With the Duanwu Festival (known as Dragon Boating Festival by many) just passed, I thought to share with you another big traditional Chinese festival with you: Mid-Autumn Festival, because for guests coming to rural China with me this September, we’ll spend the festival with the locals there in the ancient Xiheyang Village!
Mid-autumn Festival by its name, it’s the middle of autumn on the lunar calendar, i.e. 15th August. This year, it falls on 24th September on the solar calendar, strategically set during our rural China tour!
The Festival derives from the appreciation of clear autumn full moon from Spring Autumn Period 3000 years ago, with historic events happening on that day through history, it has become one of the four biggest traditional Chinese festivals… Now it is a festival of appreciating autumn full moon, autumn harvest, enjoy great seasonal food and celebrating the family togetherness.
Do you know that the dark shadows on the moon have been imagined by Chinese for eons as a white rabbit and an Osmanthus tree? Look up on a full-moon night, and you can see the rabbit ears J
A famous food to go with this festival is… the mooncake! All over China, mooncakes are made differently with various fillings, and different pastries. The fillings can be fruits, nuts, lotus seed paste, red bean paste, jujube paste, duck egg yolk and more. We’ll venture into the country market and you get to see lots of the varieties, of course feel free to try and buy the ones you like.
And the little-known ancient village that we will stay in and celebrate festival is called Xiheyang (means West of the River, Sunny). Here are some photos of the village, and in the next newsletter, I’ll share with us the activities we did with villagers in last year’s stay in the village.
There are still several spots available for the small group trip over to Rural China this September, booking closes in a month, so please let me know rather soon if you’d like to come with me this beautiful autumn!
Bookings for 2019 trips are already happening, timing is end of April and end of September, contact me for detailed information and book in early to secure special deals…