mid-autumn festival

[stephaniepainter3]

I was wondering, do students and teachers get off for the mid-autumn festival? If so, how many days? And how long is the festival? Is it mainly a night time event?

thanks!

[skylee]

In Hong Kong (you didn't mention where you are interested in, though I guess it is quite unlikely that you are interested in HK, but still), the mid-autumn festival (the 15th day of the 8th lunar month) is not a public holiday, but the next day is. This is because (you guessed it right) people can't gaze at the moon until it is dark so they can work during daytime that day and enjoy the holiday the next day. That said, many people do get unofficial leave/time-off on the festival day and go home (in theory) early because people are supposed to celebrate the festival with their family.

Koreans take the festival even more seriously than the Chinese.

I don't know much about the practice / laws in China. But as you can see in this calendar (scroll down to see what the red days are) , 10-12 September are listed as holidays for the Mid-Autumn Festival (the festival day in 2011 is 12 September).

[liuzhou]

This year, mainland schools and colleges will have the Monday off (12th). Along with the weekend (which they have off anyway), this means three days. It's pretty much the same idea every year one day statutory holiday, but if the festival is on say, a Wednesday, in order to stretch it to three days, they may take Wed, Thurs, Friday off, but have to make up for Thurs and Friday by working days at the preceding or following weekend - usually one of each.

Confused?

It gets worse at National Day when they manage to convince themselves that three days off is actually more than a week.

The arrangements for the holidays are decided by some central committee and apply nationally to schools, government offices etc. They are decided well in advance, but schools often pretend they don't know until the last minute.

[stephaniepainter3]

Oh, OK! Thanks for all of the information!!

[zhouhaochen]

depends on the school. Universities will usually take the days off (for teachers and students), private schools might handle it differently.

For us, we always guarantee 5 days of class per week paid, so we ask our students what they want to do, either continue the classes or take the classes another time/get credit for them.

We have some teachers who work through the holidays and get other days off instead and others who just take them off. Also depends on students requests.

[Takeshi]

I sure like that HK system; would be a heck of a lot more convenient if I didn't have a Chinese test at 8 o clock tomorrow morning when I know I'm going to be up late today...