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Over the past few days I have gotten many calls and emails from my Chinese friends. There has been a common theme in every email and conversation – Happy Mid-Autumn Day. 

Now because I am not an expert in Chinese holidays, I had no clue about this holiday. All I knew about this holiday is that the students did not have to go school, they were telling me to have a happy Mid-Autumn day, and that they were all eating “moon cakes”. The fact that they were all eating “moon cakes” kept catching my attention.

Being the from-the-South-native-Tennessean that I am, I was thinking only one thing: there is an Asian country full of people celebrating a holiday called Mid-Autumn Festival where they are sitting around eating MOON PIES. Yes, the tasty southern snack that can only be appropriately washed down with an ice-cold RC Cola. I thought “maybe they listen to the same country music songs as we do”. Turns out a “moon cake” and a “moon pie” are two totally different things.

This is a “MOON PIE”.

This is a “MOON CAKE”

After the disappointment of realizing that a bunch of Chinese people were not eating the Chattanooga, Tennessee-native tasty pastry, I found the humor in our misunderstanding. I hope you get a little laugh today from my misunderstanding.

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Learn more about Mid-Autumn Festival HERE.

Learn more about Moon Pies HERE and HERE.