Sasha's Flower Garden

There are many different legends connected with this festival -that it is the birthday of the moon; that the Old Man in the Moon (the matchmaker) ties together couples with invisible red thread; and that Miss Hang and Toad Circle journey back to their home on the moon, but it is a harvest celebration throughout Southeast Asia, and a time to admire the moon when it is at its fullest and brightest for the year.

Tet (Lunar New Year) is an occasion for national merry-making: fireworks, traditional foods, visits to temples and pagodas, walks by the Lake of the Restored Sword on the Eve of Tet and visits to the Flower Market (Comb Street) near the crowded Dong-Xuan market. The Mid-Autumn Festival is a children’s celebration in which the adults also join. Festival of the Moon, Moon cake.

In the eighth month comes the Festival of the Moon, answering to the Harvest Festival in Western countries. What are called “moon cake” are sold at this season. If the year has been productive there will be a great deal of rejoicing.

Presents are interchanged at this time as also at other festival seasons. As the moon becomes gradually full there appears in it to the Chinese eye a man who is climbing a tree. The full moon is greeted with much ceremony, and the night on which the luminary appears its brightest is passed in feasting and rejoicing.

Moon cakes or “mid-autumn cakes” are a mixture of fruit and other sweets wrapped up in a thin crust in the shape of a full moo, about two or three inches in diameter and a half-inch thick. According to a long established custom they must be exchanged with relatives and friends on the days preceding the Autumn festival.

On the night of 15th, each family lights the four lanterns, hanging two on either side of the “The kong” incense pot, in the main hall of the residence. Two of three large lanterns bear the family name usually with the inscription “may boys increase”, while the other two lanterns are in commemoration of the marriage of the mother and father of the family. The banner of the eight immortal is hung over the main hall, and the whole family comes together for a banquet. To the Vietnamese the full moon signifies completeness, the entire family gathered together in happiness.

This is a delightful festival for children and most pleasant for the adults to watch. Many weeks before the festival, bakers are busy making hundreds of thousands of moon cakes of sticky rice and filled with all kinds of unusual fillings such as peanuts, sugar, lotus seed. They are baked and sold in colorful boxes. Expensive ones in ornate boxes are presented as gifts.

On the night of festival, children form a procession and go through the street holding their lighted lanterns and performing the dances of the unicorn to accompaniment of drums and cymbals.

Regarding the moon, the Chinese have a legend relating to Miss Hang Nga and the “Immortality medicine”. According to a book by Alice Stralen, during the Chinese Nghiêu dynasty, there lived a marksman by the name of Hau Nghe who never missed a target with his arrows.

He was sent to earth by the Emperor of Heaven to rescue people from the sufferings. At that time, there were 10 suns shining upon the earth. As a result, the earth was suffering from severe radiation and drought, and all the crops were damaged. Utilizing his sharp shooting skill, Hau Nghe was able to shoot down 9 suns, and left only the present sun that we see today.

Hau Nghe had a wife, Hang Nga, who wished to live long and remain beautiful forever. She urged Hau Nghe to ascend the mountain of Côn lôn to seek the immortality medicine from the Fair Queen of the Western Regions. Hau Nghe brought home that kind of medicine; she felt her body floating on air, and she flew away to the moon where a rabbit, a toad and a cinnamon tree were the only living creatures. This story explained why sometimes the moon is also called Miss Hang, Toad Circle, Cinnamon Circle and Jade Rabbit.

The Vietnamese have adapted these special Chinese customs to fit their culture and customs. Therefore, the picture of a carp chasing away the devil has become a carp looking at the moon, or a carp jumping over a windy and rainy gate.

The Mid-Autumn evening was fresh, and the whole family felt happy in the bright moonlight. The long days of summer were over and the autumn winds were beginning to blow. Finally, the crickets began to sing their quiet song, and we felt a gentle melancholy.

Source: http://www.vietspring.org/custom/trungthu.html

Having read so many tales about deities and animals on the moon, what about the origin of the mooncake? There are two tales on how this delicious sweet festive pastry is derived.

The 1st one is based on the story of Chang Er. Yearning to meet her husband again, Chang Er instructed Hou Yi to, on the day of full moon, create a pill made of flour, as round as the moon.

He was to place this flour pill at the west side of the house and call out her name. As promised, on the night of full moon, Chang Er flew down to reunite with him once every Mid-Autumn festival. The mooncake tradition then evolved from there.

Zhu Yuan Zhang Mooncake Rebellion (朱元璋与月饼起义 : zhū yuán zhāng yǔ yuè bǐng qǐ yì)

The 2nd tale is set in the late Yuan Dynasty (A.D. 1279 – 1368). This is a famous legend about Zhu Yuan Zhang who gathered the masses to rebel against the tyrannical Yuan government. However, the Yuan soldiers conducted stringent checks which made communication among the rebel groups difficult.

Liu Bo Wen, his strategist, then came up with an idea. He instructed the writing of”八月十五夜起义” (Rebellion on the 15th day of the 8th month) on slips of paper which were then stuffed into pastries. These boxes of pastries with the secret message on the date of rebellion were sent to the ally forces without notice from the Yuan soldiers.

