For me the celebration began a night early because United College had a welcoming dinner for all international and foreign exchange students. Nice, right? Thankfully, I knew most of the people at my table...even though they were ALL from Mainland China. That is, with the exception of the Dean of the college, of course. Nice guy, really...I'm glad I met him. Dinner was all right, but the fun began afterwards when we each got a Mid-Autumn lantern. Mine was yellow, pink, red, and orange--all those lovely Fall colors. We put the candles inside and lit those babies up! We made a nice parade under the moonlight for all of 2 minutes before it started to rain. Thankfully, I made it inside with my lantern and (lit) candle intact. With the evening's events over, I came back to the dorm room where, as Menglu insisted, the lantern (unlit) is now festively hanging from my bookshelf.
Even though Wednesday night was the actual festival, there was still class during the day. Some of the teachers were generous, though, and canceled. I still had Mandarin (where we just talked about the holiday), but my Statistics class didn't meet. After class, Alice and I went to New Asia College's dining hall for lunch. While there, we talked some about our plans for National Day (this is how China celebrates the Cultural Revolution). I've discussed this with a few people, but National Day is Friday, October 1st, and it's another public holiday around here, meaning no class. Since that leaves us with a 3-day weekend, about 10 of us are planning to spend (at least some of) the weekend in Macao. There's going to be a huge fireworks show for National Day, which we want to attend, and then the rest of the plan is to check out the famous sites in historic Macao. Fun, huh?
Anyway, Wednesday night was festival time. As I said before, the best place to go in Hong Kong for Mid-Autumn Festival is Victoria Park. However, it's just flat-out too crowded in there. Instead, Menglu had invited me to go to a celebration on-campus held by the Mainland students. Most people go home for Mid-Autumn Festival but, for those students from Mainland, it's just too far away. Therefore, they just celebrate together with mooncakes, karaoke, riddles, games, and lots of food.
Many of the different provinces were represented by students from those areas, who prepared the local Mid-Autumn specialties. Below is a picture of the most popular table: Sichuan Hotpot. Yes, one of my roommates is from there and, yes, that's the place with the famous spicy food.
Here you can see all the wishes people have made during the festival:
It was a lot of fun and I got to practice my Mandarin--mostly listening, though. My friends were even nice enough to nab me a mooncake (which were free for the Mainland students). I haven't eaten it yet, though, because I bought a mini-mooncake at Wing Wah last week. I tried to take a picture of it, but my camera is still a little wonky, making it difficult to take pictures of small things (like mini-mooncakes, apparently):
So, I just found an image or 2 on the Internet. This one looks like your typical traditional mooncake, although China has infinite varieties:
So why is it called a mooncake? What's inside of it? Well, as you can see, there's a flaky outer crust, and the brown stuff on the inside is lotus-seed paste, which is very sweet & fruity with the all the consistency (and none of the taste) of peanut butter. The "moon" in the middle is the salted yolk from a duck egg.
Mooncakes also have a special place in Chinese history. As many of you know, the Mongols once invaded China and took over for several generations, establishing the Yuan Dynasty. Under the oppressive rule of the Mongolian emperors, a group of Ming revolutionaries came up with a clever idea for spreading conspiracy against the empire. These 2 Ming guys, Zhu Yuanzhang and Liu Bowen, spread a rumor that some horrible plague was going around that could only be cured by eating specially-made mooncakes. Of course, people began snapping up the mooncakes like crazy. Inside of the mooncakes, though, were letters with the plans for a revolt on Mid-Autumn night. So that's supposedly how the Ming Revolution started and then how the Ming Dynasty was founded.
Anyway, fast forward a good 650 years...
It's now Thursday, September 23rd at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and also, in fact, Menglu's 20th birthday. Even though she's been so busy lately that she's hardly slept, today is (thankfully) the day after Mid-Autumn Festival, making today a public holiday...probably because a significant portion of Hong Kong's population is still hung over. Hopefully, she was able to relax a little bit more. Since it was her birthday, though, Yiyun and I wanted to take her to lunch at the United College Staff Canteen. Unlike the Student Canteen, the food at the Staff Canteen is really really good. She decided she wanted sauteed cabbage, Sichuan-style eggplant, egg-custard buns, shao mai, xiaolongbao, and mini egg tarts. All 3 of us felt stuffed afterwards but, hey, that's just part of having birthdays. I paid Menglu's portion of the bill as a birthday treat. It wasn't that much, but I was still happy to do it.
For the rest of the day we all went our separate ways...to study. I'm just learning around 50 new vocabulary words, though, so it's not really hardcore studying. I also finished my latest book, Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere. My conclusion: not as good as the other 2 books of his that I've read. Maybe it's because this is his first published novel. I'm planning on some Ray Bradbury next so we'll see how that goes. I just hope Fahrenheit 451 is better in book form that it is in 1966 movie form. To be honest, it shouldn't be that difficult a feat.
The next couple of days should also hold a good bit of excitement which, I think, usually leads to good pictures and better-than-average blog entries. Tomorrow evening I'm going to Tai Po with most of the other IBCE folks (USC and CUHK alike) for our belated Mid-Autumn BBQ! That should be fun and, yes, there will be mooncake. I can already tell I'm going to be really sick of the stuff by the time the festivities die down.
Saturday, I believe, will be even more fun. I do have to wake up before 7:00am, but I'm going on a day-trip arranged by the Office of Academic Links, which deals with all of us foreigners. The actual trip lasts from 8:00am--6:00pm, and we're going to Tung Ping Chau, Yan Chau Tong, and Kat O Island...and, yes, I realize these names mean absolutely nothing to you. Basically, it's a day of exploring temples, visiting ancient fishing villages, eating local seafood, and enjoying the (surprisingly not-too-polluted) Hong Kong beaches. Unless my camera decides to malfunction in yet another way, there will be pictures.
Just as a side-note. If you're feeling adventurous, click the link for "Zai Mei Bian" by Wang Leehom in the Theme Songs box. I've recently become addicted to this song. Be warned, though, because it's a Mandarin rap song that samples from Peking Opera.
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