Latest news with #BunFestival
Observer
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Observer
Traditional culture, fancy dress meet at Hong Kong's raucous bun festival
Kids dressed as real and fantasy heroes, drummers pounding a beat and sweet treats offered to powerful gods -- thousands of visitors poured onto a small island in Hong Kong for its annual Bun Festival on Monday. Held on the Chinese city's outlying Cheung Chau, the raucous five-day festival transforms the usually quiet fishing community into an explosion of colour and noise that blends Cantonese traditions with modern culture and draws locals and tourists alike. Monday's three-hour parade -- known as "Piu Sik", meaning floating colours -- traditionally saw locals march through town with statues of local gods. These days, local children dress up as both real and imaginary figures, including Olympic fencing champion Cheung Ka Long, Ne Zha from a recent Chinese blockbuster animation, and the legendary Monkey King, Sun Wukong. The five-day Bun Festival is said to date back to the 1800s, when fisherfolk drove away pirates and the plague by parading a statue of Taoist sea deity Pak Tai. "It's my first time to visit the island and this showed me a new Hong Kong, completely different from downtown," Cedric Linet, a 49-year-old French banker, told AFP. The buns represent good fortune, holding sweet bean paste in a crumbly pastry marked with Chinese characters for "peace" and "safety". Crowds queued all day to get hold of the buns, used to make offerings to traditional deities and sacrifices to the souls of the dead. The climax of the festival comes at midnight, when contestants climb a 14-metre high tower covered in buns -- hoping to be crowned "King of Kings" or "Queen of Queens". Among those gathered were tourists from Communist Party-ruled mainland China, keen to get a glimpse of traditional Chinese culture not often seen back home. Chinese students studying in Hong Kong, Gao Yidan and Cheng Qi, said they learnt about the festival on Xiaohongshu, an app similar to Instagram. "The atmosphere of traditional culture is very strong here," Gao told AFP. Another visitor from China's southwestern Sichuan province said she appreciated Hong Kong's celebrations of Buddha's birthday, which fell on Monday. "We love the crowded atmosphere here, even though today's very hot," Huang Dan, a 42-year-old housewife, told AFP. —AFP
RTHK
07-05-2025
- Business
- RTHK
Golden Week tourism jump put down to new attractions
Golden Week tourism jump put down to new attractions About 920,000 mainland visitors came to Hong Kong during the Labour Day Golden Week holiday. File photo: RTHK A tourism-sector representative said on Wednesday new attractions in the SAR have contributed to the better-than-expected tourist arrival figures from the mainland over the Labour Day Golden Week. During the five-day holiday, about 920,000 mainlanders set foot in Hong Kong, exceeding the Travel Industry Council's (TIC) estimate of 800,000. TIC executive director Fanny Yeung told an RTHK radio programme that the number is equivalent to more than 90 percent of pre-Covid levels. "This year's Golden Week holiday was the first since Kai Tak Sports Park opened and the first since the city's panda cubs were available to welcome visitors," she said. "The weather was also really nice during the holiday period, so we were very lucky. "If the weather during that time was like it is today, I believe this would have had an impact on visitor numbers. "Also, the final day of the holiday was on Buddha's Birthday, which was the day that Cheung Chau's Bun Festival was held so that also made this Golden Week holiday more appealing." Yeung also attributed the higher arrival figures to "tourism everywhere" promotional efforts. With more visitors choosing to go hiking, she said, the government may consider setting up a quota system to limit the number of visitors in popular hiking destinations, such as the High Island Reservoir East Dam in Sai Kung to avoid overcrowding. A government working group on festival arrangements led by Chief Secretary Eric Chan found that nearly 33,000 of the mainland tourists over the holiday period came as part of more than 900 tour groups, with about 70 percent of them staying overnight. The Tourism Board has said it expects the SAR to see 49 million visitor arrivals this year. Lam Chi-ting from the Hong Kong Tourism Industry Employees' General Union believes that it won't be difficult to achieve the goal. But he told the same programme that it would be difficult to have tour group numbers fully return to pre-Covid level as they only stand at 70 percent now.
