The Chinese Dragon Boat Festival

The Chinese Dragon Boat Festival is a significant holiday celebrated in China, and the one with the longest history. The Dragon Boat Festival is celebrated by boat races in the shape of dragons. Competing teams row their boats forward to a drumbeat racing to reach the finish end first.
The boat races during the Dragon Boat Festival are traditional customs to attempts to rescue the patriotic poet Chu Yuan. Chu Yuan drowned on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month in 277 B.C. Chinese citizens now throw bamboo leaves filled with cooked rice into the water. Therefore the fish could eat the rice rather than the hero poet. This later on turned into the custom of eating tzungtzu and rice dumplings.
The celebration's is a time for protection from evil and disease for the rest of the year. It is done so by different practices such as hanging healthy herbs on the front door, drinking nutritious concoctions, and displaying portraits of evil's nemesis, Chung Kuei. If one manages to stand an egg on it's end at exactly 12:00 noon, the following year will be a lucky one.

Er'renzhuan

Er'renzhuan (Song and Dance Duet), was also known as "bengbeng". Speaking and singing alternately is the main performing form of this kind of drama.
Er'renzhuan was originally developed on the basis of northeast yanggo dance and lianhualao (a popular song sung to the accompaniment of castanets) and inherit some elements from local performing arts in other forms such as northeast dagu, bangzi, shadow show, etc. The most striking feature of "er'renzhuan" is that "one actor and one actress play a large number of various roles". The players have fans, handkerchiefs and bamboo boards in their hands as stage property and their performance are mainly accompanied with banhu fiddle (a bowed stringed instrument with a thin wooden soundboard), suona horn (a woodwind instrument) and bamboo boards.Er'renzhuan was a popular small local folk opera in all Northeast China. It started to spread in Jilin Province in the beginning of the 18th century.
After the founding of w China, Bengbeng was renamed er'renzhuan. And local opera groups were set up earlier or later in cities of Siping, Liaoyuan, Jilin, Changchun and Counties of Yushu, Lishu, Dehui, Shuangliao, Fuyu, Zhenlai for the performance of er'renzhuan. In 1960's, Jilin Province made great progress in the construction of er'renzhuan with writing and directing strengthened, a new list of plays opened, music accompaniment richened, costumes improved, dancing and fine arts enriched, hand property developed and changed.
Er'renzhuan's musical forms have been renewed continuously since the reform and opening up to the outside world in 1978. Now dulcimer, pipa (a flucked string instrument with a fretted fingerboard) are added to musical instrument accompaniment. When there is fighting in a play, drums, gongs and cymbals will be used. Also colored umbrellas, gauze kerchiefs and long silk fabric are added to the hand props. Costumes are improved according to the requirements of the creation of typical characters. Change of lighting colors is used to set off play scenes. In brief, the comprehensive artistic quality is increasingly improved.Some famous actors and actresses are warmly welcomed by the mass, such as Mu Xifa, Li Qingshan, Guan Changrong, Dong Xiaofang, Li Xiaoxia, Qin Zhiping, Zheng Guiyun, Han Ziping. Among the popular Er'renzhuan play list are Splashing Water before Horses, Returning Cups, Lord Bao Bringing Empress to Trial, Lord Bao's Apology, Listening to qin, The West Chamber, Both in Martial Competitions , Feng Kui Selling His Wife and Waters Flooded Lanqiao Bridge. These plays have been existed for a very long period.
The expression means of er'renzhuan is characterized by "four basic trainings and one unique skill". The four basic trainings refer to singing, speaking, playing and dancing. The one unique skill refers to brandishing handkerchiefs, fans, bamboo boards, and etc., which enjoys great reputation domestically and internationally.

"Banquet":Chinese Film in the 59th Cannes Film Festival

After director Chen Kaige spent 10 million RMB at Cannes on promotion for "The Promise" last year, another Chinese director Feng Xiaogang's new blockbuster "The Banquet" is planning to spend big at the annual event.

According to Huayi Corporation Vice-President, Xu Li, the press conference for "The Banquet" is scheduled for May 23 and a cocktail party will be held a day earlier.¡¡

The total budget of the film's Cannes tour is set at 4 million yuan.

Xu said that there are no big posters and guideposts for the film at Cannes because the film is not on the competition or screening lists. Instead, the producers plan to spend a lot on professional publications.

Xu also confirmed that "The Banquet" will indeed campaign for Academy Awards this year in July.

The film will be screened in cinemas across China beginning in September.

