Difference between Vietnamese Dragon Boat Festival and Chinese Dragon Boat Festival

The Dragon Boat Festival in Vietnam is celebrated on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Vietnamese calendar, which is also known as the Zheng Yang Festival. The Dragon Boat Festival has the custom of eating zongzi, as well as the custom of driving away insects at the Dragon Boat Festival. Early in the morning of the festival, parents prepare glutinous rice wine, glutinous rice with yellow ginger and several kinds of sour foods and fruits such as peaches, plums and lemons for their children. In some areas of the south, children are allowed to eat watermelon, mango, boiled eggs and drink coconut milk, while adults drink Xionghuang wine and smear Xionghuang on children's heads, foreheads, chests and umbilical cords in order to drive away worms. In many areas, children paint their fingers and toes with fingernail grass and wear talismans made by shamans with five-colored threads to ward off evil spirits. Families with fewer children or with infirm young children dress their young children in such clothes early in the morning before the festival to ward off ghosts and evil spirits. Duanwu medicine is an essential activity, people believe that "Duanwu herbal medicine" is the most effective, many bazaars have this medicine stalls.

"Eat rice dumplings to seek a bumper crop", Vietnam is also in the lunar calendar on the fifth day of the Dragon Boat Festival, their main content is to eat rice dumplings, Dragon Boat Festival to drive insects. Parents will prepare a lot of fruits for their children, wear lucky charms woven with colorful threads on their bodies, and adults will drink staghorn wine and apply it on children to drive away insects. Moreover, Vietnamese people believe that eating rice dumplings is a way to pray for good weather and a good harvest. "Early in the morning of the festival, the first thing Vietnamese adults do after waking up is to tie five-colored threads around children's wrists, ankles and necks. When tying the threads, children are forbidden to speak. The colorful threads cannot be broken or thrown away arbitrarily, and can only be thrown into the river during the first heavy summer rain or the first bath. It is said that children wearing the five-color thread can avoid the harm of snake and scorpion-type poisonous insects; throwing it into the river means letting the river wash away the plague and diseases, and children can thus preserve their health and well-being.

"Pei Xiangbao", Dragon Boat Festival, children wear scented pouches, legend has the meaning of the evil spirits to drive away the plague, is actually used for lapel head embellishment decoration. The scented capsule inside the cinnabar, andrographis, incense medicine, wrapped in silk cloth, fragrant, and then the five-color silk string buckle into a rope, for a variety of different shapes, knotted into a string, colorful, exquisite and lovely.

Festivals are the encyclopedia of social life. Festivals in a variety of activities, the content of the festival is all-encompassing, it reflects to a great extent a nation or a region of people in the material life, different aspects of spiritual life. Festivals are a mirror that allows us to understand the history and culture of a people from one side and deepen our understanding of the people. Like other ethnic groups, Vietnamese festivals are products of a certain historical period and have their own characteristics. Understanding Vietnamese festivals and customs will help us better understand the nation and its inner culture.