Throwing a handkerchief to invite marriage
Some areas in Fujian Province, the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, there is the custom of throwing a handkerchief to invite marriage. At night, in the square built a colorful platform, decorated as a moon palace scene, and set up the jade rabbit, osmanthus and so on. Some unmarried girls dress up as Chang'e, and after celebratory songs and dances, the girls throw some handkerchiefs embroidered with different colors to the stage. If an audience member receives a handkerchief of the same color as the one in the hands of Chang'e, he or she can go on stage to receive a prize. When some unmarried young men return their handkerchiefs, if they are liked by Chang'e, they can give them a ring. Thereafter, the two sides can make friends, and those who are in love with each other will be happily married.
Begging the moon moon climbing
Old Dongguan, some women believe that "the old man as a matchmaker", where there are adult men and women at home and no love interest, to facilitate the Mid-Autumn Festival night at three o'clock in the moon burning incense and candles, begging the old man of the moon for its matchmaking. Legend has it that on the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, the moonlight can make women pregnant. In some areas, on the moonlit night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, some long-married infertile women will go out of their homes, bathing in the moonlight, hoping to give birth to a son, called "shine the moon".
Stealing vegetables to seek a groom
In Taiwan, on the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, unmarried women "steal vegetables to seek a groom" custom. A beautifully made-up woman steals green onions and vegetables from other people's vegetable gardens in the moonlight, and when she does so, it is a sign that she will meet the man of her dreams. This is why there is a proverb in Taiwan that says, "If you steal onions, you will marry a good husband; if you steal vegetables, you will marry a good son-in-law".
Stealing Moon Vegetables of the Dong Ethnic Group
The Mid-Autumn Festival night in the Dong townships of Hunan Province is characterized by an interesting custom of "stealing moon vegetables".
Legend has it that in ancient times, on the night of Mid-Autumn, fairies from the moon palace would descend to the lower world and sprinkle manna all over the earth. The nectar of the fairies is selfless, therefore, people can *** with this night to enjoy the fruits and vegetables sprinkled with nectar. The Dong family gave this custom, named "steal the moon vegetable".
Mid-autumn night, the Dong girls with umbrellas, choose their own beloved after the garden beds, to pick vegetables, and will not be seen as "theft". They also intentionally shouted: "Hey! Your melon and vegetables were I ripped away, you to my home to eat oil tea! Originally, they are the use of the Moon Palace Fairy to pass the red thread it. If they can pick a melon that grows in pairs, it means they can have happy love. Therefore, the bean curd that grows in pairs became the object of their picking. Sister-in-laws also go to other gardens this night to "steal the moon vegetable", but they hope to pick the fattest melon or a handful of fresh green beans, because this symbolizes the child's fat, hairy head of the health (the harmonic of hairy beans, referring to the child). The young men also have the custom of "stealing moon vegetables" because they also hope that the moon fairies will give them happiness. However, they can only cook them in the field and eat them, not take them home. "Stealing the moon vegetable", so that the Dong village of the Mid-Autumn Festival night, adding unlimited joy and magic color.
The Miao moon
Every Mid-Autumn Festival night, the bright moonlight shines all over the Miao cottage, Miao men and women after the family reunion, are to the forest clearing, singing and dancing, held a "jumping moon" activities.
The ancient legend of the Miao people, the moon is a loyal and honest, hard-working and brave youth. There is a young and beautiful water clear girl, she refused to come from the ninety-nine states ninety-nine to her proposal of marriage to the young man, y in love with the moon. In the end, she also went through all kinds of trials and tribulations created by the sun, and was finally happily united with the moon.
The Miao fathers and mothers for their happy love of remembrance, for generations in the Mid-Autumn Festival night, bathed in the light of the moon, jumping up the Miao songs and dances, and this custom is called "jumping moon". Young men and women in the "jumping moon", looking for each other's sweethearts, pouring out their love, said to be like the water and the moon, as pure and bright, and always end up with a good white head.
Mid-Autumn Night, many places are also prevalent in the custom of seeking children. This is a reflection of the ancient cult of fertility. This is because the moon is a yin, belonging to the female God, and at the same time the pursuit of love activities, so the custom of seeking children in the Mid-Autumn Festival customs. And the custom of seeking children varies from place to place.
