Dragon Boat Festival

Wednesday, June 16th, 2010

Illustration by Song Nan Zhang from Awakening the Dragon, written by Arlene Chan (Tundra Books, 2004) June 16 is Duanwu or Dragon Boat Festival celebrated in China and parts of east and southeast Asia where there is large Chinese diaspora.  As the ancient story goes, poet and statesman Qu Yuan was exiled on a trumped up charge of conspiracy in the Warring States period of China’s history.   Frustrated by this mistreatment, he jumped into the Milo River and drowned.  The surrounding people of the area attempted to rescue him by launching the now famous dragon boats.  However, Qu Yuan’s body was never recovered, but his many followers and admirers began a tradition of tossing zongzi — sweet sticky rice wrapped in bamboo leaves — into the river to deter the fish from eating his remains.

This week alongside learning about this holiday from my Chinese friend, I received also a lovely package of freshly made zongzi.  My friend who is from Harbin said that in her region of China, the tradition was to fill  the sticky rice with currants and other dried fruits.  We enjoyed our late evening snack very much.

I haven’t yet seen a dragon boat race although I have friends who participate in them.  For a good book to share with your children about the holiday, check out Awakening the Dragon: The Dragon Boat Festival by Arlene Chan, illustrated by Song Nan Zhang (whose illustrated image graces this post).  Do you do anything to commemorate the holiday in your region?  Do share your stories with us!

Image © Song Nan Zhang, 2004

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Books at Bedtime: The Day I Became a Canadian

Sunday, May 16th, 2010

I vaguely remember the time my Japanese mother became a Canadian citizen.  It was 1974.  I was ten at the time and in elementary school.  I recall her studying for the citizenship test — learning the provinces of Canada, finding out about how parliament worked, reading about the history of Canada’s formation.  She probably knew more about Canada than I did at the time!   I don’t recall ever attending a ceremony, although she tells me she did go to one at a federal government office downtown.

The Day I Became a Canadian Citizen by Jo Bannatyne-Cugnet, illustrated by Song Nan Zhang (Tundra Books, 2008) is the story of how a Chinese girl, Xiao Ling Li, and her family become Canadian citizens.   The ceremony is held on Feb. 15, National Flag Day.  Xiao receives a gift of red shoes from her Aunt T.  Red is an auspicious color for the Chinese as well as being a representative color of Canada, so everyone wears a bit of red to the ceremony.  It is held at Xiao’s school gym in Toronto.

The judge, Dr. Williamson, who presides over the ceremony was himself an immigrant from Scotland twenty years ago, and he happily grants citizenship to Xiao’s family.  Other recipients include the Nguyen family, and two friends of Xiao’s — Sophia and Maria — whose family were refugees from Ethiopia.  At the end of the line of recipients of the citizenship certificate is a woman whom the judge gives an extra big hug to.  Xiao wonders who it is.  The judge remarks afterwards that it is his wife — a new Canadian originally from Greenland!

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Being born a Canadian, I don’t know what it feels like to become one.  But reading The Day I Became a Canadian, I got a child’s glimpse of what becoming a citizen must be like — a bit of an adventure in discovering oneself in a new identity yet to be forged.  As Judge Williamson says, “Very few Canadians share a common past, but all of us share a common future.”

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