Long Table Festival

This past weekend, I got to go see the "Long Table Festival" (or if you directly translate the Chinese, the "Long Street Feast") in the town of Lu Chun. Brian drove his jeep and another friend drove his car the 6 hours from Mengzi to Lu Chun. There were 8 of us in our group. The Long Table Festival is the biggest holiday for the Hani minority group. Matthew, one of our closest student-friends here at HHU, is Hani and he came with us and taught us a lot about the Hani people.

There are over 3,000 tables set up in Lu Chun for the festival! It goes for literally miles through the one main street in the town. When I asked how the logistics worked, I was told that the government pays local Hani families to provide the food and serve a group of tables (maybe 3 or 4). Guests then buy tickets to attend the festival. It's like a giant pot-luck. Sadly it was pouring down rain most of the time we were in Lu Chun but we still had a fun weekend.



Brian's umbrella broke so he went out in search of a big "manly" umbrella. This is what he bought. We laughed and laughed when he carried that massive umbrella down the crowded streets.
A lot happened this weekend and it's hard to cover it all on my blog. Besides all the Long Table Festivities, we made a trip out to Matthew's remote village where his parents and extended family live. I'll probably do a few more posts about the trip, but if you want to see an online album with captions, you can click on this link - Long Table Festival.