Flippery Flip Flap Flop…

Delicious savory or sweet dumplings wrapped in bamboo leaves mark the celebration of the jung cheet festival. Celebrated on the 5th day of the 5th lunar month every year, the dumpling festival, or jung cheet in Cantonese, is heralded by grand dragon boat races held in Penang and with the wrapping and cooking of rice dumplings or jung.

These rice dumplings come in two main types, either savory or sweet. The savory ones also come in variety of fillings including salted egg yolk, pork, chicken, minced prawns, mushrooms and more. Savory dumplings can be eaten straight, or dipped in sugar. There are now halal versions available, and these dumplings are available all year round. The other version is sweet, and made of glutinous rice mixed with lye water. These sweet dumplings are normally smaller, and dipped in  sugar or gula Melaka syrup. Though there is an air of gaiety and celebration about it, the original reason for the festival is more sombre. The dumpling festival commemorates Qu-Yuan, one of China’s greatest poet and patriots, who protested against a corrupt government. Wrongfully dismissed, he protested against the justice and drowned himself in a river. They sought to recover his body from the river he drowned in, but it was never found.

So that his body won’t be eaten by fish, the people then threw dumplings made of rice into the water for fish to eat instead of his remains and boat raced throughout the expanse of the river to find him. Though the ages, the celebration has evolved to become two rather distinct, albeit related festival, namely the Dragon Boat festival where teams of rowers led by a drummer race a dragon-headed boat to reach the finishing line, and the Dumpling festival. The Dragon Boat festival is normally held from the 15th to the 16th of June in Penang. The dumpling festival usually lasts throughout the month.

This entry was posted on Friday, March 30th, 2007 at 2:38 am and is filed under Culture and Tradition. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.