Zhongqiujie, 中秋节, Mid-Autumn or Moon Festival

The Mid-Autumn or Moon Festival is fast upon us being the 15th day of the 8th month on the Lunar calendar and 25th of September this year on the Gregorian. You can google "Moon Festival" and find all sorts of information about ways to celebrate: eating round fruit, gazing up into the sky at the luminous orb, saying odes to the moon, and especially eating mooncakes. In our city people tend to go home to family and be together over a meal. It really is a special time in this way. They also exchange all sorts of elaborately boxed mooncakes. This area is especially notorious for its ham ones which Josh likes. The rest of us tend to prefer the fruit filled; though you can get some with bean paste and egg inside as well. Among the foreigner community, we have this theory that mooncakes are much the equivalent of our Christmas fruitcakes which get passed around and around the relationship circle. We think we have detected a good bit of mooncake regifting. I myself do like fruitcakes; but in this season, I am holding out for the over 200 kuai giftset of Dove chocolate mooncakes. Yeah right:)

ham mooncakes

Another nice link to Moon Festival information can be found here.
Also the Moon Festival comes right before another huge holiday, National Day, which is October 1st. This is the remembrance day of the formation of the Peoples Republic of China which took place in 1949. Many people will take a week or so off from work and travel or play. Like May Holiday it is consider one of the Golden Weeks.