Tradition draws the crowds during Dragon Boat Festival

Tourist attractions in Shanghai's suburban areas which offered traditional festive events proved popular during the three-day Dragon Boat Festival, Shanghai Tourism Bureau said yesterday.

Oriental Green Boat Park in Qingpu District invited tourists to take part in dragon boat racing and learn to make zongzi, a traditional festival food of rice wrapped in reed leaves. The park welcomed 19,500 visitors over the three-day holiday, more than double the number in the same period of last year.

Fengjing Water Town in Jinshan District offered painting classes in the Jinshan farmers' style along with making zongzi and tasting yellow wine, another festival tradition. There were around 46,600 visitors over the three days, a rise of 19 percent.

Gucun Park in Baoshan District, Shanghai Wildlife Park in the Pudong New Area, and Dongping Forest Park on Chongming Island also reported a big increase in visitors.

Less popular, however, were venues in the former World Expo site with the Saudi Pavilion, renamed Moon Boat, and the Italy Center seeing numbers drop by 30 and 27 percent, respectively.

Nanxun Water Town in Shanghai's neighboring Zhejiang Province, and Tongli Old Town and Qinhu Old Town in Jiangsu Province were the most popular short trips for city residents, the Shanghai Sightseeing Bus Center said.

Meanwhile, online shopping, food quality and prepaid services topped the number of complaints during the holiday period, the city's market watchdog said.

The Shanghai Industrial and Commercial Administrative Bureau said it had received 20 complaints related to zongzi over the past three days.

The bureau said that among the complaints was one from a customer whose zongzi voucher was rejected because a local outlet said no product was available.

The bureau received 249 complaints during the holiday, 13 percent down on the year before, and they were being dealt with, officials said.