China Letter: Congratulations on the Mid Atom Festival

The eighth episode of the series mentioned a few Chinese festivals. One of them was the Mid Atom Festival. The same festival is being celebrated in China on September 21. The Chinese people have been given a three-day holiday to mark the occasion.

The Mid-Atom Festival is celebrated on the fifteenth day of the 8th month of the Chinese lunar calendar, the night of the full moon. Why is it celebrated? We go back 3,000 years to find out when the Xiao dynasty ruled in China. In this kingdom, kings worshiped the moon goddess on a full moon night for a good harvest in the fall and offered sacrifices to her. He believed that by doing so, the moon goddess would be happy and if she was happy, her harvest would be good this season.

In the Tang Dynasty, the country's princes began worshiping the moon. In the autumn, they used to hold big feasts in their homes on full moon nights, in which they drank wine, danced and ate good food.

Ordinary people who saw them also started giving light feasts on the night of the full moon in the autumn season. Together they reaped the harvest and worshiped the moon when the harvest was good. Under the Song Dynasty, the festival was formally renamed the Mid-Autumn Festival.

In the Yuan Dynasty, the moon began to form palm-shaped round cakes on the occasion of the festival, which was named Yue Bing in Chinese. They are called moon cakes in English. Today, these cakes are known by the same name in China and outside China.

In modern China, the Mid-Atom Festival is all about eating moon cakes and a three-day holiday. Mooncake-shaped decorations can be seen everywhere in China near this festival. Whether shopping malls or subway trains or parks, mooncakes are everywhere.

Before the Corona epidemic, Chinese used to return to their homes to celebrate the Mid-Atom Festival and celebrate with their families, but this tradition has changed since the Corona epidemic. People are reluctant to travel. The students fear that if they return home and the number of cases behind them increases, the government will ban them from returning.

Many Chinese students did not even go home during the summer holidays. He spent his holidays at the university like us, bumping around. As the new semester began, the university's largest cafeteria announced that mooncakes were being made for the Mid-Atom Festival, which would be sold someday. A Chinese friend said that these mooncakes disappear as soon as they hit the shelf. Students eat cakes themselves and send them home.

Moon cakes are very different from ordinary cakes. Think of them as a kind of pastry. The outer part is made of wheat flour and the inside is filled with salty or sweet things. Sweet moon cakes are famous all over the world except China. They are traditionally filled with 4 types of fillings, including salted duck egg yolk, lotus seed paste, red bean paste and dried fruits. Some even taste like rose petals.

Salty moon cakes are filled with Chinese-style sausages, pork and radish. In some parts of China, the outer part of moon cakes is also made from puff pastry and rice flour.

Drink tea with Chinese moon cakes. Their tea is not like our tea. They use only tea leaves, leaves, flowers and water to make tea. Put the tea leaves, leaves or flowers of your choice in the teapot, pour boiling water over it and the tea is ready. I put a flask of hot water with it. As the water in the teapot dwindled, more water was poured from the flask.

Our master's supervisors drank jasmine tea. We barely finished our tea and tried to keep our cups as far away from them as possible so that they could not pour any more tea into it. They would still find the cup and fill it. He was hospitable. We also used to take a sip of tea with a smile, proving to be a good guest. Some people may like the taste of jasmine tea but we don't like it at all.

We also found mooncakes very strange in the beginning. Our minds were full of all sorts of things about Chinese food and gifts that didn't make them taste good. This time, since we came to China voluntarily, we are enjoying Chinese culture better and more fully.

We have eaten many moon cakes in the last 2 days. One was filled with rose petal paste and finely chopped nuts. One was filled with lotus seeds. The Chinese like the salty yolk moon cake of duck eggs, but we avoid it. If you want to eat, plan a trip to China. Moon cake is an ancient and delicious Chinese gift that everyone must taste once in a lifetime.