MoonCake Festival

Mid-Autumn Festival

Tonite is the yearly Mid-Autumn Festival also known as the Mooncake Festival. Its a meaningful nite where families spent their time together under the round luminous full moon eating various kinds and flavours of mooncakes, telling stories, sipping teas and basking under the moonlight.The full moon(round) also symbolize the time of reunion which comes from the word 团圆(tuan yuan) where yuan is the word round in chinese.

The Stories of the Chinese Mid Autumn Festival

I. The Lady - Chang Er

The time of this story is around 2170 B.C. The earth once had ten suns circling over it, each took its turn to illuminate to the earth. But one day all ten suns appeared together, scorching the earth with their heat. The earth was saved by a strong and tyrannical archer Hou Yi. He succeeded in shooting down nine of the suns. One day, Hou Yi stole the elixir of life from a goddess. However his beautiful wife Chang Er drank the elixir of life in order to save the people from her husband's tyrannical rule. After drinking it, she found herself floating and flew to the moon. Hou Yi loved his divinely beautiful wife so much, he didn't shoot down the moon.

Note: Chang'e 1 Lunar orbiter was launched to the moon on October 24, 2007. The Chang'e moon satellite, named after Chang Er, will take 3-D images of the moon surface for yearlong. This is the groundwork for the next Lunar Lander (Chang'e 2) project in 2012 , Lunar Sample Return (Chang'e 3) in 2017 and Chinese astronaut on the moon project.

II. The Man - Wu Kang

Wu Kang was a shiftless fellow who changed apprenticeships all the time. One day he decided that he wanted to be an immortal. Wu Kang then went to live in the mountains where he importuned an immortal to teach him. First the immortal taught him about the herbs used to cure sickness, but after three days his characteristic restlessness returned and he asked the immortal to teach him something else. So the immortal to teach him chess, but after a short while Wu Kang's enthusiasm again waned. Then Wu Kang was given the books of immortality to study. Of course, Wu Kang became bored within a few days, and asked if they could travel to some new and exciting place. Angered with Wu Kang's impatience, the master banished Wu Kang to the Moon Palace telling him that he must cut down a huge cassia tree before he could return to earth. Though Wu Kang chopped day and night, the magical tree restored itself with each blow, and thus he is up there chopping still.

III. The Hare - Jade Rabbit

In this legend, three fairy sages transformed themselves into pitiful old men and begged for something to eat from a fox, a monkey and a rabbit. The fox and the monkey both had food to give to the old men, but the rabbit, empty-handed, offered his own flesh instead, jumping into a blazing fire to cook himself. The sages were so touched by the rabbit's sacrifice that they let him live in the Moon Palace where he became the "Jade Rabbit."

IV. The Cake - Moon Cake

During the Yuan dynasty (A.D.1280-1368) China was ruled by the Mongolian people. Leaders from the preceding Sung dynasty (A.D.960-1280) were unhappy at submitting to foreign rule, and set how to coordinate the rebellion without it being discovered. The leaders of the rebellion, knowing that the Moon Festival was drawing near, ordered the making of special cakes. Backed into each moon cake was a message with the outline of the attack. On the night of the Moon Festival, the rebels successfully attacked and overthrew the government. What followed was the establishment of the Ming dynasty (A.D. 1368-1644). Today, moon cakes are eaten to commemorate this legend.

Aside from this, there's this funny occurance that happened at my room. i'm attacked by termites!!! These tiny small insects are munching the bookshelf and almost got my books all munched. i've almost forgotten the existence of these tiny creatures and now its right in front of my eye. gotta report to the hostel management d. have a great nite and a happy Mooncake Festival.

Music

Music is a universal language,

It connects hearts of all alike.

No matter what colour are you,

When it comes to music,

We understands each other.

Many learn of music,

Some born with it.

One thing we can't deny,

Even till the last breath of our life,

We can't live without it.

Some composes and some creates,

Others sing and play of it.

When we listen to music,

There in our brain form colours of electric waves,

That lights our heads up like multi colour light bulb.

Words are beautified when put into music,

Which adds meanings to it.

When we feel the music,

When we reflect on meanings of the music,

Our spirit gets lifted up bit by bit.

Music colours up our life,

It brings joy and happiness,

It brings sadness and grieve.

And with all these colours and patterns,

Each of us will have different pictures of our own.

This is Faith

This is Faith

To walk where there is no path

To breathe where there is no air

To see where there is no light..

This is Faith.

To cry out in the silence,

The silence of the night,

And hearing no echo believe

And believe again and again..

This is Faith.

To hold pebbles and see jewels

To raise sticks and see forests

To smile with weeping eyes..

This is Faith.

To say:" God, I believe" when others deny,

"I hear" when there is no answer,

"I see" though naught is seen..

This is Faith.

And the fierce love in the heart,

The savage love that cries

Hidden Thou art yet there!

Veil Thy face and mute Thy tongue

Yet I see and hear Thee, Love,

Beat me down to the bare earth,

Yet I rise and love Thee, Love!"

This is Faith.

~Amatu'l Baha Ruhiyyih Khanum~

Colours of Life

Colours

Colours are everything in our lives. Imagine a life without colours, how dull it would be. The world without colours will be just like a sheet of empty plain paper,meaningless. Colours beautify our world, enables us to categories things, enable us to have different feelings toward things as well as enable us to embrace UNITY in DIVERSITY.

The Great Designer, Painter, or Creator had designed every single thing in this world with utmost uniqueness, preciseness and with the highest intelligence that even if all the human brains were to be combined into one, they still can't fully grasp its secrets. And a part from this He had endowed each and every creation with colours of its own creatively, making this world into a wonderful garden.

So should we differentiate ourselves base on the colour? or should we be grateful for having peoples with various skin, hair and eye colour making this world into a huge garden with various colours, shapes and fragrances? take some time, take a few steps back and try to look at the world again..

Other than that, colours are also universal alphabets that forms words and sentences that bring meaning everyone can understand. When colours are combined together forming a picture, they present a meaning of its own or even a thousand meanings like what the we know "a picture is worth a thousand words". Colours can show a person's feelings, his way of thinking and also his creativity which can be understood everyone.

From the Baha'i Writings its said that God had gave each of us a frame which we called it as our fate-things we cannot change for example the talents we're endowed with is a fate. Different person have different fate. But inside that frame the painter of the picture is ourselves. How we want to design it, what colours we choose for the picture is decided by our ownself just like how we utilize our talents and faculties for the betterment of the world.

Hence, we choose the colours of our life ourselves. I choose to have various colours for my picture and where does this colours come from? It comes from friends of mine with different skin colours, different thinking, different talents and comes from different walks of life. What about you?

We are One Family