Today was the Moon Festival, or Mid-Autumn Festival, held to celebrate the coming of autumn and cooler weather. Since the Chinese believe a rabbit lives in the moon, many rabbit pastries are sold at this time. Everyone celebrates by looking at the moon, buying and giving sticky, sweet moon cakes as presents, and eating lots of barbecue. Since most people don't have backyards or porches, they barbecue in front of their houses on the sidewalk and you can see them as you walk by. The air smells like cooking meat as a result.
Today was also Confucius' birthday (the 2553rd, I think), and so a special ceremony was held in Taipei to honor him. It is only held once a year, and tickets are strictly limited to 1000 people. As a result, it is very difficult to get tickets. However, I was lucky and was able to go with a ticket from my Chinese school. The ceremony was very interesting: in its present form, it dates back to the Ming Dynasty (15th to 17th centuries) but many parts are much older. For instance, they still sacrifice a cow, a goat and a chicken, and collect their blood in a bowl (although not in public view). Specially trained students dressed in yellow dance with pheasant feathers, while others in red play music and ones in purple supervise. All the city council members attend dressed in blue and black as part of their governmental duties. The mayor of Taipei was there, and I met him and shook his hand. Wouldn't it be cool if Gavin Newsom or George Bush had to dress in a silk robe and bow to spirits?
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