Long Island

Every 8th of the 4th lunar calendar month, Cheung Chau’s residents celebrate Bun Festival(包山节) aka 太平清醮. Cheung Chau is a  fishing village, every year at this time they will pray to the god for safety and prosperity, and also thank God for blessing the villagers in the previous year.
The two highlights of the festival are the Colour Parade in the afternoon and then bun-mountain climbing competition at midnight. In Colour Parade(飘色), different organizations will dress up kids as different characters, then they will be put up on a cart which will be push by adults. The kids are well treated, adults will be serving drinks, fan-ing the kids from below. During midnight, participants will compete to be the first to reach the top of the bun mountain.


1/ departing from Kai-to Pier, Discovery Bay


2/ reach Peng Chau 15 minutes later


3/found that Peng Chau is a traditional village. famous for cheap and fresh seafood. next time should spend some time on this small island.


4/ saw a laundry shop that sell veggie. they do laundry inside lar.


5/ took another ferry to Cheung Chau. finally took one ferry that is not rocky and bumpy.


6/striking banner celebrating the festival


7/ polices put up police line so that audiences won't keep on pushing to the front. people squeezing at every inch possible. you have to imagine the crowd, we were being shove around like revolving door by people who wants to go into the alley.


8/ colour parade. kids being dressed up and put up on cart.


9/ fire fighters spraying fragrant water, crying baby, representing restaurant


10/ LuiMan Brother, WaiSiuBo, cheering for East Asia Game


11/ the kids on top can only stand on one leg. i think they have more supporting metal inside.


12/ and the kid below have to hold on to the kid on top.


13/ the two kids were fixed on the cart. the kid below cant be carrying the one on top and the one on top cant be standing on one feet.


14/ 麒 and 麟 kirin. two of the four lucky mascots of China besides dragon and phoenix


15/ my favourite lion dance. lion here are so colourful! green, purple and blue!


16/green, black and  fluorescent orange


17/ pink!! yellow and lions on bamboo stick


18/ giant puppets


19/ temples on Cheung Chau have their keepers bring out the god statue for audiences to pay their respect


20/ people can burn(??) joss stick when the cart pass by them


21/ there are quite a number of temples on Cheung Chau


22/ kids dancing during the parade


23/ pairs of gong


24/ colourful flags with blessing wordings on them.


25/ residents really enjoyed themselves in the festival, smiley faces on everyone’s face.


26/ flower girls and another type of flags


27/ lanterns


28/ more bigger flags that need around 6 people to carry


29/ the must eat Ping On Bun. they have red bean, lotus and custard flavour, very similar to the tortoise bun during nine goddess festival on 9th lunar calendar
month.

30/ big bun mountain and small bun mountain


31/ bun mountain for competition. The supporting frames used to build by wood or bamboo. After it collapse in 1978, the event stops for 17 years. During its reintroduction in 2005, they start to build the frame using metal. After trainings and semi-final beforehand, 12 finalist were chosen and will be competing on the midnight of the actual day.

32/ ping-on bun side products. coin purse and decoration


33/ more side products. blanket and t-shirts

 
34/ Seafood Street. they say seafood here are not as expensive as SaiKung and Lamma Island.


35/ hope to be back one day. wish to explore the unexplored part of Cheung Chau.

the blog has gradually turn into a travel blog of hong kong.i shall go sit by the corner and reflect on the things i did.