The Auspicious Leaves
The 5th lunar month is marked as "Poison" month in Chinese Farmer's Calendar. This is because the gem, insect, fly, mosquito, and pest are active in this summer month and people is easy to catch infectious disease. On the Dragon Boat Day, Chinese put the leaves of Acorus and Artemisia on the doors or windows to repel insect, fly, flea and moth away from the house. Those leaves have anti-poison function and can prevent an epidemic.
The leaves of Acorus are linear, sword-like, glossy, evergreen and lush. Artemisia belongs to daisy family with fern-like leaves.
In Tan Dynasty (618-907 A.D.), Rebel Huang scouted the target village and prepared the next attack in 5th lunar month. He saw a woman carrying a boy in her one arm and holding the another boy's hand was running. Rebel Huang asked her why running. She said, "We heard Bandit Huang is coming, we need to run for our lives." Huang asked again, "Why carrying one in the arm, but holding another with hand?". The woman said, "The one in the arm is the only son of my husband's elder brother. The other one is my son. In case, I cannot run quickly enough, I will drop my son and save my husband brother son." Rebel Huang was very touching, then told her that "Go home quickly and put Acorus and Artemisia on your door, then rebel forces won't hurt your family." She returned to the village and told some people. On the 5th day of 5th lunar month, Rebel Huang's forces entered the village, all the families with Acorus and Artemisia on the door were safe. The custom keeps since then.
The Incense Bag
Many contagious disease and plague had found in the 5th lunar month in the Chinese history. Besides putting the Acorus and Artemisia on the doors or windows, Chinese make the incense bag and hang on the neck to prevent from contagious disease and keep evil spirit away.
The incense bag are made by hand. Chinese put the powder of Acorus and Artemisia with some other fragrance stuff into different kind of sewing bags. Therefore the incense bag can prevent an epidemic as the leaves of Acorus and Artemisia. The popular incense bags was 12 horoscope animals. Today, we can find many different auspicious symbols, many other animals, fish, flower, bird, even the cartoon characters. Long time ago, Chinese women liked to make incense bag for children.
The Inauspicious Day
The 5th lunar month is a bad month. The 5th day of the month is an inauspicious day, because many famous people died on this day in Chinese history. One customary book recorded, "if a baby's born on this day, baby boy brings bad luck to dad and baby girl brings bad luck to mom." It happened that parent killed the baby born on this day before.
One famous tragedy story about the 5th day of 5th lunar month happened in Han Dynasty. A 14-yar old girl Tsao Er's father were drowned in the river. The girl cried along the river and looked for her father for 17 days. On the first day of 5th lunar month, the girl jumped into the river. On the 5th day of 5th lunar month, people found the girl's body and her father's body holding together and floating on the river. People were very touching and prayed for them.
The Wine and Water
They said that you will become healthier to drink the spring water from the well on the Dragon Boat Day during Horse hour (11.00 AM to 13.00 PM). The story is from late Ming dynasty. A general brought his troop to the hill and couldn't find the water for days. He prayed to the heaven, then struck his sword into the ground and the water spurted out on the 5th day of 5th lunar month at noon.
Once Chinese drank Strong Yellow Wine to clean up the gem in the body on the Dragon Boat Day. The Strong Yellow Wine is made of rice. It's a tonic wine and not good for children. Therefore adult just wipe the children forehead with the Strong Yellow Wine. They believe that will make children healthier and won't catch the 5th lunar month disease.
