- Gordon Dumoulin
a 2,000 year old Valentine's day....
Chinese Valentine's Day today (25th of Aug. this year) | The Double Seventh Festival (七夕节, Qixi Festival) is one of Chinese traditional festivals, and also known as a Chinese Valentine's Day. It's based on a romantic legend about a weaver girl and a cowherd. It falls each year on the 7th day of the 7th Chinese lunar month.
The festival has been celebrated since the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD). The general tale is a love story between Zhinü (the weaver girl, symbolizing Vega) and Niulang (the cowherd, symbolizing Altair). Their love was not allowed, and they were banished to opposite sides of the Silver River. Once a year, on the 7th day of the 7th lunar month, a flock of magpies would form a bridge to reunite the lovers for one day. As you can imagine there are many variations to the story in the course of time and many traditions have evolved around the festival since the Han Dynasty.
Today, younger couples celebrate Qixi Festival similar to Valentine's day on 14th of February with flowers, chocolate or a romantic dinner.
Luckily the circumstances at Chinese Valentine are quite different from the 14th of February Valentine this year for most people in China, certainly without masks for most of them :-)