Spectacular sights mark start of Lantern Festival
Print Edition
COLORFUL lanterns are lighting up China’s night sky, as activities begin across the country to celebrate Lantern Festival today.
In Quanzhou city, southeast China’s Fujian Province, the lantern shows began on Thursday night. Xinmen Street was decorated by 805 traditional hand-made lanterns embroidered with beautiful patterns.
“While enjoying the shows, some people walk around with a small lantern in hand, making the atmosphere especially festive,” Mai Binbin, a local resident, said.
At the Confucius Temple, a tourist spot in Nanjing city, in eastern China’s Jiangsu Province, tens of thousands of colorful lanterns for a grand lantern show are creating a sea of lights to attract tourists.
Local resident Mao Mingjuan took her son to the temple to watch the lanterns on Thursday evening, saying she hoped her son would now better understand the history of the festival and the temple.
Dating back to the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 25), the Lantern Festival is held on the 15th day of the first lunar month to mark the first full moon of the lunar new year.
You Guoqing, a folk custom expert in Tianjin Municipality, said the Lantern Festival was about going out for a colorful celebration rather than a family get together.
Besides watching lanterns, it is also a day to appreciate the full moon, solve lantern riddles, watch art performances and eat tang yuan, dumpling balls made of glutinous rice, usually with sweet fillings.
The festival was once also a time for romantic encounters. In feudal times, young women were not allowed to go out freely, but Lantern Festival was an exception, when young men and women could meet up.
Some aspects of the festival, such as its romantic atmosphere, are fading, but people still see the Lantern Festival as a day to rejoice and a chance to wish for happiness.
Childhood memories of Lantern Festival are still vivid for Yu Le’an, an elderly man from Changsha, capital of central China’s Hunan Province.
“It would be a time when we could have new clothes and good things to eat,” he said.
The Lantern Festival is a now a mixture of the traditional and modern.
The workshop of lantern craftsman Lu Xiezhuang in Shanghai is especially busy, as flocks of people visit to appreciate and buy his lanterns on the eve of the festival.
Lu, 63, is glad to see people’s love for the lanterns, but she believes that there is still much to do to ensure the traditional craftsmanship survives.
She says “innovation” is key to keep the ancient art alive, and has been exploring the creation of lanterns of different patterns and colors catering for modern day aesthetics.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
