Frog dance or Dragon Boat race on Friday 22nd June?
Swedish Midsummer celebration
This Friday it is holiday both in Sweden and China. In Sweden it is one of the biggest holidays in the year, Midsummer´s Eve, 仲夏夜, Zhongxiaye. And in China it is the Dragon Boat Holiday, 端午节, Duanwujie. Karin will spend the Swedish Midsummer in Shanghai and Jie will spend the Dragon Boat Holiday in Europe. So we only post a small blog this week with the help of Lydia, Karin´s friend in Shanghai.
Both the Swedish and Chinese holidays have their special activities and special food. We have written about them in previous blogs (see June 2011)
Strawberrycake or Zongzi?
On Midsummer´s Eve in Sweden you eat pickled herring, fresh potatoes and strawberry cake.
Strawberrycake at Midsummer
On DragonBoat Holiday in China you eat Zongzi, 棕子, which is a pyramid shaped sticky rice snack. It is folded in a bamboo leaf, in a quite tricky way. Not many of the young Chinese know how to do it.
Zongzi -typical snacks at Dragon Boat festival in China
Schnapps or Xiong huang jiu?
Schnapps or “Nubbe” as it is called in Swedish
At the Swedish Midsummer Eve you drink beer and schnapps, or “nubbe” as it is called in Swedish, in special glasses. And you sing special schnapps songs. And as time goes, everybody gets happy 🙂 and stay outdoors dancing till sunrise. In Sweden the night at that time is very short.
In China there is a traditional medicine drink called Xiong huang jiu, that you sometimes drink at Dragon Boat Festival.
And the frog dance?
It is actually very easy, just jump like a frog! If you want to see it and the other traditional activities on a Swedish Midsummer Eve, check out this video (on Youku.com): http://t.cn/zOkPgER!
Jie&Karin
Swedish eyes, Chinese mind 