Dragon Boat Festival

Dragon Boat festival is one of the most important festival in China. it's on the 5th day of the 5th month of the lunar calendar and we will have three –days holiday.

There is a story, 2000 years ago, there was a great poet and minister named QuYuan, he was exiled by the king, he didn't want to see his country invaded and conquered, so he chose to drown himself in the river. He died on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, so we people decided to commemorate him on that day every year. 

The customs of the festival are eating Zongzi and Dragon boat racing. Why we need to do that there are some reason  about it, After Qu Yuan drowned himself, as the legend said, people tried to seek his body everywhere by boat, so the dragon boat racing tradition comes out. In order to stop fish eating his drowned body, people threw rice into the river, so Zongzi comes out. . It's a kind of sticky rice dumpling made of glutinous rice filled with meats, beans, and other fillings. They are wrapped in bamboo or reed leaves, banana leaves and the rest.

Another interesting customs in Dragon boat festival is dragon boat racing. A dragon boat is simply a human-powered watercraft. But it is made of various designs and sizes. The racing has been held over the past 2000 years all over southern China. Now it is an international sport, starting in 1976. 

A team usually has 22 members, including 20 paddlers, 1 drummer at the bow end and 1 member who steers at the rear end of the boat. But team members also change as per the size of the boat, from 10 paddlers in small dragon boats up to 50 paddlers in the traditional boats