It's Dumpling Festival - 5th Day Of 5th Lunar Month

Haha... my hubby reminded me that "Duan Wu Jie" (端午節) belongs to Korean Festival when I told him that this Wednesday is Dumpling Festival (today). In certain countries, it's also known as "Dragon Boat Festival" (龍舟節). Yes, it really twisted our mind to accept the fact when we heard KOREA succeeded to file "Duan Wu" as their intangible heritage to UNESCO's list.

How do we tell the tales of this festival to our next generation? Originally, we celebrate "Duan Wu Jie" is to pay respect to the patriotic poet in ancient Chu, Qu Yuan (屈原）. Indeed, this festival is as important as other Chinese traditional festivals like Lunar New Year, Lantern Festival (元宵节), Mid-Autumn Festival (中秋節)and Winter Solstice Festival (冬至), all Chinese families' members (for Malaysia) get to celebrate it together by sitting around the table for a re-union dinner. Today, most Chinese families only gather to celebrate the Lunar Chinese New Year and QingMing Festival (清明节).

No matter how, we still celebrate the Dumpling Festival as usual - eat variety of dumplings (ie pork, red bean, plain, Nyonya) which were made by inlaw and aunties with sweats. This morning, still I saw my mom prepared a can of orange liquid (雄黄水) to splash over the front and back of the house. At the main door, she hung twigs of a herb plant. These are another customs passed down from my grandma that in a belief to keep the evil things away. In fact, my mom explained that her mom (my grandma) used to rub the brownish liquid on her and siblings' foreheads and all members gathered around to eat like reunion dinner.

Lastly, I wish all Chinese friends have a happy Dumpling Festival. Bon appetit.