On our side of the world we’re preparing for the Mid-Autumn festival, a harvest celebration that takes place on the Autumnal Equinox. The most visible part of this three-day holiday is the gathering of families to eat mooncakes. And they must eat a bunch of them, because there are large displays of mooncake gift sets everywhere you look:
The gift sets are really fancy, and as with many traditions here there is a feeling that eating the right mooncakes will bring good luck. However, eating them must not bring much help when it comes to spelling!
It’s even hard to find a loaf of bread at our local bakery. 80% of their shelf space is now occupied by mooncakes:
We’ve asked a few students about whether or not they like mooncakes and gotten mixed reviews. It kind of reminds us of the old tradition of giving fruitcakes at Christmas (the first bite is interesting, but then…).
Unfortunately, they don’t actually “give” you a three day holiday in our country – they just “lend” it to you. As you can see from my school calendar below, we have to make up most of these holidays (and the October national days) on the adjacent weekends:
I remember moon cakes… I don’t think they ever tasted how I thought they would. I always wished they would be more dessert like!
Hi Mark :
We just celebrate the Mid-Autimn Festival last saturday, Of course with moon cake for everyone ( Home made by Anita Shen), Billy and Gayle also joint our party, all the students (7 now) enjoy the Pot Luck, most of them will be graduated this December, more new students will come either this winter or next summer.
Hi Alan,
Glad to hear that you enjoyed Mid-Autumn festival even in Texas. I’m sure that Anita’s homemade mooncakes were delicious. We had some good moon cakes here also (and some that were not as good). Timothy is now living in Chengdu. He and his roomate bought 20 different kinds of mooncakes and tested them all. He probably doesn’t want any more until the next festival!
Hey Mark
Nice blog.Hoping to come with my husband to teach in Kunming next year ,maybe at the Nationalities Uni not sure yet, so I am happy to read anyone’s experiences in China.
all the best