DongZhi Festival (Mid Winter)

DongZhi Festival ocuur around December. During Dongzhi, the sunshine is weakest and daylight is shortest. The origins of this festival can be traced back to the Yin and Yang philosophy of balance and harmony in the cosmos. After this celebration, there will be days with longer daylight hours and therefore an increase in positive energy flowing in.

Traditionally, the Dongzhi Festival is also a time for the family to get together. One activity that must done in this Festival is making and eatimg Tangyuan.

Tangyuan are made of glutinuous rice flour and sometimes brightly coloured. Each family member receives Tang Yuan base on their age. The flour balls may be plain or stuffed. They are cooked in a sweet soup with both the ball and the soup served in one bowl.

QI Qiao(Qixi) JIe: Chinese Valentine Day

Qixi is fall on 7th day of the 7th lunar month in the Chinese calendar. That is a very romantic story about this festival. The 7th daughter of Emperor of Heaven name “Zhinü” and an orphaned cowherd known as “Niulang”. However, The Emperor separate them by forced his daughter to star of Vega and the cowherd move to Star of Altair. They are only allowed to meet each other only once a year on the day of 7th day of 7th lunar month in bridge that build by pied magpie between 2 star.



Chinese believed that if girl pray to moon at this time, they will be bless by Zhinü to get their truth love.

Please refer following link for more details:
http://chinesefood.about.com/od/foodfestivals/a/chinavalentine.htm
http://blog.youxu.info/2007/08/18/qi-xi-chinese-valentines-day/

Ancestor Day

Ancestor Day is known as Qing Ming in Chinese and it usually fall on 5th of April of Chinese Calendar. Qing Ming is the time to remember the dead ancestor and more important is period to pay respect to one's deceased ancestors and family members.

During QingMing, people will slightly sweeping the tombs, then people will offer food, flowers and favorites of the dead, then burn incense and paper money and bow before the memorial tablet.

KItchen God Festival

Before the new year eve, at the 23rd day of the 12th month in a year on the lunar calendar is called "off year", (Xiaonian in Chinese). It is the day on which the folk people offer sacrifices to Kitchen God, Kitchen god is a god sent from heaven by Jade Emperor to each family taje charge of family affairs and make a report on what the family has done in the past year to Jade Emperor on the date of 23th allow the Jade Emperor to make it punishment and rewards.

In order for the kitchen god can't speak ill of the people in front of the Jade Emperor. Folk people will offer a typical Chinese Candy instead of usual cow, chicken, fish , pigs or sheep. By the way, people will also offer pure water, soybeans and grass fodder. It is said the water and fodder is prepared for the god's horse while going up to the celestial palace.

According to the folk custom, "men do not worship the Moon while women do not offer sacrifices to Kitchen god." So sacrifices to Kitchen god is only confined to men.

Please look into below link for more details:
http://www.chinavoc.com/festivals/KitchenGod.htm
http://chineseculture.about.com/library/weekly/aa010300a.htm

Ghost Festival (GuiJie)

The Ghost Festival is fall on the 15th night of the seventh lunar month in Chinese Calendar. In the Ghost Festival, “The Gate of Hell” will open allow ghost and spirit include dead ancestor come out from Hell and back to human world.


Offering that prepare for ghost and spirit.


The food on the table are offer to ghost and spirit that released from Hell.



“Getai” literally known as sing stage are usually perform to entertain the ghost and spirit. However, there are also many people love “Getai” too!!

Please refer the following link for more details:
http://www.chinese-culture.net/html/hungry_ghost_festival.html
http://travelerfolio.com/getai-hungry-ghost-festival/

Dragon Boat Festival

Dragon Festival on the fifth day of the fifth month of the lunar calendar on which the Chinese calendar is based. The Dragon Festival is originated from ancient China. Quyuan, a patriot of the Chu Kingdom during War State period. Qu Yuan drowned on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month in 277 B.C. Since Quyuan is love and esteem by the citizen, the Chinese citizens throw bamboo leaves filled with cooked rice into the water. Therefore the fish could eat the rice rather than the hero poet. This later on turned into the custom of eating rice dumplings.

Dragon Boat races are the most exciting part of the festival. Dragon Boats are generally brightly painted and decorated canoes. Ranging anywhere from 40 to 100 feet in length, their heads are shaped like open-mouthed dragons, while the sterns end with a scaly tail. Depending on the length, up to 80 rowers can power the boat. A drummer and flag-catcher stand at the front of the boat. Before a dragon boat enters competition, it must be "brought to life" by painting the eyes in a sacred ceremony. Races can have any number of boats competing, with the winner being the first team to grab a flag at the end of the course. Annual races take place all over China, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and other overseas Chinese communities.

Please refer to following link for more details:
http://www.c-c-c.org/chineseculture/festival/dragonboat/dragon.html
http://www.ncsu.edu/midlink/dec97/holiday/boatz.html

MoonCake Festival

Moon Cake Festival also known as Mid Autumn Festival. In Chinese, it is known as Zhongqiu. It is celebrated at 15th August in Chinese Calendar. The picture above is one of the point of Moon Cake Festival : Deng long

The Moon cake Festivals is to commemorates an uprising in China against the Mongol rulers of the Yuan Dynasty. Liu Bo Wen , ad visor to the Chinese rebel leader came up with the idea of timing the rebellion to coincide with the Mid-Autumn Festival. He distribute thousands of moon cakes to the Chinese residents in the city, Inside each cake, was inserted a piece of paper with the message: "Kill the Mongol on the 15th day of the 8th month" . On the night of the Moon Festival, the rebels successfully attacked and overthrew the government


Moon cake is another point of Mid Autumn Festival. It is a special kind of sweet cake prepared in the shape of the moon and filled with various ingredient such as sesame seeds, ground lotus seeds and duck eggs

Chang-er is one of the legend about Mid Autumn Festival. The time of this story is around 2170 B.C. The earth once had ten suns circling over it. One day all ten suns appeared together, scorching the earth with their heat. Fortunately, the earth was saved by a strong and tyrannical archer Hou Yi. He succeeded in shooting down nine of the suns. One day, Hou Yi stole the elixir of life from a goddess. However his beautiful wife Chang Er drank the elixir of life in order to save the people from her husband's tyrannical rule. After drinking it, she found herself floating and flew to the moon.