[3] This Chinese tradition goes back thousand of years where on this day, families will visit the cemeteries to pay their respect and to sweep the graves of their ancestors.
Legend told of the story where a junk, while sailing across the South China Sea, was caught in a tremendous storm and was about to sink.
By resisting all temptations, he found that to attain true knowledge and peace, man had to renounce all of earthly desires and eliminate the self.
The festive occasion starts from Kwan Tai Temple (near Leal Senado square) where groups of intoxicated men will dance their way through markets and lanes while waving wooden dragons' heads and tails.
[8] Looked upon by fisherfolk, worshippers at the shrines of Taoist child god, Tam Kung, pray for health, wealth, knowledge and wisdom-and calm seas.
It was said that during the Qing Dynasty, the orphan Tam Kung who was raised by his grandmother attained extraordinary power at the age of 12, thus making him the subject of worship.
A spectacular competition, it commemorates a 3rd-century BC court adviser who drowned himself in protest against a decision by the emperor to go to war with a neighboring state.
Several temples in the territory are dedicated to this deity, one of the most important of which is situated at Rua dos Mercadores in the Historic Centre of Macau.
On the occasion of the Feast of Kuan Tai, lion dances are enacted and Chinese opera performed in a specially constructed bamboo shed outside the temple.
[12] Macau stages a section of the volleyball matches in the spacious Venetian stadium with international teams battling to qualify for the finals.
The festival celebrates the only day in the year when the legendary Heavenly Weaver can meet her lover, the Cowherd, over a bridge of birds spanning the Milky Way.
It was done in memory of a 14th-century uprising against the Mongols when rebels wrote the call to revolt on pieces of paper and embedded them in cakes, which was then smuggled to compatriots.
Today, in commemoration of the festival, people eat special sweet cakes known as mooncake made of ground lotus and sesame.