Cave Dwellers In Shaanxi Province

On a freezing winter's day warmed by the sun we arrived at the peasant house of six stone caves which was our goal in Northern Shaanxi Province on the vast loess plateau. In the courtyard stood several leafless jujubetrees hung with bright yellow corn ears. On one side of the arched door were strings of red chilis-on the other, jade white gourds. The clucking of the hens as they pecked grain from the ground added life to this quiet country house.
"This would make a gorgeous New Year woodcut!" exclaimed my companion, press photographer Lu Huang. He had graduated from the Beijing Institute of Fine Arts two years before and he couldn't resist making a composition of everything he saw. Ma Jinxi, the official of the county government who was showing us around, added, "You should have seen it in the fall when the threshing grounds were covered with different kinds of grain and the jujube trees were green and thick with dates, like so many agates."
We were in Suide County 400 kilometers north of Xi'an, Shaanxi's capital. Northern Shaanxi is the part of the province which includes among its more than twenty counties and cites Yan'an, the revered cradle of the Chinese revolution. Back in the Qin Dynasty over two thousand years ago, Suide was an important town in the frontier area. In today's capital of the county, are the tombs of Crown Prince Fu Su and General Meng Tian of the Qin Dynasty. It was Meng Tian who helped the first emperor of Qin build the Great Wall. He also may have invented the Chinese writing brush.
Our host Wang Shuhou emerged to greet us in a sheepskin coat, a white towel tied around his head. A tall, rugged man of 57 with a deeply lined sunburned face and bushy eyebrows, he looked every inch the hard-working peasant he was. As he led us to the arched doorway, insisting on carrying our luggage, he gestured toward the three caves to the east, explaining that these were his quarters while the rest were occupied by his nephew. Now Mrs. Wang drew aside the door curtain and motioned us inside and onto the kang.
Inviting visitors to take their ease on the kang goes back a long way among the peasants of north China. A multi-purpose piece of furniture if ever there was one, the kang serves as a bed, a place for members of the family to sit and talk among themselves, a sewing center, a desk for the children to do homework, a place to entertain visitors. Always adjacent to the stove, it is usually built of mud bricks or stone slabs with a fire passage inside. The left-over heat of the cooking fire passes under the kang before it goes out the chimney at the roof of the cave. The kang not only helps save firewood_it keeps the air fresh indoors.
Sitting on the kang with our legs crossed warmed us in more ways than one. The felt blankets helped, but the Wangs' spirit of welcome produced the stronger glow.
First our host set a small short-legged table in the middle of the kang on which he put a plate of apples and a large bowl of peanuts and wine-saturated dates, simple enough fare to be sure but delicious and meaningful. Wang pointed out that there was little to offer guests in these remote mountains, but "these are the products of our village and it's our pleasure to share them with you."
We were to be offered these wine-saturated dates everywhere we went in Northern Shaanxi. You can make them yourself quite easily. Here's how: you clean and dry however many you want to preserve, put them in jars, and after spraying them with a bit of white spirits, seal the mouths of the jars and put them away for a couple of weeks. They have now expanded fully; they are plump and lovely to look at and even better to taste-deliciously sweet and fragrant with the scent and flavor of wine. The locals here swear that these red dates invigorate one's spleen and benefit the kidneys. Moreover, they say, since they have no side effects, you can eat as many as you like. Lu Huang and I made the most of our opportunity, leaving only a couple in the bowl.
All the villagers here plant jujube trees around their houses, and the red ones on Northern Shaanxi are well-known throughout China. The local people keep a sack or two of dried dates for themselves to send to friends and relatives, give to children, or keep for folks like us passing through. For festivals, weddings and elderly people's birthday celebrations they make date cakes that look like pagodas.
After consuming all those dates and peanuts I was suddenly quite thirsty, but neither Mr. nor Mrs. Wang saw fit to offer us tea and I asked Ma Jinxi how come. He explained that tea drinking was habit that somehow had never penetrated this area and that if I wanted any I'd have to ask for it. "But," he pointed out, "fruit can quench your thirst just as well now, can't it?" And he passed me a nice fat apple.

China has more than 2.6 mln websites

The number of websites registered in China reached 2.6 million at the end of last year and 1.1 million of the websites are with ".CN" domain name.

The websites increased by 40 percent in terms of number last year, said a report released by the Informationization Office under the State Council. The websites with the domain name of ".CN" increased by 154 percent in 2005, becoming the largest national domain name in Asia and the sixth in the world.

