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Living in Shanghai •
Shanghai life
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Shanghai!
- Chinese Customs -
Traditional Festivals -
Surrounding Landscape
◦ Traditional Festivals
Chinese
has many traditional festivals, and all listed by Lunar Calendar, below
are some important ones.
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Spring Festival
Chinese
Lunar Calendar New Year, or Spring Festival has the longest chronological
record in history. Like the Western calendar, The Chinese Lunar Calendar
is a yearly one, with the start of the lunar year being based on the
cycles of the moon. Because of this cyclical dating, the beginning of the
year can fall anywhere between late January and the middle of February. A
complete cycle takes 60 years and is made up of five cycles of 12 years
each.
The
Chinese Lunar Calendar names each of the twelve years after an animal.
Legend has it that the Lord Buddha summoned all the animals to come to him
before he departed from earth. Only twelve came to bid him farewell and as
a reward he named a year after each one in the order they arrived. The
Chinese believe the animal ruling the year in which a person is born has a
profound influence on personality.
Like
Christmas to Westerns, Spring Festival is the most important festival to
Chinese. The festival activities may last out for a month. After Yuanxiao
Festival, the Spring Festival is ended really. Red color is the color of
the Festival, everywhere.
On
Chinese New Year, Eve Dinner is specially sumptuous. It's the time to see
off the old year and wish for a prosperous new year. At such dinner people
give good omens to some of the dishes, such as "facai" is
homophonic with "getting rich". After dinner, people will stay
up for the night, waiting for the coming of the new year. This is called
"Shou Sui", but young people mghit not know it now.
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Yuanxiao Festival
On
the 15th of the first lunar month, people hang up colorful lanterns,
lanterns can be like ingot, bat, lotus blossom, jade toad, a basin for
collecting treasure and a boat of plain sailing. In this city, the Yuyuan
garden will be a very crowded place this night.
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Duanwu Festival
Duanwu
Festival or the Dragon Boat Festival is a long history folk festival. It
falls on the 5th of the 5th lunar month. People eat "zongzi",
glutinous dumplings wrapped in reed or bamboo leaves, drink realgar wine,
wear little bags with sweet-grass, and smoke the rooms with moxa leaves.
Dragon boat race is held to commemorate the patriotic poet Qu Yuan, of the
Chu State while the Warring State Period.
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Moon Festival
Moon
festival falls on the 15th of the 8th lunar month, so it's called
Mid-Autumn festival. It's also called the Reunion Festival, people eat
moon cakes and drink sweet Osmanthus wine. When the moon rises, people set
up altars in open air and place moon cakes, fruit, soya beans, taros and
lotus roots to offer to the moon, whole family together.
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Looking up at the moon, missing homeland and families.
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