Herbal tea with festive red packaging gift of choice amongst China’s Dong people during traditional events

Photo by Wang Qiyou

In recent years, people of Dong ethnic group in Tongdao Dong Autonomous County of Huaihua in central China’s Hunan Province have been bringing people a Chinese herbal tea with red packaging as the main present for major events, Economic View app reported on Feb.9.

With the improvement in people’s living standards, these Dong people have included healthy and fashionable products with festive packaging on their gift list for festivals and significant events like “huimen”, when a bride returns to her mother’s home on the third day of the wedding ceremony, accompanied by the bridegroom’s families, neighbors, and even all the fellow villagers with gifts.

Jiaduobao, a Chinese herbal tea in a festive red can is in favor with the Dong people in Tongdao Dong Autonomous County as they prepare gifts for “huimen”, an important rite that is usually no less grand than the wedding ceremony when a huge number of gifts such as liquor, pork, rice, and fish are prepared by the bridegroom’s family for the bride’s first visit to her mother’s home after wedding.

The Chinese name Jiaduobao sounds comparable to the Chinese phrases meaning “many children, great blessings and joy” when pronounced in the local language of Dong people, which adds an air of festivity by the packaging in the red color that symbolizes prosperity.

(By Hong Yang )