Where to See Dragon Boat Racing
Dragon boat racing has become an important competitive sport. Many places in China hold dragon boat races during the festival. Here we recommend the four most ceremonious places.
A dragon boat in the Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival.
· The Hong Kong Dragon Boat Festival: Victoria Harbor, Kowloon, Hong Kong
· Yueyang International Dragon Boat Festival: Yueyang Prefecture, Hunan Province
· Guizhou Dragon Canoe Festival of the Miao Ethnic People: Qiandongnan Miao and Dong Autonomous Prefecture, Guizhou Province
· Hangzhou Dragon Boat Festival: Xixi National Wetland Park, Hangzhou City, Zhejiang Province
How Chinese People Celebrate the Festival
Duanwu Festival(Dragon Boat Festival) is a folk festival celebrated for over 2,000 years, when Chinese people practice various customs thought to dispel disease, and invoke good health.
Dragon boat racing
Some of the most traditional customs include dragon boat racing, eating sticky rice dumplings (zongzi), hanging Chinese mugwort and calumus, drinking realgar wine, and wearing perfume pouches.
Now many of the customs are disappearing, or no longer observed. You are more likely to find them practiced in rural areas.
Eating Sticky Rice Dumplings
Zongzi (粽子zòngzi /dzong-dzuh/) is the most traditional Dragon Boat Festival food. It is related to Qu Yuan commemoration, as the legend says that lumps of rice were thrown into the river to stop fish eating his drowned body.
Zongzi
They are a kind of sticky rice dumpling made of glutinous rice filled with meats, beans, and other fillings.Zongzi is wrapped in triangle or rectangle shapes in bamboo or reed leaves, and tied with soaked stalks or colorful silky cords.
Drinking Realgar Wine
There is an old saying: 'Drinking realgar wine drives diseases and evils away!' Realgar wine is a Chinese alcoholic drink consisting of fermented cereals and powdered realgar.
In ancient times, people believed that realgar was an antidote for all poisons, and effective for killing insects and driving away evil spirits. So everyone would drink some realgar wine during Duanwu Festival.
Wearing Perfume Pouches
Perfume Pouches
Before Dragon Boat Festival arrives, parents usually prepare perfume pouches for their children.
They sew little bags with colorful silk cloth, fill the bags with perfumes or herbal medicines, and then string them with silk threads.
During Dragon Boat Festival perfume pouches are hung around kids' necks or tied to the front of a garment as an ornament. The perfume pouches are said to protect them from evil.
Hanging Chinese Mugwort and Calamus
The Dragon Boat Festival is held at the start of summer, when diseases are more prevalent. Mugwort leaves are used medicinally in China.
Plants for Dragon Boat Festival
Their fragrance is very pleasant, deterring flies and mosquitoes. Calamus an aquatic plant that has similar effects.
On the fifth day of the fifth month, people usually clean their houses, courtyards, and hang mugwort and calamus on doors lintels to discourage diseases. It is also said hanging mugwort and calamus can bring good luck to the family.
How Did Dragon Boat Festival Start?
There are many legends about the origin of the Dragon Boat Festival. The most popular one is in commemoration of Qu Yuan.
Competitors are paddling hard in a dragon boat race.
Qu Yuan (340–278 BC) was a patriotic poet and exiled official during the Warring States Period of ancient China.
He drowned himself in the Miluo River on the 5th day of the 5th Chinese lunar month, when his beloved Chu State fell to the State of Qin.
Visiting China at the Dragon Boat Festival
Our customers taking a bamboo raft to see the beautiful scenery of the Li River in Guilin
Many Chinese people will make use of the 3-day holiday to go traveling.
Therefore, during the Dragon Festival, most attractions will be crowded, cheap public transport (like buses and trains) may be sold out, and accommodation may be slightly more expensive.
