Celebrating a heroic death with rice, lights and 'phoenix tails'

The home of dragon boat racing marks the festival in a unique fashion, as Cang Wei reports from Nanjing, with Zhou Lihua in Wuhan

The people of Miluo, Hunan province, known as the home of dragon boat racing and the Dragon Boat Festival, celebrate the event in a unique way.

Liu Shilin, former curator of the Qu Yuan Memorial Hall in the city, said many locals rise early and walk along the banks of the Miluo River, deliberately soaking their shoes with morning dew, in memory of Qu Yuan, a patriotic poet who drowned himself in the river on the fifth day of the fifth month on the Chinese lunar calendar, when ancient Chu State was occupied by enemies in 278 BC.