Last week was 端午节 (duan1wu3jie2 – Dragon Boat Festival), the holiday which 纪念 (ji4nian4 – commemorates) commemorating the passing of 屈原 (qu1yuan2 – Qu Yuan), a patriotic poet who had been 放逐 (fang4zhu2 – exiled) from his country, the kingdom of Chu.  He is commemorated because of his loyalty to the people of his country.  His exile is said to be due to his criticism of the existing regime.  Unable to endure being exiled from his country, he jumped into a river to kill himself.  One story holds that his supporters and admirers raced down the river to locate his body, while throwing 粽子 (zong4zi3 – leaf-wrapped glutinous rice with fillings such as peanuts, eggs, or meat) into the river to kep fish from eating the corpse.  To this day, the holiday is celebrated by eating 粽子, and 赛龙舟 (sai4long2zhou1 – dragon boat racing).  At Hong Kong’s 赤柱 beach, a large dragon boating tournament took place, with up to 165 entries in the mixed (men + women) event racing down the 270m course.  This is no small amount of people, considering that boats may have 18 people in them at a time!

The reason why the holiday is called 端午节 can be understood by looking at the component characters of the name.  端 means “extreme), while 午 means “noon”, and 节 means “holiday” or “festival”.  This is the holiday where the sun is said to be at its highest point in the sky (this is not to say that the sun is out longest as during the summer solstice).