The websites launched by companies constitute 60 percent, that launched by individuals account for 21.9 percent, followed by websites on education and on government, the report said.
The 2.6 million websites are mainly in Beijing, Shanghai, east China's Zhejiang and Fujian Provinces and south China's Guangdong Province.

Chinese Stone Lions

Lion is a special animal to Chinese people. A pair of stone lions, a male and a female, can often be seen in front of the gates of traditional buildings. The male lion is on the left with his right paw resting on a ball, and the female on the right with her left paw fondling a cub.
The lion was regarded as the king in the animal world so its imagines represented power and prestige. The ball played by the male lion symbolized the unity of the empire, and the cub with the female thriving offspring.
The stone lions were also used to indicate the ranks of officials by the number of lumps representing the curly hair on the head of the lion. The houses of first grade officials had lions with 13 lumps and the number of lumps decreased by one as the rank of the official went down each grade. Officials below the seventh grade were not allowed to have stone lions in front of their houses.
It is interesting to note that China had no lions originally. It is believed that when Emperor Zhang of the Eastern Han reigned in AD 87, the King of Parthia presented a lion to him. Another lion was given by a Central Asian country known as Yuezhi in the next year. The earliest stone lions were sculpted at the beginning of the Eastern Han Dynasty (25 - 220 AD) with the introduction of Buddhism into ancient China. It is said, Sakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism, was seen after birth "to point to Heaven with one hand and to Earth with another, roaring like an lion." In the Buddhist faith, the lion is considered a divine animal of nobleness and dignity, which can protect the Truth and keep off evils.
It was also popular to decorate bridges with sculpted-stone lions for the same reason. The best known of this is the Lugouqiao (also as Marco Polo Bridge), built from 1189 to 1192. The stone lions on the posts of the bridge are most famous. It is said there are 485 lions in all, but there may be 498 or 501. A famous proverb says "the lions on the Lugouqiao are uncountable."

Tattoo in Chinese Minorities

The Chinese Drung and Dai minorities have tattoo customs inherited from their ancestors.
Among the Drung ethnic minority, women have tattoos on their faces. In the past, girls were tattooed when they turned 12 or 13 as a symbol of maturity.
First, an old woman would dip a bamboo slip into sooty water and draw on the girl's face, then beat a thorn into the skin with a small stick in the designed area, and fill the pricked spots with soot. When scabs formed, a dark blue design was left on the face, The tattoo was drawn between the two eyebrows and around the mouth in diamond shape and on the cheek with dots, forming a flying butterfly design.
This form of tattooing is popular in the upper reaches of the Drung River. Along the lower reaches, the tattoos are simpler, with two or three lines on the lower jaw.
The Drung minority tattoo originated from the late Ming Dynasty about 350 years ago. At that time, the Drung people were usually attacked by other ethnic groups, and women were captured as slaves. To avoid being raped, the Drung women tattooed their faces to make themselves less attractive and, thus, protect themselves. It was a tragedy. Though the Drung women are not threatened by other minorities now, they retain their tattoo custom, and it has become a symbol of maturity for Drung women.
Tattooing is also an ancient custom of the Dai people, and can still be found in some remote villages in the Dai inhabited area or among some old Dai people.
Both men and women were tattooed according to the Dai custom, men on the strong muscles and women on the back of hand, arm or between the eyebrows.
In old times, the Dai Children had designs pricked into their skin when they were 5 or 6, for it was said to be the best age. Later, they were tattooed at 14 or 15 as a symbol of reaching maturity.
There are no fixed designs in Dai tattoo, most preferring tiger or dragon designs drawn in black with black plant juice.
The Dai people have a long tattoo history. In ancient times, they lived by the river and were often hit by strange monsters. Later they discovered that a black skin could keep the monster away, and they began to tattoo themselves in this way to prevent attacks.
As time went on, tattooing lost its original function and has become a symbol of the boldness and bravery of men and the beauty of women. Now, tattoos are drawn on the back of the hands in octagonal flower design, and a dot is tattooed between the eyebrows of girls, symbolizing their beauty. With these tattoos, the Dai people can easily recognize their ethnic friends even when they are not wearing their minority costums.

