Bun Bun Baby...

Towers of Buns filled with bean/lotus/glutinous rice/sesame paste.

The May Day weekend saw Cantoland celebrating Bun Festival in Cheung Chau. Not that Bun Fest is in anyway related to May Day, but that the Saturday happened to be Buddha's birthday= Bun Festival. Isn't is great to have a bun festival on your birthday? When I'm the queen, I am going to declare my birthday to be custard bun festival too! :)

I have been recuperating from my horrible cold and have found myself fit to enjoy the festival. I am the podiatrist here, so no one should question my judgement. So Friday night saw the bankers partying it up, and yours truly amongst them. It also saw Cantoland's first case of Swine Flu also known as Influenza A (type H1N1) and the lockdown of the hotel with 300 innocent people within it. We had dinner at the American Restaurant with was a bare 2 minutes walk from ground zero. There were cops everywhere! Bankers are paranoid people and refused to walk through the area for fear of cross-infection. I figured that the guy would have infected everyone around the area prior to being admitted anyway, and may even have sat in the very seat in the very restaurant we were having dinner at, and partied at the very clubs we went that night.

Saturday, bright and early, we went to Cheung Chau for the festival. For those newly addicted to my sporadic writings, bun festival occurs once a year. They have bun towers four storeys high, and people climb up a tower and grab as many buns as they can to win the competition. There are team events and individual events. The winner gets to take home a giant bun. No, I am only kidding. They get a trophy, though a giant bun would be better. They also put kids on sticks and parade them about town for kicks. If I ever have a kid, I would put him/her on a stick and join the parade too so that my kid won't feel left out.

The children are dressed in various characters. This year included AIG. It was probably for the children's safety they didn't dress them up as Lehman bankers!

The lawyer and her friends, the American and the medic student went along with me for the parades during the day. The pseudo-lawyer went for the competition at night. I am a lightweight and was unable to stay awake for such long hours in the heat. Next year, I am going to join the competition hah!

The queues were horrendous!

Peace Buns- thought to bring peace to the receiver.

Preparing the tower for the competition. Buns at the top are worth 9 points; bottom 1 point. Aim of the game is to get as many points are possible.

Buns are taken down to be distributed to the masses.

We went to the beach after. The beach was lovely! All nice soft sands, clean waters, and hot men in swimwear. Ah... Sight for tired eyes. :) Beer googles helped too.

Only in this country, would you get quirky festivals such as this. And they take it real serious too!