May is midsummer. There is a famous traditional festival, Dragon Boat Festival. Dragon Boat Festival is a traditional cultural festival popular in China and other countries in Chinese cultural circle. It is also an important festival to apply for the world intangible cultural heritage, so it is a national legal holiday.
Is Dragon Boat Festival a legal holiday
Dragon Boat Festival is a legal holiday. The Dragon Boat Festival, together with Spring Festival, Qingming Festival and Mid Autumn Festival, is known as the four traditional festivals of Chinese people. Since 2008, the Dragon Boat Festival has been listed as a national legal holiday. In May 2006, the State Council listed it in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage list. In September 2009, UNESCO officially reviewed and approved China Dragon Boat Festival to be listed as the world intangible cultural heritage, becoming China's first festival selected as the world intangible cultural heritage.
The custom of Dragon Boat Festival
1. Dragon Boat Race: Dragon Boat race is the main custom of the Dragon Boat Festival. It is said that it originated from the death of Chu people in ancient times due to their reluctant minister Qu Yuantou Jiang. Many people rowed boats to catch up and save. They rushed to Dongting Lake without any trace. After that, on May 5 every year, a dragon boat is rowed to commemorate it. By rowing a dragon boat, fish in the river are scattered, so as not to eat Qu Yuan's body.
2. Hanging wormwood: Dragon Boat Festival is the first festival after summer, when the temperature is rising, it is the period of frequent diseases. People often hang a few wormwood plants at the door of their homes. Because of the special fragrance of wormwood, people use it to drive diseases, prevent mosquitoes and ward off evil spirits. At the same time, the ancients inserted wormwood and Acorus calamus to a certain extent, which also reflected the fine tradition of the Chinese nation.
3. Eating zongzi: eating zongzi at Dragon Boat Festival is another traditional custom of the Chinese people. According to records, as early as in the spring and Autumn period, millet wrapped in wild rice leaves became horn shaped, known as "corn". Rice in bamboo tube is sealed and roasted, which is called "zongzi". In the last years of the Eastern Han Dynasty, millet was soaked in grey water of plants and trees. Because of the alkali content in the water, millet was wrapped in wild rice leaves to form a quadrangular shape and cooked to become an alkaline rice dumpling in Guangdong Province.
4. Mulan soup: it is an ancient custom recorded in dadaili, but the orchid in the article is not orchid, but Peilan or herbal medicine of Compositae. It has fragrance and can be boiled and bathed. In wuzazu, people in Ming Dynasty take five colored grass to brush and bathe because LAN Tang is not available. Later, it is usually fried with herbs such as PU and AI to take a bath.
5. Daub realgar: the custom of daubing children's forehead with realgar during the Dragon Boat Festival. Clouds can repel poisonous insects. The typical method is to use realgar wine to draw the word "Wang" on the forehead of children. One is to use realgar to expel poison, and the other is to use tiger to control evil. In addition to the forehead, nose and ears, it can also be applied to other places with the same intention. This custom is rarely seen in the city.
7. Hiding Dragon Boat Festival: hiding Dragon Boat Festival refers to taking a newly married or married daughter home to spend the festival. It is customary to take May and may 5 as the bad month and bad day. There are many things to avoid, because there is a custom of taking a daughter home to hide Dragon Boat Festival. This custom seems to have been formed in Song Dynasty. In the poem of Fengsui by Lu You, there is a saying that "the wine in sheep's antrum is used to welcome women, and the drums and dragon boats are used to compete with the gods". "Jiajing Longqing annals" also records that "the married daughter calls back the festival".
8. Avoid five poisons: the Dragon Boat Festival in the minds of the ancients is a poisonous day and a bad day. This idea has been passed down in the folk belief, so there are various customs of seeking peace and resolving disasters. In fact, this is due to the hot and dry weather in summer, people are easy to get sick, plague is also easy to spread, plus the reproduction of snakes and insects, easy to bite people, so we need to be very careful, which forms this habit.
Related proverbs of Dragon Boat Festival
Toad tadpole hides from Dragon Boat Festival. (North)
It's hard to buy May 5 drought if you have money. (Shanxi)
Willow in the Qingming Festival and AI in the Dragon Boat Festival. (North)
The toad can't hide from May 5. (Beijing)
Dragon Boat Festival invites Bodhisattva to carry six squids. (Jiangsu and Zhejiang)
Good time for five days, wish you a long life together. (Jiangsu)
Don't wear AI in Dragon Boat Festival, die and become a monster. (northwest)
After drinking realgar wine, all diseases are far away. (Shanxi)
Take a sip of water at noon and take tonic for three years. (Shandong)
After drinking realgar wine, all diseases are far away. (Shandong)
Dragon Boat Festival, hot weather; five poisons wake up, restless. (Jiangsu and Zhejiang)
Do not eat dragon boat festival dumplings, cold clothes can not be sent; eat dragon boat festival dumplings, but also three frozen. (Jiangsu and Zhejiang)
Not eating may Zong, bedding is not sweet. If you don't eat rice dumplings in May, you won't let them go. If you don't eat rice dumplings in May, you won't let them go. If you don't eat may zongzi, don't be too long in cold clothes. Not eating may Zong, cold clothes not long. After eating may Zong, cold clothing income bar, not eating may Zong, cold clothing dare not send. Not eating may Zong, not long cold clothing, eating may Zong, not a hundred days and wind. (Guangdong)