Taiwan Holidays
Ghost Month
Each year, on the seventh month of the lunar calendar, the barrier between the realms of the living and the dead opens for one month, and so begins Ghost Month. To welcome spirits and returning ancestors, families and businesses prepare offerings and feasts, and at the end of the month, use lanterns to guide them back to the realm of the dead.
The Bombing of the Earth God
In Taipei’s Neihu District, the Fude Temple 福德祠 celebrates Lunar New Year with the festival of the Night Procession of the Earth God, Tu Ti Kung. Residents express their respect to the Earth God by offering and throwing firecrackers to the sedan chair, as the God travels throughout the neighborhood. People believe the bigger the explosion, the more auspicious the incoming year.
