It’s Duan Wu Jie here! There are several stories behind this holiday, but the best known legend is about a famous Chinese poet named Qu Yuan. Despite his love and passion for his country, he was exiled. Qu Yuan in great despair committed suicide by drowning himself in the Miluo River (Yunan Province) on the 5th day of the 5th lunar month (lunar calendar – May 5th).

The rest is legend… When they heard of Qu Yuan’s death, the local people were very sad, and rowed out on the river to search for his body, but were unable to find him. To preserve his body, the locals paddled their boats up and down the river, hitting the water with their paddles and beating drums to scare evil spirits away. They threw lumps of rice into the river to feed the fish, so that they would not eat Qu Yuan’s body. Pretty superstitious huh? I think for most people now it’s just a story, but it has become tradition to race dragon boats (long boats witha dragon head at the front) and eat zongzi (balls of really sticky rice wrapped in bamboo leaves).

The was no dragon boat racing in our city, I thought that would’ve been really cool to see! They said they are mostly in the countryside But, our neighbor did bring us some zongzi to eat, and I must say they were the best I’ve ever eaten since being here! The kids are off school on Monday for the holiday, and we plan to go with our neighbor to the countryside. Should be fun! Will post pics next week!

Kylie eating some zongzi!