Nahar Net
06-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Nahar Net
Crowds flock to celebrate the century-old Bun Festival in Hong Kong
by Naharnet Newsdesk 06 May 2025, 12:57 Crowds flocked to the outlying Cheung Chau Island in Hong Kong to celebrate the Bun Festival, held each year in a century-old tradition to ward off evil and pray for peace and blessings. The festivities began with a parade of children in costumes, called "Piu Sik," which translates as "floating color." Children dressed as legendary deities or historic characters are carried on stands above the gathered crowds, meandering through the island's narrow lanes. The highlight of the festival comes at midnight with a "bun-scrambling" competition, where climbers race up a tower covered with plastic buns. Whoever gets the most buns of greatest value wins the race. Buns near the top have higher value. The competition was suspended for decades after an accident in 1978 when a bun tower collapsed and caused injuries. The tradition resumed in 2005. Legend has it that the colorful custom began after a deadly plague devastated the island of Cheung Chau. Residents followed the local Taoist tradition of imploring the deities for help and used white steamed buns as offerings to drive away the evil spirits. Nowadays, residents and visitors to the island eat the white steamed buns as part of the celebrations. They are called "Ping On Bao" in Cantonese, meaning "peace" buns, and are stamped with two red Chinese characters meaning "peace" and "safety."
San Francisco Chronicle
05-05-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Crowds flock to celebrate the century-old Bun Festival in Hong Kong
HONG KONG (AP) — Crowds flocked to the outlying Cheung Chau Island in Hong Kong to celebrate the Bun Festival, held each year in a century-old tradition to ward off evil and pray for peace and blessings. The festivities began with a parade of children in costumes, called 'Piu Sik,' which translates as 'floating color.' Children dressed as legendary deities or historic characters are carried on stands above the gathered crowds, meandering through the island's narrow lanes. The highlight of the festival comes at midnight with a 'bun-scrambling' competition, where climbers race up a tower covered with plastic buns. Whoever gets the most buns of greatest value wins the race. Buns near the top have higher value. The competition was suspended for decades after an accident in 1978 when a bun tower collapsed and caused injuries. The tradition resumed in 2005. Legend has it that the colorful custom began after a deadly plague devastated the island of Cheung Chau. Residents followed the local Taoist tradition of imploring the deities for help and used white steamed buns as offerings to drive away the evil spirits. Nowadays, residents and visitors to the island eat the white steamed buns as part of the celebrations. They are called 'Ping On Bao' in Cantonese, meaning 'peace' buns, and are stamped with two red Chinese characters meaning 'peace' and 'safety.' — This is a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors.
Yahoo
05-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Crowds flock to celebrate the century-old Bun Festival in Hong Kong
HONG KONG (AP) — Crowds flocked to the outlying Cheung Chau Island in Hong Kong to celebrate the Bun Festival, held each year in a century-old tradition to ward off evil and pray for peace and blessings. The festivities began with a parade of children in costumes, called 'Piu Sik,' which translates as 'floating color.' Children dressed as legendary deities or historic characters are carried on stands above the gathered crowds, meandering through the island's narrow lanes. The highlight of the festival comes at midnight with a 'bun-scrambling' competition, where climbers race up a tower covered with plastic buns. Whoever gets the most buns of greatest value wins the race. Buns near the top have higher value. The competition was suspended for decades after an accident in 1978 when a bun tower collapsed and caused injuries. The tradition resumed in 2005. Legend has it that the colorful custom began after a deadly plague devastated the island of Cheung Chau. Residents followed the local Taoist tradition of imploring the deities for help and used white steamed buns as offerings to drive away the evil spirits. Nowadays, residents and visitors to the island eat the white steamed buns as part of the celebrations. They are called 'Ping On Bao' in Cantonese, meaning 'peace' buns, and are stamped with two red Chinese characters meaning 'peace' and 'safety.' — This is a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors.
