Dragon Boat Day

Today, Friday, was the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, which means it's a national holiday in China called Dragon Boat Day (Duānwǔ Jié). The festival commemorates the death of poet Qu Yuan of the Warring States Period (c. 340 BCE – 278 BCE). He died by drowning in a river, and to honor him, the local people dropped zhongzi (a special kind of rice dumping, see below) into the water. The rice was wrapped in bamboo leaves so the fish could not eat them, and the racing of dragon boats stemmed from the boats scaring the fish away.

Now, people celebrate by eating zhongzi and racing dragon boats. Because of the holiday, we did not have classes today (except for the Economics class, which is not taught by a Chinese professor). Instead of morning language classes, we went to a restaurant called Campus and learned how to wrap dumplings (jiaozi), which we ate for lunch along with zhongzi.

I picked up the wrapping technique pretty quickly, and the dumplings were really good. There were two types of pork filling, which I did not eat, and a vegetable and egg filling, which was delicious. I've found that the foods are less sweet and less salty than in the US while still tasting wonderful, which I really like. The dumplings were eaten with a sauce combination you created yourself; the options on the cart were soy sauce, garlic, chili, and vinegar that you could mix however you liked. After trying a couple combinations, I preferred mine plain.

The zhongzi are triangular sticky rice dumplings with sweet or savory fillings that are wrapped in bamboo leaves and boiled for around two hours. I liked the rice part of mine, but it had a fruit filling that was not something I would have chosen for myself if given all the options. There were pits, and I think I would have liked a smoother filling or a meat that I knew what it was. They were very sticky, but fun to eat, and it was nice to partake in the tradition. Other fillings were red bean paste, possibly another fruit, and meat ones (not sure how many varieties).

This part of the day ended at 11:15, and then I got to go back to the dorm to chill for a while. I ran into my language buddy Eric on the pedestrian bridge on the way back to the dorm, and we are going to make plans for Sunday.

At 5:00, I met my other language partner, Helen, for dinner. She took me to a campus cafeteria where we at zhongzi (it had a bean filling that I really liked, but the rice is still my favorite part), a squash dish, spinach, a noodle dish, and watermelon. Everything tasted good, and I need to load money onto my card to eat in cafeterias since it is so simple. You get a plate of food, then swipe your ID to pay for it. After eating, we went for a walk around campus, particularly past her department's building and the lake, then I showed her where I'm living. We were together until 8:00, and it was really nice to see how much we really do have in common.

By the time we parted ways, the rest of my American group had left the campus area for dinner/nighttime activities, so I had a quiet night in the dorm. I would have tried to meet up with them to hang out, but I can't get around the city without a person who can speak Chinese and help me. I felt a bit lame staying home, but I'm glad to have some extra sleep before an early morning. We have to be on the buses to Tiananmen Square at 8:00, which means I have to be up by 7, and that would be harder if I had been out late.

Today is awesome because of cooking lessons and zhongzi.