On June 8th, people are excited about this festival since the government has not taken away two holidays from May so that the holidays would be more spread ut. The two single day holidays are the Qing Ming Jie known as the Tom Sweeping Festival, and the Duan Wu Jie known as the Dragon Boat Festival. The Tomb Sweeping Festival is would families gather at family tombs, clear out the mess in their houses, and burn incense with paper money. This burning of the paper money is suppose to sent money to dead in their spirit world. As for the Dragon Boat Festival, there is more history where it is always celebrated on the fifth month of the Chinese lunar calendar (June 8). There a lot ideas on origins of this day, but the most popular brief is the one with Qu Yuan (choo yu-ehn) who was a popular poet in 339 B.C. to 278 B.C. living in the Chu state. He was a wise man who fought against corrupt leaders which official had feared him. The official spoke to the Emperor and convinced him that Qu Yuan has difficult to handle and dangerous. The Emperor Huai (475 – 221 BC) dismissed Qu Yuan and exiled him.

During his exile, Qu Yuan wrote about his experience which have become master writings and invaluable for studying ancient Chinese culture. Over time, he saw gradual decline of the Chu state and his state was defeated by the Qin State. He was so troubled that he ended his life by jumping into the Miluo River. Once other heard him drown, they were upset and fishermen went to search for his body. Since they unable to locate him, people threw zongzi (a special traditional food) and other food into the river to feed the fish. These fish would nibble on his body remains to there would be nothing left of him in his next life. People honored Qu Yuan through dragon boat races, eating zongzi, and other food on the anniversary of his death. The date was the fifth day of the fifth month. The Zongzi food is made of glutinous rice wrapped in bamboo leaves which bounded together and boiled for many hours. The final food product is a large piece of rice mass that is gels together. The filling inside the zongzi varies on the region the people come from. The people from Taiwan would like more peanuts, dates, lotus seeds, pork pieces, and bean paste inside it. The people from the mainland like sweet red bean as well as egg yolk in the center of it. You can purchase of these zongzi in the stores, but they would taste as good as homemade or restaurant made ones. It is a popular holiday food during this time, and you may be able to find it if you have a local Asian or Chinese community. Until next time, I hope you can find these zongzi food around town, and enjoy your Chinese cooking.