Chung Yeung

Chung Yeung

September-October; ninth day of ninth lunar month

A Chinese holiday, Chung Yeung is the second family-remembrance day of the year. It's customary, as on the festival of Qing Ming, for families to visit the graves of ancestors, tend their gravestones, and make offerings of food, which are eaten after the ceremonies are completed.
It's also traditional on this day for people to go to the hills for picnics and kite-flying. This is done because, according to an ancient legend, a scholar was warned by a soothsayer that disaster would fall on the ninth day of the ninth lunar month. He took his family up into the mountains. When the family returned to their village, they found every living thing dead. They gave thanks that they had been spared. The custom of flying kites stems from traditional lore, which holds that kites can convey bad luck up into the sky.
The day is also known as Ch'ung Yang, Double Nine Day, and the Festival of High Places . It is a public holiday in some places, including Hong Kong and Macau.

CONTACTS:
Hong Kong Tourism Board
115 E. 54th St., 2nd Fl.
New York, NY 10022
212-421-3382; fax: 212-421-8428
www.discoverhongkong.com

SOURCES:
AnnivHol-2000, p. 240
BkFest-1937, p. 81
BkHolFestWrld-1970, p. 117
BkHolWrld-1986, Oct 15
DictFolkMyth-1984, pp. 225, 1106
EncyRel-1987, vol. 3, p. 327
FolkAmerHol-1999, p. 380
FolkWrldHol-1999, p. 574
HolSymbols-2009, p. 147

Celebration days: Oct 5, 2011; Sep 23, 2012; Sep 13, 2013; Oct 2, 2014; Sep 21, 2015