YUAN XIAO FESTIVAL                                NYCHINATOWNcom

2001: February 7

2002: February 26

   The Yuanxiao Festival falls on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. The word yuanxiao denotes the first night of the year with a full moon. On that night, streets and squares in cities and towns are festooned with lanterns of all shapes and sizes. This explains why the Yuanxiao Festival is also known as the Lantern Festival and gives a hint as to why it is thought of as the Chinese Valentines Day.

    In the past, women did not have many opportunities to go out of the house. But on Yuanxiao night, young men and women would go out into the streets, look at the lanterns, solve the lantern riddles and, and enjoy a rare chance to mingle freely with one another.

Origins
   According to an ancient Chinese legend, people could see heavenly spirits flying in the sky on the night of the first full moon after the Lunar New Year. To get a better view of these spirits, they would hold torches up to the sky. With the passage of time, torches have been replaced by lanterns.

    The custom of hanging lanterns during the Yuanxiao Festival began in the Han Dynasty (206 BC-220 AD). It grew into a full-fledged lantern festival in the Sui and Tang Dynasties (581-907 AD). During the Tang Dynasty, a curfew was imposed in the capital Chang'an (present day Xian), but the Emperor lifted the curfew for three nights so that the citizens could celebrate Yuanxiao Festival.

    For those three precious nights, everybody, from high officials to ordinary commoners, thronged the streets of Chang'an to look at the Yuanxiao lanterns. The streets were packed with revelers. From then on the scale of Yuanxiao celebrations became larger and grander.

Lanterns
   Lanterns are a major component of Yuanxiao celebrations. On this night, lanterns of all sorts decorate streets, temples and other public places.

    Traditional lanterns are constructed from bamboo strips. They can take a myriad of forms, but they generally fall into one of two basic categories - Image Lanterns and Story Lanterns. Image Lanterns are depictions of flora and fauna, man and machine. Story Lanterns, on the other hand, depict scenes from popular folklore and historical stories like Madame White Snake, Shepherd Boy and Weaving Girl, Romance of the Three Kingdoms and the like. They also serve the purpose of educating the public on traditional virtues like loyalty and filial piety.

Riddles
   Riddles have been around in China for thousands of years. It used to be an elegant pastime for scholarly gentlemen, but gradually it became a form of entertainment enjoyed by all. There are many forms of Chinese riddles but the most enduring form is the lantern riddle.

    Lantern riddles are riddles posted on lanterns. While taking in all the different lantern designs, people also try to solve the riddles written on them. Riddles can be quite difficult to solve and so are also known as tiger riddles (tigers being elusive animals that are extremely difficult to catch).

    Lantern riddles can be about anything under the sun - poetry, essays, flora, fauna, people or just things. The trick is how the riddle can be made clever and interesting.