Dragon Boat Festival

The Dragon Boat Festival is held on the 5th day of the 5th lunar month. The festival memorializes the Chinese poet Qu Yuan (c. 340 BC-278 BC) of the Warring States Period. He committed suicide by drowning himself in a river because he was disgusted by the corruption of the Chu government. The local people, knowing him to be a good man, decided to throw zhongzi , glutinous rice wrapped in corn leaves into the river to feed the fish so they would not eat Qu Yuan’s body. They also sat on long, narrow paddle boats called dragon boats, and tried to scare the fish away by the thundering sound of drums aboard the boat and the fierce looking carved dragon head on the boat’s prow.

Today, people still follow the tradition by eating zhongzi and participating in dragon boat races in honor of Qu Yuan’s spirit. In Taipei, dragon boat races take place at Dajia Riverside Park . This years festival features 125 dragon boat teams of all ages from all over the world.

Safety and rescue services are provided by the Taipei Fire Department, the police and the Taiwan Red Cross. All perform a great service. Bouyancy vests are mandatory, with teams penalized 5 seconds for the failure of any crew member to wear a vest when in the boat.

Before a race can take place, teams have to check their scheduled times and move to the registration area.

Check-in procedures complete, there is time for some last minute exercise and pep-talks.

Participants make their way to the boats and climb aboard.

Once set, the boats move over to the start line and wait for the flag to drop.

Racing.

The goal is to be first to grab the flag at the other end of the course.

Boats then return to the river bank, acknowledging the judges, timekeepers, media and spectators.

While the racing boats return, the flags must be recovered from the water and put back into place, which is done by a few hardworking men in a much less elaborate boat.

Back on dry land, there’s time for a refreshing wash.

Time to check the results.

Time to meet the fans.

Or time to take a nap.

The sides of the river are full of photographers.

Supporters.

Contestants.

And a large number of interested spectators.

Wishing you a Happy Dragon Boat Festival, 2009.

This post originally appeared as a report on the 2007 Taipei Dragon Boat festival. As this site is in the process of moving to a larger hosting company, I’ve chosen to share this from the archives.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 27th, 2009 at 08:50. It is filed under Festival, Travel and tagged with Chinese festivals, Dragon Boat. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.