Happy Lantern Festival!
Thank you for subscribing to Wu Fei’s Music Daily! This is the 273rd episode — Fish lantern.
This solo guzheng track was recorded yesterday. Today is the Lantern Festival, which marks the last day of the lunar new year celebration. It is also known as 元宵节 - "Prime Night Festival". As early as the Western Han Dynasty (206 BCE - CE 25), it had become a festival with great significance.
Eaten during the Lantern Festival, tangyuan '湯圓' (Southern China, Taiwan and Southeast Asia) or yuanxiao '元宵' (Northern China) is a glutinous rice ball typically filled with sweet red bean paste, sesame paste, or peanut butter. The Chinese people believe that the round shape of the balls and the bowls in which they are served symbolize family togetherness, and that eating tangyuan or yuanxiao may bring the family harmony, happiness and luck in the new year.
This fish lantern I found here looks exactly like the one I had as a kid on Lantern Festival. Fish 鱼 yu, is a good character in Chinese language. This is based on a pun: “年年有魚, 年年有餘” (niannian you yu, niannian you yu), which means “every year there’s fish, every year there’s surplus.”
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