The Mid Autumn Festival or Tet Trung Thu

            

            Happy Mid Autumn, my lovely readers.  Today is the 15^th day of the 8^th lunar month, meaning people who follow the lunar calendar are celebrating the harvest and the moon goddess Change’e.  One version of the Chinese legend goes as follows:

            Houyi, an archer of legend, saved the earth by shooting down nine of the suns (sons of the Jade Emperor) with his arrows and aim.  Following this, he gained many followers and, regrettably, became a tyrant.  In his greed, he stole an elixir of immortality from a goddess.  When his wife drank it to save the people from his never-ending tyranny and greed, she promptly began to feel light.  After grabbing a rabbit to be her companion, she floated up to the moon.  Houyi’s wife was Change’e. 

            Today, the Mid Autumn Festival is often celebrated to worship the moon, or ask Change’e for prosperity.  There are many smaller traditions included in the festival, like the consumption of mooncakes 

or lantern making.  

Other traditions are more regional.  In Fujian Province, for example, they play Bo Bing, or mooncake gambling.  Bo Bing is a game played with dice in a ceramic bowl.  There is also swinging in Chaoxian province.  

            The Mid Autumn Festival isn’t only celebrated by Chinese youth though.  As it is a lunar calendar holiday, Vietnamese celebrate it too.  For the Vietnamese, or at least, those living in New Orleans, The Mid Autumn Festival is now celebrated for children where once it was a harvest festival.  The kids have a lantern making competition with prizes available, and the adults can pay more attention to the local musicians and dancers performing on the stage.  Good food is had by all, as the night wears on.  If you ever have the opportunity to go, I highly suggest it.

*Cited sources include 

China Daily:

<http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/culture/2015-09/27/content_21992312.htm>

and Kathy Kilbourn in Louisiana Folk Life:

<http://www.louisianafolklife.org/LT/Articles_Essays/creole_art_vietnamese_folk.html>