In Taipei
DURING the Chinese New Year, it is said that firecrackers are set off to scare off a monster, hence the tradition.
For the Dumpling Festival, dumplings are eaten to mark the death of the patriotic poet Qu Yuan.
As for the Mid-Autumn Festival, which falls on Sunday, it is said that mooncakes are eaten to celebrate an ingenious resistance operation against the Mongols, featuring messages in mooncakes.
But barbequeues during the Mid-Autumn Festival? It is an uniquely Taiwan phenomenon and nobody is quite sure how it has became all the rage in the last decade or two.
While Chinese elsewhere enjoy tea and mooncakes under the full moon, the Taiwanese do that and more.
On pavements, in parks, on rooftops, groups of people gather around a fire to grill meats under the moonlight.
I ask two 50-somethings what’s the story behind these mid-autumn barbequeues and both told me it’s an invented tradition as they don’t remember having these when they were kids.
It seems like I am not the only one losing sleep over this burning question. Many folklorists in Taiwan have chewed on it too.
One guy believes that these moonlit barbequeues were fuelled by Taiwan’s roaring economy in the 1980s.
People were newly rich and keen on new ways of consuming, hence the idea of having juicy grilled meats on top of mooncakes caught on like wildfire.
One food studies expert also gave his two matchsticks worth.
Grilling is the most primitive form of cooking and fires are a means to get people together in hunting and gathering societies.
Thus, mid-autumn barbequeues may have come about as they provide a great platform for families to gather and work hand in hand to fill their stomachs (as opposed to just standing around to eat mooncakes or peel pomelos).
But you have to hand it to the Taiwanese media to sniff out the Great Mid-Autumn Barbequeue Conspiracy.
The media here has it that these were fanned by two soya sauce companies, which ran TV ads to plant the idea that Mid-Autumn equals barbequeues.
Whatever their origins, it seems that such barbequeues have become a part of Mid-Autumn celebrations here.
When the government here nagged about the evils of barbequeues, some huffed and puffed and wrote to newspapers to defend their grilling rights.
Still, what the government cannot douse, Typhoon Sinlaku – on track to spoil my first Mid-Autumn in Taiwan even as I write - might yet do.
Read Ho Ai Li's story 'Taiwan's festive mood hit by gloom' in today's edition of The Straits Times.