Duan
Wu Festival, also known colloquially
as the Dragon Boat Festival, is a
traditional Chinese festival held
on the fifth day of the fifth month
of the Chinese calendar. It has since
been celebrated, in various ways,
in other parts of East Asia as well,
most notably Korea. The exact origins
of Duan Wu are unclear, but one traditional
view holds that the festival memorializes
the Chinese poet Qu Yuan of the Warring
States Period. He committed suicide
by drowning himself in a river because
he was disgusted by the corruption
of the Chu government. The local people,
knowing him to be a good man, decided
to throw food into the river to feed
the fishes to prevent them from eating
Qu's body. They also sat on dragon
boats, and tried to scare the fishes
away by the thundering sound of drums
aboard the boat and the fierce looking
dragon-head in the front of the boat.
In the early years of the Chinese
Republic, Duan Wu was also celebrated
as "Poets' Day", due to
Qu Yuan's status as China's first
poet of personal renown. Today, people
eat zongzi (the food orginally intended
to feed the fishes) and race dragon
boats in memory of Qu's dramatic death.
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