Mid Autumn Festival!

Today, we in China celebrate one of our big four annual festivals, Mid Autumn Festival, so it's lanterns and mooncakes and public holidays all around.

The problem, however, with writing a post on it is that, after three years blogging, I've covered all the festivals.  Mid Autumn Festival can be found here, although this account comes from 2004 when our world was very different indeed.  There are later accounts but you'll have to find them yourself.

However, this year, what's different is that everyone is raving about how they've found a new-style mooncake they actually like and want to eat.  And they aren't talking about the same mooncake in each instance because there are literally dozens of these new suckers.  Seems this year everyone has tried their hand at reinvention.

That was the problem with the original mooncakes:  made from baked lotus seed paste and with a double-yoked hundred-year-old egg in the middle, they tasted foul, weren't good for you, and - if that weren't enough to whammy them - they had, at their heart, a little piece of toxicity that would very likely kill you.  It was the only food on earth that came with a government health warning.


There are folk out there who claim to like the original mooncake but they never sound sincere to me.  All those "No, seriously.  I really do.  Of course, I only ever eat a slither of it each year, but I really do like them."

So if ever there was a food in need of reinvention, it has to be this one.  But you may recall how, six years back, Starbucks tried its hand at coming up with their own version and everyone was outraged.  "How dare you Americans come in here and try to change our most sacred foods?" and thus it wasn't a success ... although several people did whisper to me that they tried the Starbucks mooncake and actually LIKED it. But that was something you could ever say aloud.

However, here we are, six years later, and most everyone has admitted something has to be done and now, this year, reinvented mooncakes are outselling the original.

Tonight we plan to go to Sai Kung to watch the kiddies float their lantern boats followed by a big communal beach party.  Man, those Jewish families out there in New Territories know how to throw a fabulous Mid-Autumn Festival Extravaganza!