The Mid-Autumn Festival and its Legends

The mid-Autumn Festival is held on the 15th day of the eighth month in the Chinese lunar calendar, which is usually around late September or early October in the Gregorian calendar. It is a date that parallels the autumn and spring equinoxes of the solar calendar when the moon is supposed to be at its fullest and roundest. This year, it fell on September 12. The traditional food of the festival is the moon cake, of which there are many different varieties. Traditionally, on this day, Chinese family members and friends will get together to admire the bright mid-autumn harvest moon and eat moon cakes and pomelos.

Chang'e & Houyi

Long time ago, there were 10 suns in the sky which burnt all the plants on the Earth. People were dying. A strong archer Houyi used his bow and arrows to shoot down nine of them. All people on the Earth were saved.

Houyi had a beautiful wife named Chang'e. They lived a happy life. One day, on the way back home, Jade Emperor (Emperor of Heaven) gave Houyi two pills, one for him and the other for his wife, which granted eternal life as a reward for shooting down the suns. Houyi planned to take it on the coming New Year's Day together with his wife. So Chang'e put the pills in her jewellery box for safe keeping.

Hou Yi became more and more famous after shooting down the nine suns. More men wanted Hou Yi to be their master. Not every apprentice of his had good morality. Peng, one of his apprentices, decided to steal the pills. One day he pretended to be sick so that he could stay at home. When making sure Hou Yi had gone away from home, Peng sneaked into Chang'e's room and forced her to give him the pills. Chang'e knew she couldn't defeat Peng, so she had to swallow them. However, soon after swallowing the pills, she began to float, higher and higher, to the sky, and was unable to make a stop. Chang'e didn't want to leave her husband too far, therefore she stopped on the moon. Upon finding out what had happened, Houyi was heartbroken. He missed his wife very much and looked up into the night and called her name. Each time when he called, he discovered that there was a lady's shadow that looked like Chang'e inside the moon.

From then on, people often pray to Chang'e for fortune and safety. Especially on the Mid-Autumn Festival they prepared lots of foods for Chang'e.

Jade Rabbit

In this legend, three immortals transformed themselves into pitiful old men, and begged for food from a fox, a monkey and a hare. Both the fox and the monkey found food for the old, but the hare couldn't, so he jumped into a blazing fire and said "please eat me", offering his own flesh instead. The immortals were so touched by the hare's sacrifice that named him as 'Jade Rabbit' and let him accompany Chang'e in the Moon Palace.

Wu Gang & Cherry Bay

Wu Gang was a woodchopper who always wanted to become an immortal, but he never tried his best to learn the theurgy. Jade Emperor got angry with him and decided to punish him. He planted a huge cherry bay of 1,665 metres high on the moon and ordered Wu Gang to chop it down so as to become an immortal. However, this time, Wu Gang was very serious. Unfortunately, he could never finish his work, for the cherry bay got healed every time when he chopped it. But Wu Gang didn't give it up and was trying time and time again. At unclouded nights, people can see some obvious shadows on the moon which are made by the huge cherry bay.