The Mid-Autumn Festival brings fun, cultural immersion and plenty of mooncakes to campus The Lafayette – The Lafayette

Students from many cultural backgrounds gathered in front of Farinon on Tuesday to celebrate this years Mid-Autumn Festival.

Observed on the 15th day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar, the Mid-Autumn Festival falls on September 21 this year. It is an annual festival of harvest observed in several countries across East and Southeast Asia, including China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Laos, Vietnam, Singapore, Thailand and Japan.

The Asian Cultural Association (ACA) brought the Mid-Autumn Festival to campus in collaboration with the Chinese department, sharing this cultural experience and significance with the wider Lafayette community.

We usually celebrate it inside the Farinon Atrium. We put lanterns up inside. There are different game stations and you pick prizes. We also have musical chair[s], but its not feasible anymore [due to COVID]. Theres an origami station. Theres lantern painting. Calligraphy is a must as well, said Sophea Pa 22, the president of ACA.

Because Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated all throughout East and Southeast Asia, customs vary across different countries. Kevin Tzeng, the Fulbright teaching assistant for the Chinese department, said that people in Taiwan celebrate Mid-Autumn Festival by having barbecues, for instance.

Regardless of time and place, the Mid-Autumn Festival remains at its core a significant celebration of familial bond. Marked by outings, sharing of mooncakes and tea and an appreciation of the moon, it is an occasion that brings families and friends together.

No matter how busy we are, we will try to show up [on Mid-Autumn Festival] and celebrate it togetherThe circle of the moon symbolizes the reunion of familiesThe mooncake is also the symbol of the full moon, Tzeng said. We all cut the mooncake together so that we wont break the circle individually.

Over time, elements of the festival have undergone changes to accommodate the modern age.

Theres a lot of commercials and consumerism going on in the promotion of the mooncakes, Chinese Visiting Professor Yingying Huang said.

When I was little, we used to just walk out, and our neighbors and we went to the same lawn, and wed sit downWe dont see that anymore. People are busier. The cities are so busy. We dont find such places, she added.

Huang shared one version of the legend surrounding the festival. The myth follows the story of Change, the beloved moon goddess, and her tragic separation from her husband Hou Yi. After Hou Yi shot down nine of the 10 suns in the sky, saving the planet from scorching heat, he was rewarded by the gods in heaven with an elixir that would grant him immortality. Although Hou Yi hid the elixir, his curious wife Change consumed it, attaining the promised immortal life. Unable to control the elixirs powers, she then floated to the moon.

According to legend, the moon is cold because Change is living there alone without her husband. But theres a little bunny living with her there. People say in the middle of autumn when the moon is in its fullest and roundest and brightest, you can see shapes of a tree there, which is the tree that grows outside Changes palace, Huang explained.

In continuation of this spirit of cultural exchange and immersion, students on campus have a lot more to look forward to. The Chinese department plans to host a calligraphy event presented by Tzeng soon after midterms. Pa also shared plans of collaborating with the South Asian Students Association to recreate a celebration of the South Asian festival Diwali in November.

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The Mid-Autumn Festival brings fun, cultural immersion and plenty of mooncakes to campus The Lafayette - The Lafayette