Duan-wu jie — double five celebration (03/06)

Duan-wu jie — is one of the three most important traditional holidays in China. This day is also called the double five holiday, Duan-yang holiday, and Poet's Day. The holiday is celebrated on the fifth day of the fifth month of the lunar calendar.

According to the most common opinion, the origin of this holiday is associated with the memory of the ancient Chinese poet-patriot Qu Yuan.

Qu Yuan lived in the Chu kingdom during the Warring States era (5th - 3rd centuries BC). Many times he approached the Chu ruler with proposals for reforms aimed against political degradation, decline and corruption. Ho the ruler, believing the denunciations of the dignitaries who deliberately slandered Qu Yuan, expelled the poet from the capital. In 278 BC, troops of the Qin kingdom captured the capital of the Chu kingdom. Qu Yuan, having learned about such a national disgrace, could not bear it and on the fifth of the fifth month he committed suicide by throwing himself into the river. According to legend, upon learning of his death, people rushed into boats in grief and horror and searched for the poet’s body in the river for a long time, but never found it.



At the same time, they threw bamboo knees filled with boiled rice into the river for Qu Yuan. Ho one day, as legend has it, they met Qu Yuan himself on the shore and said: «All the rice you give me is eaten by a dragon. Wrap the rice in reed leaves and tie it with colored thread because the dragon is most afraid of these two things».

This is how the traditional food of this holiday — zongzi — wrapped in cane leaves, glutinous rice, appeared.

Currently, the Duan-wu jie holiday is a state day off — weekends last three days, starting from the day of the holiday.

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