A "Dragon-boat" piled up with soft drink bottles

Dragon-boat Race

Dongguan

A Dragon-boat Race begins today in Dongguang, Guangdong province, as a part of the "China Dragon-boat Month". The activity attracts dragon-boat race delegations from home and abroad.

Delegations from Australia, Indonesia, Japan, Hong Kong, etc, will Join the international Dragon-boat Race, while the natives organize a race themed 'celebration of the Dragon-boat Festival'.

Shunde
Shunde, another city of Guangdong province, named as "home of dragon boats", will hold a Dragon Boat Race on Dragon-boat Festival, and hundreds of teams will participate.

Dragon-boat Festival /Duanwu Festival

Boat racing is a traditional way to celebrate the Dragon-boat Festival, also called the Duanwu Festival, which falls on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Lunar calendar. This year the traditional festival falls on tomorrow (June 11th, Saturday).

The festival is in commemoration of an ancient Chinese poet Qu Yuan, who some three centuries before the birth of Christ, served the King of Chu during the Warring States period. As a loyal minister, Qu Yuan at first enjoyed the full confidence and respect of his sovereign. Eventually, through the intrigues of his rivals, he was discredited and found himself in disfavor. During that time, he composed his immortal poem, "Encountering Sorrow", an allegorical description of his search for a prince who would listen to good counsel in government.

Qu Yuan was never able to regain the emperor's favor and on the fifth day of the fifth moon in the year 295 B.C., at the age of 37, he clasped a stone to his chest and plunged into the Milo River in the Hunan Province.

Legend has it that local fishermen raced out in their boats to save him but failed. To protect his body, they beat drums in their boats and furiously hit the water with their paddles. They also threw rice dumplings wrapped in silk into the river as a sacrifice to his spirit.

Today, on the festival, people hold dragon boat race and eat zongzi (rice dumpling wrapped in bamboo leaves) to commemorate this patriotic poet.

Editor: Yan 

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