understand why!), the rebels wrote the call to revolt on pieces of paper and embedded them in cakes that they smuggled to their compatriots.
Enough about the history! We went to the festivities at Victoria Park. They had traditional dancing, singing, opera and these volcano-like things that had a light show going on. There was a place to hang fish, or other animal shaped wishes. Here is the link to our pictures http://www.kodakgallery.com/Slideshow.jsp?mode=fromshare&Uc=hggnkpd.6m74lq7h&Uy=-ytm20j&Ux=1
Then we went in search of the fire dragon. It was quite a draw and the streets were packed. The idea is to make a lot of noise and burn incense to scare away the ghost of the dead. When we finally saw the dragon, our eyes stung and we could hardly breathe due to all the incense. It was a long long long thing of wire and straw with burning incense stuck it –anyone think fire hazard??? However, those next to us thought the most amazing sight was me in a skirt on David’s shoulders trying to film it all! Poor David’s shoulders! We took some video of the whole festivities posted on YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo3YYZXN1pA Check it out!