Chinese Potted Landscape

Chinese potted landscapes have been famous for centuries and often described as "soundless poetry""stereoscopic painting", or "living sculpture". In a pot no larger than a wash basin, the ingenious craftsmen create a miniature reproduction of a natural scene using stunted trees and plants, rocks and sometimes water.
When potted landscapes were first grown it was very difficult to determine because they were only a folk art in the beginning. But a mural in the tomb of Crown Prince Li Xian of the early Tang Dynasty shows that they had already won royal favour by then.
Great Tang and Song poets like Wang Wei, Han Yu, Bai Juyi, Su Dongpo and Lu You all mentioned them.
Monographs describing the miniaturizing of trees and the art of miniature rockeries began to appear in the Song Dynasty and reached their peak in the Ming and Qing dynasties.
Potted landscapes require painstaking efforts to create, taking dozens to hundreds of years. Craftsmen devote all their lives to their art works only to have later generations enjoy them to the fullest.
Chinese potted landscapes started as early as the Eastern Han Dynasty with a history of 1,900 years. They are of two major kinds: trees and rockeries.
Miniature trees are made from old stumps. Short, easily shaped stumps are forced into the form wanted by hanging, binding, trimming, deleafing and grafting. Some are made to look like running beasts, some like soaring birds, and some like beasts created from the imagination of the craftsmen.
Miniature rockeries are made by carving or corroding and then glueing either solid or absorbent rock, which is decorated with slender growing plants. Absorbent rock will accept mosses. some rockeries are imitations of paintings, but often they represent scenic spots.
Nowadays, in Chinese cities, big or small, there are potted landscape exhibitions within parks.

Xu Jinglei : most famous actress,director and Blogger

Being a 30 year old woman, Xu Jinglei owns lots of things the other women long for: beauty - her roles in many TV operas and movies as quiet beautiful girls have made her loved by thousands of boys all over the country; wisdom - she won some important awards as a young guide of two movies, every day thousands of viewers click on her blog（http://blog.sina.com.cn/m/xujinglei） to read her articles, as well as her new albums.

Yangge and Waist Drum Dance

During the season in winter, young people in villages in northern Shanxi begin doing the yangge dance and waist drum dancing in order to greet Spring Festival (first day of the first lunar month) and Lantern Festival (15th of the first lunar month).
On the lunar New Year's Day, after eating jiaozi, the yangge group begins paying New Year calls to the households. They wish the hosts a happy New Year and do the yangge dance in the courtyards. Accompanied by drums, they wave red silk waist bands. The hosts set off firecrackers to welcome the dancers' arrival and invite them to taste their home-made rice wine. The sounds of songs, drums and firecrackers blend, creating a festive atmosphere in the village. Yangge originated 2,000 years ago, as a religious activity to greet gods and dispel evil, but now it is a recreational activity in the sowing season or on holidays.
The most interesting part is waist drum dancing. A dancer with a red drum tied to his waist holds a drumstick with red silk, beating the drum while dancing. The rhythmical drum sound and graceful dance show the straightforward and uninhibited character of villagers in northern Shanxi Province and is an expression of their happy and passionate feelings.
Ansai waist drum dancing and Luochuan waist drum dancing in northern Shanxi have distinctive features. Ansai dancing includes vigorous movements accompanied by rhythmic drumbeats. At the climax of the dance, dancers beat drums while jumping into the air, uttering the sound "Haihai"excitedly. Louchuan dancing is done with a drum as big as washbasin and the drumstick is long and thin. The dancers wear white war gowns, with a towel tied on their heads and flags on their backs. Their costumes are decorated with the designs of ancient bronze wares. They dance back and forth, jumping from time to time, to the drums just like soldiers fighting each other.
Decayed wooden drums covered with boa skins were unearthed from the Yin ruins of Anyang City, Henan Province, which implies that drums appeared more than 3,000 years ago. In ancient times, drums were used to offer sacrifices, fight the enemy, sound alarms, and give the time, as well as for daily recreational activities.
As for the origin of the waist drum in north Shanxi Province it is thought that it was a tool for officers in ancient times and for soldiers stationed at borders to sound alarms, and give the time, as well as for daily recreational activities.
As for the origin of the waist drum in north Shanxi Province it is thought that it was a tool for officers in ancient times and for soldiers stationed at borders to sound alarms and train troops. Especially for cavalries, the drums accompanied the rhythm of the horse's hooves, as the soldiers yelled and advanced. Later, the waist drums were handed down among the people by demobilized soldiers. This was deduced from the fact that the waist drums in northern Shanxi are popular in the frontier fortress regions near the ancient Great Wall and that dancers dress in the clothing of ancient warriors and the dances have martial elements and formations similar to those of ancient times. Another view of the origin of the dance is that shepherds in northern Shanxi Province were the earliest makers of the waist drums. They beat drums made with sheepskin to liven up their lonely life. Later, beating drums, along with other percussion instruments, gradually became a recreational activity for villagers to pray for favourable weather for crops and a happy life.