The ‘bright’ side of the moon

The moon holds fascination for so many people from V who points at the sky and shouts “moon moon” every time he sees it, to entire cultures. If you are Indian, you know the long list of Indian festivals are often governed by the lunar calendar and each festival has a story around it that has been retold for generations. The Chinese too, have a moon goddess and an entire festival dedicated to her.

Last week marked the Mid- Autumn festival and our first ‘cultural‘ foray. Since we live on an island inhabited mostly with expats, it’s a bit of a cultural melting pot. However, we could see signs of the upcoming festival with lanterns being put up in shops and our local recreation club. We kicked off the festival by making our own lanterns (thank you YouTube!).

L has now become my ‘teacher’, a hat she loves wearing. Oh how the tables have turned! Each week she comes home and teaches me a few words that she’s learnt in Mandarin. I can now say "dog", "disappeared", "brother", "hello" and "thank you" in Mandarin. She is also the one who told me about the story of the Mid- Autumn festival. There was once an excellent archer named Hou Yi who was married to Chang Yi. At that time there were ten suns in the sky and this was making life unbearable for people. Hou Yi shot nine of the suns and was rewarded with an elixir that could make him immortal. Legend says, Hou Yi loved his wife so much he didn’t want to be immortal so he did not drink it. However, one day one of Hou Yi’s students Pang Meng, broke into his house to try and steal the elixir. His wife Chang Yi knew she couldn’t defeat him, so she drank the elixir herself and flew until she landed on the moon where she remains as an immortal. Hou Yi was very sad and put a table filled with food hoping his wife would come back.

Today, this festival is celebrated on a full moon day and families get together, share food - especially moon cakes (which I have yet to try) and light lanterns.

How do a bunch of expats celebrate? Get together on the beach with picnics in the moonlight! I’ve been lucky enough to meet some lovely people here - particularly two families who have just moved from London and are newbies like us. We set off to experience our first festival together. As a teen, I was an avid fan of Gilmore Girls and always wondered what living in a small town would be like. While DB is by no means Stars Hollow, it does have a somewhat small town you run into people you know all the time feeling. Thank god for that, as firecracker L was off as soon as she saw her friend…and she decided to wear all black that day 🤦‍♀️. It’s really hard to keep track of three kids on a beach. Throw in a playground on the beach, take away all the light and it’s nearly impossible! Thank god for the sense of community on this island. I would run into mums that recognised L and they would say “L’s there”.

That’s L coming down a slide in the moonlight.

Glow sticks, lanterns, friends, food, a full moon and a playground on the beach - doesn’t get better than this (except for the moment when a baby snake crawled on my leg….eeek). Beach in the moonlight looked less rosy after that 😹!