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On Great Heat day, four more events on the Chinese calendar you won’t find on a Western one

The Chinese calendar is peppered with events and festivals alien to Western calendars. We explain why

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The fire dragon dance is performed at Pok Fu Lam in Central during the celebration of the Mid-Autumn Festival. Photo: Nora Tam

Monday is Great Heat Day in the Chinese calendar – one of many traditional markers dividing the year up that lack an equivalent on Western calendars. This is because the Chinese calendar is based on solar events.

Here are four more days traditionally of great cultural significance on the Chinese calendar.

Competitors take part in the Dragon Boat Festival in Jingxian County, China. Photo: Xinhua
Competitors take part in the Dragon Boat Festival in Jingxian County, China. Photo: Xinhua

1. Duanwu Festival

An early summer festival known also as the Dragon Boat Festival, it is celebrated with boat races and a delicacy of glutinous rice wrapped in bamboo leaves. There are different stories as to how it became a holiday, but the story of poet Qu Yuan is perhaps the most enduring.

The legend dating back to China’s Warring Periods has it that following a period of political turmoil, Qu was forced to leave his home state, and when he had heard that it had been conquered by foreign forces he committed suicide by drowning in a river.

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