On the fateful day (which is set on the Mid-Autumn day), Zhu Yuan Zhang led a successful rebellion and founded the Ming Dynasty. Since then celebrations on the Mid-Autumn Festivals included these moon cake pastries to commemorate the event.

Source: http://ilearn-culture.com/the-origin-and-legends-of-the-mid-autumn-festival/

Plot
Napoleon Dynamite (Jon Heder) is a high school student from Preston, Idaho who lives with his grandmother, his elder brother Kip and their pet llama, Tina. Kip (Aaron Ruell), 32, is unemployed and boasts of spending hours in Internet chat rooms with ‘babes’ and training to be a cage fighter. Napoleon daydreams his way through school, doodling ligers and other fantastic rare creatures and being bullied. Napoleon is constantly bullied, even with his “kick-butt ninja skills.”

Napoleon’s grandma breaks her coccyx in a quad bike accident and, believing her grandsons cannot be trusted to look after themselves, she asks Uncle Rico (Jon Gries) to stay with them while she recovers. Uncle Rico is a middle-aged former high-school quarterback who lives in an orange 1975 Dodge Santana campervan and is mentally stuck in the year 1982 (a fact which caused a breakup with his girlfriend). His presence, although increasingly irksome to Napoleon, is a boon to Kip as he and Uncle Rico embark on a joint project to become door-to-door salesmen selling sets of Tupperware. Kip reveals that he would like to earn some money to enable him to meet his new Internet girlfriend from Detroit, LaFawnduh Lucas (Shondrella Avery). Uncle Rico is not averse to using Napoleon’s name to gain credibility in his attempts to sell herbal breast-enhancement products to Napoleon’s school mates, causing increasing friction between Uncle Rico and Napoleon.

As the plot progresses, Napoleon makes two new friends from high school, Deb and Pedro. Deb (Tina Majorino) is a shy and sensitive girl. The two have a falling out, when Uncle Rico attempts to sell her breast-enhancement herbs and implies that Napoleon suggested it. Pedro (Efren Ramirez) is a transfer student from Juárez, Mexico, who decides to run for class president against popular girl Summer Wheatley (Haylie Duff). Despite a couple of hiccups, the campaign goes well until the time Pedro is about to deliver his final speech, when he discovers that each candidate must perform a skit afterwards. Having not prepared a routine, a despondent Pedro gives a lacklustre speech, believing that his candidacy is over. Napoleon gives a music tape he had received from the visiting LaFawnduh to the sound engineer and performs a dance routine (to “Canned Heat” by Jamiroquai), which wins a standing ovation from the school audience.

The film closes out with a montage of scenes showing a happy ending for all concerned. Pedro wins the class presidency. LaFawnduh, smitten with Kip right from the start, transforms his fashion, and they leave town together. A fully recovered Grandma returns and has clearly missed Tina, the llama, more than her grandchildren. Uncle Rico’s girlfriend returns to Rico, and while Napoleon is playing tether ball by himself, Deb shows up and starts playing with him, having forgiven her friend.

A post credits scene, added after the festival release, reveals Kip and LaFawnduh getting married.

Setting
Preston is a real town in southeastern Idaho, located near the Utah border. Since the release of Napoleon Dynamite, it has become a tourist attraction of sorts, with Preston High School being a main feature. Also with its premiere in 2004, Preston has held a Napoleon Dynamite Festival every summer to celebrate the filming of Napoleon Dynamite  in Preston and nearby towns. In April 2005, the Idaho Legislature approved a resolution commending the filmmakers for producing Napoleon Dynamite, specifically enumerating the benefits the movie has brought to Idaho, as well as for showcasing various aspects of Idaho’s culture and economy. Most of the film was filmed in Idaho, except for the diner scenes in Richmond, Utah.

Origin of the name “Napoleon Dynamite”
Upon the film’s release, it was noted that the name “Napoleon Dynamite” had originally been used by musician Elvis Costello, most visibly on his 1986 album Blood and Chocolate, although he had used the pseudonym on a single B-side as early as 1982. Filmmaker Jared Hess claims that he was not aware of Costello’s use of the name until two days before the end of shooting, when he was informed by a teenage extra. He later said, “Had I known that name was used by anybody else prior to shooting the whole film, it definitely would have been changed … I listen to hip-hop, dude. It’s a pretty embarrassing coincidence.” Hess claims that “Napoleon Dynamite” was the name of a man he met around the year 2000 on the streets of Cicero, Illinois, while doing missionary work for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Costello believes that Hess stole the name: “The guy just denies completely that I made the name up… but I invented it. Maybe somebody told him the name and he truly feels that he came about it by chance. But it’s two words that you’re never going to hear together.” Costello has taken no legal action against the film.

Source: http://www.floweradvisor.com.sg/lifestyle/interests/movies/150531/plot_and_setting_napoleon_dynamite/

See Also : Mooncake, moon cake, Mid autumn festival