The Mid-Autumn Festival is a time for families to gather and admire the moon, which has inspired many Chinese poems and legends. Ahead of this year’s festival, international students from Donghua University (DHU) visited Guilin Park in Shanghai to take part in three festival-themed activities.

Guessing Lantern Riddles

The students made their own lanterns, each featuring a handwritten riddle. Here are three riddles translated into English. Can you work out the answers?

Riddle 1: I make medicine on the moon, pounding and grinding year after year. What mythical creature am I?

Riddle 2: I hang in the evening sky, sometimes round and sometimes curved like a sickle. What am I?

Riddle 3: I hold the sun and moon. What Chinese character am I?

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Answer 1: The Jade Rabbit

Answer 2: The Moon

Answer 3: 明 (míng, meaning “bright”)—a Chinese character formed by combining 日 (sun) and 月 (moon)

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Reciting Classical Chinese Poems

During the poetry activity, the students reflected on memories evoked by classical Chinese poems about the moon.

One student recited “Quiet Night Thoughts” by Li Bai, a Tang dynasty poet. The poem describes someone looking up at the moon and thinking of home, reminding the student of family far away.

Another student shared lines from Li Bai’s “Old Song of the Bright Moon,” in which a child imagines the moon as a white jade plate and a mirror in the clouds. The poem’s beautiful and mysterious imagery brought back memories of the student’s simple, playful childhood ideas about the moon.

Retelling the Legend of Chang’e

For the final activity, the students retold a story familiar to many in China: how Chang’e came to live on the moon.

Long ago, ten suns scorched the land, making life unbearable. A skilled archer named Hou Yi shot down nine of them. An immortal rewarded him with an elixir that could grant eternal life. One day, while Hou Yi was away from home, someone tried to steal the elixir. To keep it from falling into the wrong hands, Hou Yi’s wife, Chang’e, swallowed the elixir. Suddenly, she began to float into the sky, rising higher and higher until she reached the moon. From then on, she lived in a palace with a rabbit. When Hou Yi returned home and discovered that his wife was gone, he was heartbroken. Every night, he gazed up at the moon, longing to see her again.

After a half-day of activities, the students left Guilin Park with a better understanding of the traditions and legends associated with the Mid-Autumn Festival, along with fond memories of celebrating the occasion together in Shanghai.

 

Source: Donghua University