Theft of melons and pray for children
In Hunan's Hengyang, "the evening of the Mid-Autumn Festival, there is a gift of melons," the matter. Where the seat abundant履原之家，娶妇數年不育者，则亲友举行送瓜，先數日，在菜园中窃冬瓜一个，須令园主不知，以彩色绘成面目，衣服包裹在其上如人形。 Raise the elderly life good people to hold it, "sounding the gold cannon, sent to their homes," the elderly set the winter melon in the bed to be covered, the door to read the day, planting melon get melon, planting beans get beans. The recipient of the melon set up a feast, if the event again. After the woman got the melon, that is, dissected and eaten. Popular rumor has it that this matter is the most effective cloud". In Hengyang, where the village married without children of the family, "as long as the goodwill, the village will be someone to give them "send son".
In other parts of Hunan, there is also the custom of sending a child with a melon, similar to that of Hengyang. On the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, when the master is away from his house enjoying the moon, his close neighbors secretly send him a child. The person who delivers the son must be someone who already has children. They first choose the village's most evil family's melon round, steal a large winter melon from the garden, draw the face of the doll on the melon, then use a section of five-inch-long small bamboo tube into the winter melon belly, down the bamboo tube into the water until it is full. Sending people will be hidden in the master of the winter melon in the quilt, and so the master back to bed with a hand pull was, winter melon dolls move, the water will flow down the bamboo tube, like a child wetting the bed. And lose melon family will get up early in the morning to scold, it is said, scolded the more fierce, the future birth of the doll the more robust. If the next year really gave birth to a child, the child will have to pay tribute to the person who sent the child "godfather", "godmother".
In Guizhou, there is also the custom of stealing melons to send children. When you steal a melon at night, you deliberately let the person who was stolen know, in order to provoke anger and scolding, scolding the more powerful the better. After the melon is stolen, it is dressed in clothes and eyebrows, pretending to be in the shape of a child, and is sent to a childless family with a bamboo mikoshi (a portable bamboo carriage) by banging gongs and beating drums. The person who receives the melon must treat the person who sends the melon to a meal of mooncakes, and then accompany the melon to sleep for the night, and then the melon is boiled and eaten the next morning in the belief that the person will then be able to conceive a child.
Shexian County, Anhui Province, around the Mid-Autumn Festival, adults let the children to discover the family's bonobo or even the mother with the son of the son of the mother taro, mud and water drenched into the newlywed family's quilt, so that the mattress is extremely dirty. In this way, the bride's son was given away. There is a poem that says: "Sending off a son in the mid-autumn is a beautiful thing to talk about, and melons and taro are always suitable for men. The most important thing to remember is the red damask quilt, which can be used to drag water and mud.
Hakka Customs
The Hakka custom of eating mooncakes and enjoying the moon during the Mid-Autumn Festival is more or less the same as the rest of the country. The Hakka people call it the August Festival or August Half.
Whenever the full moon rises during the Mid-Autumn Festival, Hakka people set out mooncakes, peanuts, pomelo and other fruits as early as possible in their courtyards, on the terrace of their buildings or in front of their houses in front of the place where the moon rises to prepare for the activity of "honoring the moonlight".
After worshipping the moon, families enjoy the moon and eat outside. Moon worship is for grown-ups, and children usually don't sit upright to enjoy the moon, but chase and play under the bright moonlight, which is their paradise at this time. Eating, on the other hand, is a bit of a delicacy. Parents often start by letting everyone eat these offerings that have been sacrificed to the moon god. In Chinese sacrificial culture, there is a tradition that after the God Master has enjoyed the food, the sacrificers will often share and eat the offerings so that the whole ritual is over. In the process of sharing and eating, we receive the blessings of the moon god on the one hand, and fulfill the traditional sacrificial culture on the other. People in Meixian say that eating these offerings is more "good", and that those who eat them are blessed with good fortune and will be more auspicious.
In Meizhou, in addition to mooncakes, a traditional Mid-Autumn Festival food with universal significance, pomelo is an essential holiday food, varieties of golden pomelo (Shatian pomelo), honey pomelo or crystal pomelo. And eating pomelo has certain meanings. "Like dissecting a pomelo is called 'killing the pomelo', which carries the meaning of driving away evil spirits in it. It is also said that peeling pomelo is 'peeling ghosts', which implies the wish to drive away evil spirits and eliminate disasters."
The Hakka region's mooncakes, in addition to ordinary mooncakes, there are "five kernel mooncakes", and there is also a kind of glutinous rice flour and sugar pressed into the size of the round cake. Although the social and economic progress, but the Hakka people have always inherited the traditional food culture and in the development of folk food culture, and the Central Plains remains unchanged.
Walking on the Moon and Three Bridges
The custom of walking on the moon and three bridges is practiced in the Wu region, which is to walk across at least three bridges while traveling under the light of the moon (see Gu Lu's "Ching Ka Records, Volume 8"). Shanghai also has this custom (see jade squid raw sea production and travel record). The so-called walk three bridges, obviously the flavor of doom in.