[28] Dragon Boats and other holiday racing

When asked to explain the National Dragon Boat festival holiday, my
Taiwanese friends seem to experience that brand of self-consciousness
reserved for explaining a strange idea that doesn't make much sense but
you accepted a long time ago.

Legend has it that a poet loyal to the king in third century China was falsely
accused of treason; rather than living shamed in exile he decides to
drown. The townspeople, who loved the poet, threw rice cakes to the
river so the fish wouldn't eat him and raced boats to find him. Ever
since, they celebrate each year the dragon boat race.

In my opinion, it is a perfectly valid and beautiful explanation. If
you disagree and it seems a little strange to celebrate a holiday by
racing adorned boats, I submit for your consideration three other
holiday races I've seen, the true strangeness of which should put things
in perspective:

Top 3 - The Seven Churches Race, South America

Maundy thursday, also known as holy thursday, is a christian holy
day which happens every year the thursday before Easter. It
commemorates the last supper between Jesus and the apostles and
precedes the Easter Triduum, the three days of Good Friday, Holy
saturday, and Easter Sunday, which commemorate the passion, death, and
resurrection of Jesus.

So far so good. Here's the strange part: Seven local churches are visited by
devout catholics in south america in celebration of this day. The
churches are to be visited before midnight and a certain number of
prayers have to be performed in each. Because it is time-bound, there
is a sense of urgency to the proceedings and more than a pilgrimage
the route acquires the taste of a race against time.

In some locations such as downtown Lima, ts is relatively easy to
accomplish. More than eleven churches in one square kilometer
provide ample time to complete the requirement. In other cities, it
can get complicated; I remember as a kid attempting this race only
once and from my recollection, skipping a few due to lack of time (or
perhaps, lets admit it, devotion.)

Why should there be seven and not eight or six is explained apparently
by the important stops Jesus made that night. It is unclear whether
the participants can tell what those stops were but one thing is
certain: grandmothers and children alike buzz from one crowded church
to the next in order to fulfill the tradition.

Top 2 - The Easter Egg Hunt Race, US (and increasingly in its cultural colonies)

The usual explanation about ancient pagan rites of fertility (of which
the hare and egss were symbol) getting mixed with early european
christian celebrations may shed some light into the origin of easter
eggs, but does nothing to lessen the cacophony of the
celebration: On one hand you have the resurrection of Christ. On the
other, children racing to collect the largest number of colored eggs.

More weird is seeing this tradition imported to catholic countries,
where there was no history of egg hunting until recently, as part of
adopting more "American" celebrations. Some Middle and upper class people
in south-american countries as well as Philippines are putting their
kids through the egg hunt as a "fun" activity during easter.

As an atheist I can only say the theological implications of this
import are left to each parent's conscience.



Top 1 - The Halloween Drag Race, Washington D.C.

It is my favorite, but Halloween is also the least rational of
all holidays. If you ask americans to explain it, 95% of the time
you'll get the "dress-like-a-slut-day" reasoning; this is not an
attempt by most of the population at being witty. We just don't know.

To make things better, this race has no mythical grounding on the
holiday in question; it has no grounding at all other than satisfying
a verbal pun. Drag Queens run down Dupont Circle while a crowd of
confused bystanders cheer and take pictures. Drag - Race. Get it?




So, Taiwanese friends, no reason to fret. Compared with grandmas
running through churches to commemorate Christ's pain, and screaming
banshee-like drag queens in the US capital, a dragon boat race doesn't
seem a strange celebration. Not at all.

Fabio Arciniegas A.
Taipei, Taiwan - June 2011