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May 5Th is the the Dragon-boat Festival in the lunar calendar (the traditional Chinese calendar).
There are several versions of the stories. But the widely accepted one may be about the great ancient poet Qu Yuan.
He had been a minister in Chu Empire before he was exiled from capital because he was a hawk against Qin Empire's invasion. During his exile, he wrote some great poems. All of them were about his love for his country. Later, the Qin Empire beat Chu and broke into its capital. Qu Yuan felt the future of his country and people were hopeless and miserable, so he threw himself into the Miluo River and killed himself.
the people of Chu were mournful about his death and just deified him. They sent boats to fish up his body from the river. A fisherman threw rice rolls and eggs into the river, and said if the fish ate his food and felt full, they wouldn't eat Qu Yuan's body anymore. A doctor poured real gar wine into the river, and said if the dragon in the river get drunk, he wouldn't hurt Qu Yuan anymore. But some feared that the dragon would eat those rice rolls and eggs, so they wrapped rice rolls with bamboo leaves, and that was how the Chinese tranditional food Zongzi came into being.
So every May 5th, people eat Zongzi and eggs and drink realgar wine to commemorate Qu Yuan.
As to evil spirits, ancient Chinese believed May 5th is a ominous day. Many plagues and diseases broke out around this date. And snakes and insects increase. So, what we called evil doesn't refer to evil spirits, but more about health. And there is also a medical term in Chinese medicine refering to those evil things happen in human body.
In Taoism, spirits maybe just symbolized those evil things. Anyway, that's the way we create gods and spirits.
BTW, realgar wine is always assicated with Taoist according to Chiness stereotype. And being a Taoist can also be a profession. It's kind of like what a reaper does, hunting ghosts. But Taoists do it for money.
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Taoism and "may 5th"?
