Let's be honest: Moon Cakes are gross.

Happy Holidays everyone!  Yesterday was another holiday: the Mid-Autumn Festival.

This festival, combined with the Chinese National Day, meant an 8-day holiday break for the whole country!  Not too big a deal for me, though, since I'm on my third straight week of holiday.  I just can't get enough!

I didn't do a whole lot of stuff during this festival, since most of the traditions are family-based, but I did partake in two important Mid-Autumn traditions:  sitting down to a nice dinner, and eating moon-cakes (as well as, of course, a bit of firework watching).

Moon cakes themselves are these  delicious-looking small cakes that generally come individually wrapped or in boxes. For some inexplicable reason (read: I don't know why), it is tradition on this holiday to give them out to /everyone/.  I received like a million of these little guys (occasionally without word from complete strangers), and even gave out a few myself. They come in a variety of flavors, with some popular ones being "red bean" and "green bean", and the one I decided to take pictures of is "egg yolk" flavored.  Also, and this is an important point, they are gross, and taste like sugar-cardboard mush.  But the thought still counts.

As for the dinner, I was again touched by the thoughtfulness of two new friends I made in one of the cafeterias on campus.  The day before, I had met this married couple (about my age) that runs one of the small shops in the cafeteria, and they told me that if I came back the next day, dinner would be on them.  I was already impressed, but when I came the next night (the day of the festival), I simply expected the husband to whip up a quick dish for me to eat, and I wouldn't have to pay.  Instead, I was invited back into the kitchen where they had set up a table, cooked two separate dishes (plus rice for everyone), and bought two more from the nice, rather expensive restaurant upstairs.  They then sat with me and we had our nice, Mid-Autumn family dinner together.  It was both incredibly kind and incredibly delicious.  I did not, unfortunately, bring my camera to photograph the royal spread, but I stole a picture off of the internet of my favorite dish in the group, Shao Fu Zhu, which is a lovely combination of bamboo shoots and "tree ears".

And yes, they also gave me a moon cake.  Yippee.