We arrived in Ankang in the afternoon on Monday 14 June 2010. We had dinner then went for a walk around the town.
The next morning, we participated in the street parade as a part of the opening ceremony. Our group carried a flag that read 国际友人, meaning "international friends". The parade ended on the banks of the Han River (汉江) where we listened to some speeches and then posed for photos with the locals.
That afternoon we went for a trip to the nearby Xiangxi Cave, said to be the place where Lü Dongbin (one of the Eight immortals of Taoism) educated himself. This shrine dates back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907 CE).
We climbed the steep stairs to the temple at the top of the hill where we came across a group of musicians and dancers.
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| A painting on one of the walls inside the temple. |
Later that afternoon, we returned to Ankang to practise our rowing in the dragon boats. Around half of the international students were from Kazakhstan, so they formed one team all dressed in blue, and the rest of us were dressed in white.
That evening we went for a walk around the town again, this time along the river bank where the locals were out enjoying the warm summer air and going for a swim in the cool water.
Before long, we attracted a bit of a crowd. Some just wanted to have a chat and ask us all about what we were doing in China, and others were fascinated by an African-American student's tightly plaited hair and dark skin. When they felt her hair, they didn't think it was real. I was told by this same student that in some places they even want to rub her skin to see if the colour would come off, as they thought it looked like she had covered herself in make-up.
The next morning, we got up early and went back down to the river, this time to participate in the opening ceremony of the Dragon Boat Race. Before we got in the water, we had some hard boiled eggs and traditional dumplings called "zongzi" (粽子) made of sticky rice with pork and nuts all wrapped in a banana leaf and steamed.
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| Our dragon boat (the white one). |
During the ceremony, we rowed our boat down the river past a large crowd watching from the shore. We had to row to the beat of a drum to keep us in time. Fireworks were going off everywhere, some fireworks were even set-off from the back of our boat. It was so loud and lively, with the smell of gunpowder in the air, the cheers of the spectators and firecrackers along the river banks, and the sound of drums beating and rowers chanting.
We were towards the front of the procession, so we rowed into shore and sat in the boat to watch the other boats go past. They had singers, dancers and acrobats performing on a large cement area on the river bank. I was interviewed on camera and photographed by a local news crew.
After the performances, the other boats went back out onto the river where they took part in a traditional competition. We were still on the river bank, so we had front row seats. They set ducks and large fish loose into the river and then the teams in each boat had to compete to catch the animals. Each boat had one or two simmers that would jump in the water and grab as many fish or ducks as they could. Whoever had the most won and after the race they cooked up what they had caught. We all went back to the hotel for lunch and then got in the bus to go back to Xi'an. There was an actual Dragon Boat Race on later that afternoon, but unfortunately we weren't able to stay to see it.
There are many stories behind the traditions of the dragon boat festival which began more than 2,500 years ago. The story that I head was that Qu Yuan, a loyal court official to the king of the state of Chu, committed suicide in protest of the corruption of the era by holding a large rock and jumping into the Miluo river. Legend has it that the locals rushed to save him in their fishing boats, however they were unable to recover his body. Racing out onto the water in boats to catching fish and ducks is supposed to be a reenactment of this.
Click here to see all my photos from Ankang.
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