The spring holiday can be more than banquets with families and friends, lazing around on sofas watching TV soaps and surfing the Internet. There are plenty of activities that happen during the spring festival, such as temple fairs.

As an important form of folk economic and cultural activity, temple fairs are where people trade, entertain and worship. As the name suggests, the origin of temple fairs is closely related to temple activities. They used to be held only during temple festivals or special temple fair days and were complemented with some business activities. As time went by, the religious color of temple fair faded and temple fairs became more and more like flea markets for common folks.

In 2007 in Beijing, temple fairs will have many different themes, including the Olympics at Longtan Temple, traditional Chinese costume parades at Daguanyuan, a garden modeled after the garden in the classic Chinese novel A Dream of Red Mansions, and a spring festival folk culture exhibition at Yuyuantan Temple.

Longtan Temple Fair

This year's Longtan Temple Fair is taking the Olympics as its theme. Famous Chinese Weichi chess players Wang Runan, Hua Yigang and Xiejun will lead a team of brilliant Chinese chess players who will meet fans and play chess with them. Excellent judo and tae kwon do practitioners,, boxers and Olympic weightlifting gold medal winners Liu Chunhong, Shi Zhiyong and Wangxu will also have exchanges with sports fans.

Time: February 18- February 24
Location: Longtan Park, No.8, Longtanlu, Chongwen District
Tel: 010-67144336
Ticket£ºRMB6

Daguanyuan

Visitors attending the Daguanyuan Temple Fair will be able to see the annual Yuanfei Xingqin parade, in which people will wear traditional Chinese festival costumes. A traditional wedding ceremony (Baoyu chenghun) and a traditional birthday ceremony (jiamu heshou) will also be performed.

Some Chinese directors are planning to shoot the Chinese classic A Dream of Red Mansions as a soap opera and they have conducted a nationwide casting call. . Some of the candidates will also be present at this temple fair.

Time: February 18- February 23
Location: Daguanyuan (grand view garden), No.12 Nancaiyuanjie, Xuanwu District
Tel: 010-63544993/63544994
Ticket: RMB 15

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