China celebrates dragon boat festival

Thursday marks a traditional Chinese holiday, the Dragon Boat Festival. People across the country celebrate it with many different activities.

Thursday marks a traditional Chinese holiday, the Dragon Boat Festival. People across the country celebrate it with many different activities.

And it's all to pay tribute to a great figure who lived more than two thousand years ago.

The festival commemorates Qu Yuan, a patriotic poet from China's Warring States Period some 2,300 years ago.

Actors read the poet's famous works at a poetry recital in Shanghai.

The recitals are accompanied by music and dancing.

But the most important traditional practice is dragon boat racing. Its origins can be traced to when the poet threw himself into the Miluo river and people in boats tried to save him, though he still drowned.