Today is the Dumpling Festival!

Tweet

...and I am totally loving it. Savoury, sticky glutinous rice dumplings are one of my favourite traditional Chinese foods! So far today I've eaten 3 dumplings and later I'm going to pig out on the ones I have in my fridge. I think I'm lucky to be living in a "food paradise" because here in Singapore you can buy dumplings everyday at the supermarket, or at dumpling stores! Today's also Dragon Boat Festival where lots of people set sail and compete in Dragon Boats on the river, but I didn't go out to watch the races today. If anyone's interested, here's the story of the Dragon Boat/Dumpling Festival (Duan Wu Jie in Chinese): Duan Wu Jie is on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Lunar calender. It is a day to remember the poet Qu Yuan, who was a loyal and patriotic court official in the Chu Kingdom during the time of the Warring States. Corrupt and jealous officials told the new king many lies about Qu Yuan, resulting in his banishment and the weakening of the kingdom over the next two decades. When the country was finally taken over by the Qin Kingdom, Qu Yuan was so overcome with grief that he leapt into the river. Fishermen who had heard about this sent their boats out to look for his body, and when they could not find it they wrapped rice in bamboo leaves and threw them in so that the fish would eat it instead of the body. Thus the tradition of Dragon Boat Festival or Dumpling Festival began.