Cheung Chau Bun Festival

The tradition & historical record

Cheung Chau Bun Festival or Cheung Chau Da Jiu Festival is a traditional Chinese festival on the island of Cheung Chau in Hong Kong. Held annually, and with therefore the most public exposure, it is by far the most famous of such Da Jiu festivals, with Jiu (醮) being a Taoist sacrificial ceremony. Such events are held by mostly rural communities in Hong Kong, either annually or at a set interval of years ranging all the way up to once every 60 years (i.e. the same year in the Chinese astrological calendar). Other places that may share the folk custom include Taiwan, Sichuan, Fujian and Guangdong. ¹

Cheung Chau's Bun Festival, which draws tens of thousands of local and overseas tourists every year, is staged to mark the Eighth day of the Fourth Month, in the Chinese calendar (this is usually in early May). It coincides with the local celebration of Buddha's Birthday. The Cheung Chau Bun Festival began as a fun and exciting ritual for fishing communities to pray for safety from pirates. Today this religious origin has largely been forgotten, and the festival has mainly become a showcase of traditional Chinese culture. Kwok Kam Kee, the official bun supplier for the festival which was opened 40 years ago, makes over 60,000 buns for the festival. ¹

One story of the origin of the festival is that in the 18th century, the island of Cheung Chau was devastated by a plague and infiltrated by pirates until local fishermen brought an image of their patron Deity, Pak Tai to the island. Paraded through the village lanes, the deity drove away evil spirits. Villagers also disguised themselves as various other deities and walked around the island to drive away the evil spirits. Hailufeng people are the first on Cheung Chau to worship Pak Tai. The Cantonese and Tanka on the island subsequently also worship Pak Tai. Gradually, all dialect groups on the island took part in the Cheung Chau Bun Festival which integrates different folk elements. ¹

Every year on the 8th day of the fourth month of the lunar calendar, the islanders organise a weeklong thanksgiving, the Cheung Chau Bun Festival usually in April or May. The festival lasts for seven days. On three of these days the entire island goes vegetarian; most of the island's famous seafood restaurants adhere to this tradition. The local McDonald's also takes meat off the menu and instead sells veggie burgers made of mushrooms. ¹

In addition to traditional lion dances and dragon dances, children dressed as legendary and modern heroes are suspended above the crowd on the tips of swords and paper fans (飄色). They form the parade-in-the-air and are all secured within steel frames, though they appear to glide through the air. Parents consider it a great honour for their offspring to be part of the parade. This procession is accompanied by musicians loudly beating gongs and drums believed to ward off evil spirits. It is led by the image of Pak Tai, the God of Water and Lord of the North, to whom the island's Temple of the Jade Vacuity is dedicated. ¹

Here are some of the important Deities worshipped by Cheung Chau people during the festive celebration: ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Cheung Chau Bun Festival”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

Cheung Chau Bun Festival is folk festival on the island of Cheung Chau in Hong Kong, a Taoist ritual event, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²

The source record links this tradition to 3 external registers, which can be verified through the citation. ²