Poople in northern China like to eat dumplings (jiaozi). It goes that those who don't eat dumplings at Winter Solstice Festival, their noses will be cut down by the cold wind. It seems funny, doesn't it?

However, there is a legend about this festival. It goes like this: During the Eastern Han dynasty, in Nanyang, lived Zhang Zhongjing who is a famous doctor in Chinese history. He belived that people must do some contribution to their country when they are working in government departments, they must help each other when they are out of power. In other words, the right person must be either a successful public official or a good doctor. So when he was flustrated in his political carrier, he resigned his Changsha viceroy job, went back to the countryside to help sick people. It was a cold winter when he arrived in the Bai river. He found that people there were suffering from cold and hunger,they were lean and haggard. He also found that most people's ear were freezed off by the cold wind. In order to help these sick people, he ordered his followers to build some medical sheds in the eastern city of Nanyang. The followeres put up a big pot at the winter solstice day and give medicine to help people. They boiled the mutton with some unti-cold medicine firstly. Then they dredged up the mutton and cut the mutton into pieces.
Next, they wraped the mutton pieces with flour and shaped them as ears. They called this food "Jiao Er". After cooked, the Jiao Er were sent to the sick people. People who eated the Jiao Er felt good and recovered soon. From that moment, people started to cook Jiaozi at the Winter Solstice day to express their thanks to Zhang Zhongjing.

As time flying, it becomes a convention to eat Jiaozi at the Winter Solstice day .

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/12/2011 01:50AM by Olive.

Wow, I didn't know it! it is a good story, i think the people at that time are so thank of him, so we still eating JIao Zi in Winter Solstice Festival. I bet people dont know about this story, just like me!

No jiaozi for me in Winter solstice because my ancestors weren't from Northern China.

Where are they from?
Mine were from Foshan, Guangdong.

Trien Wrote:
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> No jiaozi for me in Winter solstice because my
> ancestors weren't from Northern China.

Guangdong is in the south. I have ancestors both in Fujian/Fukien province [father's side] & Guangdong province [mother's side]. We don't celebrate like other Chinese people do. Only some things are the same at certain times of the year.