Pudu ceremony at Keelung ghost festival takes place on the 15th day of the 7th lunar month. (Craig Ferguson)

In Chinese culture, the 7th lunar month is known as ghost month. With Taiwan being a treasure trove of living culture, there is no better place to be to witness the events that are held, both public and private, in conjunction with the month long festival.

On the first day of the seventh lunar month (which fell on July 31st this year) it’s believed that the gates of hell are opened and ghosts are free to wander to earth for a month. Throughout the month, the living perform rituals and make offerings to their deceased ancestors by way of lighting incense, parading lanterns and burning paper ghost money. The center of ghost month festivities in Taiwan is the northern port city of Keelung. While ceremonies and offerings are performed island-wide, it’s in Keelung that the biggest public rituals take place.

Official group prayers to mark the start of Ghost Festival at Laodagong Temple, Keelung, Taiwan. This temple is the center of activities on the first day of the mid-summer ghost month that occurs during lunar July. (Craig Ferguson)

On the first day of the festival, a door next to the altar in Keelung’s Laodagong Temple is opened. This symbolizes the opening of the gates of hell and it remains open all month. On the final day of the lunar month, the door is closed again, locking the ghosts away for another year.

While Laodagong temple is where the gates of hell are opened, most of the other public rituals take place at the Chupu temple overlooking Keelung Harbor. Here. on the 12th day the lights of the main altar lamps are lit for the first time. A couple of days later, on the evening of the 14th day, a citywide parade of water lanterns is held. These are intricate paper lanterns designed to look like houses for the ghost. After being paraded through the streets accompanied by marching bands, acrobats, dragons and fireworks, they are released into the harbor sometime after midnight and set alight. The parade itself cleverly mixes modern culture with ancient traditions, sometimes in some seemingly bizarre ways. A prime example of this was the police marching band that played songs including Smoke on the Water by Deep Purple and Bad Romance by Lady Gaga.

Souna (Chinese oboe) marching band with fireworks during water Lantern Parade held on lunar July 14 at the Keelung Ghost Festival, Taiwan. (Craig Ferguson)

The fifteenth day sees the main offering worship known as pudu take place. Sacrificial God pigs, lanterns, incense and offerings are play a role. This part of the festival marks the middle of the month and is officially known as “ghost day”. The same day is celebrated as Ullambana by Buddhist, O-bon in Japan and Tet Trung Nguyan in Vietnam.

The last main public ritual takes place at the end of the lunar month with the closing of the gates of hell. In Yilan county, the Ghost Grappling festival takes place where teams race to climb up a greased pole to fight the ghosts and send them back to hell. However with the effects of a strong typhoon being felt throughout Taiwan, it might be quite easy for the ghosts to come out on top.

I’ll be publishing selected photographs from ghost month throughout the week so stay tuned.