Mid-Autumn Festival ???

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Mid-Autumn Festival ???
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Mid-Autumn Festival ???

• The Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon
  Festival, Zhongqiu Festival
• In Chinese, Zhongqiujie (???), is a popular
  harvest festival celebrated by Chinese people
• In Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines, it
  is also sometimes referred to as the Lantern
  Festival or Mooncake Festival.

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How it is celebrated??

• Farmers celebrate the end of the summer
  harvesting season on this date.
• Traditionally on this day, Chinese family members
  and friends will gather to admire the bright
  mid-autumn harvest moon, and eat moon cakes and
  pomelos together.
• Accompanying the celebration, there are
  additional cultural or regional customs, such as
• Eating moon cakes outside under the moon
• Putting pomelo rinds on one's head
• Carrying brightly lit lanterns, lighting lanterns
  on towers, floating sky lanterns
• Burning incense in reverence to deities including
  Chang'e (??)
• Planting Mid-Autumn trees
• Collecting dandelion leaves and distributing them
  evenly among family members
• Fire Dragon Dances

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Stories of the Mid-Autumn Festival Houyi and
Change

• Once upon a time, the earth had ten suns.
• They burned the crops and people suffered
  infertility.
• Houyi sympathized with humans, so he decided to
  shoot down nine suns and leave one for the
  benefit of the people.
• After he shot down the suns, he was treated as a
  hero.
• He had a beautiful wife named Chang'e, and they
  lived happily together.
• The emperor of the immortals gave Houyi two
  pills, each of which granted eternal life as a
  reward for shooting down the suns, one was for
  Houyi, and the other for his wife. He warned
  Houyi, Make no haste to swallow the pill.
• Houyi was to wait until New Years Day, on which
  he and Chang'e were supposed to eat the pills
  together.
• Change put the pill in her jewelry box for
  safekeeping.

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• But Peng, one of Houyis apprentices, discovered
  their secret and decided to steal the pill.
• One day, when Houyi and other apprentices went to
  the mountain, Peng pretended to be sick so that
  he could stay home.
• After everyone had gone to the mountain, Peng
  sneaked into Changes room and forced her to
  give him the pill.
• Change knew she couldn't fight Peng, so she ate
  the pill herself.

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• However, after eating it alone, she began to
  float.
• Unable to come back to earth, she took flight and
  flew far, far away. She did not want to leave her
  husband, so she stopped at the moon, which is the
  body closest to Earth.
• After Houyi found out what happened, he was very
  angry and heartbroken. He looked up into the
  night and called Changes name.
• He discovered that inside the moon there was a
  ladys shadow that look like Change, so he ran
  and ran and tried to reach the moon.

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The Hare - Jade Rabbit

• According to tradition, the Jade Rabbit pounds
  medicine, together with the lady, Chang'er, for
  the gods.
• Others say that the Jade Rabbit is a shape,
  assumed by Chang'e herself. You may find that the
  dark areas to the top of the full moon may be
  construed as the figure of a rabbit.
• The animal's ears point to the upper right, while
  at the left are two large circular areas,
  representing its head and body.