Chapters 19-21 Peonies

Chapter 19

Peonies

The Peony is the National Flower of China. The Peony Festival is held in Luoyang from April 5 to May 5. It began in 1982. People from all over China and the world come to Luoyang during that time to see the beautiful peonies in Luoyang. It is not unusual to have up to a million people and more come to Luoyang during a weekend.

Part of this festival is having Chinese performers come to sing at the Peony Festival Performance. There is one night during April when they would perform in the stadium in front of thousands of people.

As you will see in the pictures, the flowers are very colorful. There are many more colors than what I have shown here. There are hundreds of thousands of peonies throughout the parks in Luoyang. During the Peony Festival, the parks charge a fee to get in but it isn’t much. Also in the pictures, you can see some of my friends by the flowers and see how tall some of the plants are.















Zhang Xufang, Huang Guoqin and her daughter Cindy (Guan Xin)

Some of the Peony plants were really tall.







Xiao Dan and her mom Liu Hua

Chapter 20

The Luoyang Peony Festival

People come to Luoyang from all over China and the world. It started in 1982. The Peonies throughout the parks can blossom at different times so there are always flowers to be seen.

In November of 2010, the festival was renamed the China Luoyang Peony Culture Festival.

People go to the parks to see the Peonies. The Festival is great economically for the hotels, restaurants and other places but the streets are so crowded and traffic jams everywhere especially during the weekends. Tour buses come from everywhere. Not so good for us that lived there and had to put up with all of the people for the month.

From where I lived, it took fifteen minutes to walk to Wangcheng Park. It is the oldest and one of the main parks in the city. At noon one Saturday in April of 2013, I was out walking and I counted two hundred tour buses in the area surrounding Wangcheng Park. Each bus carried fifty people, which makes 10,000 people went into that one park at that certain time.

There would have been more people than that including the ones that drove there. I had read that on weekends, there would be 30-40,000 people a day at Wangcheng Park. There are many parks in the city to go to. During the week, things were slower of course because people were working but the weekends were really busy. Some restaurants and hotels would make more money during the month of April then the rest of the year.

I would go to Wangcheng Park maybe two times a year. I would go during the Lantern Festival. There would be the Chinese New Year and then two weeks later was the Lantern Festival, which was the official day to end the Chinese New Year. During that time, it was decorated and all kinds of things set up for the celebration. It is really something to see. 

I would go there the second week. I didn’t want to go during the first week, too many people. I would go about 5:00 p.m. and take pictures when it was daylight and then as it got dark I would walk through taking more pictures and video of all the colorful lights and decorations. It would be like going to Riverside Park between Thanksgiving and Christmas when it is decorated.

In April of 2015, for the Peony Festival, this is the report I saw. During the first week of April is the Qing Ming Festival (Tomb Sweeping Festival when people honor their ancestors). It is usually April 4th or 5th and people get two more days off also. The number reported was one and a half million people came to Luoyang at that time for the Peony Festival and to see other tourist sites. The next weekend it was reported that one million people came to the city. I did not see any figure after the month for a total.

Chapter 21

Peony Square

This is a place in the city. It is about three blocks long and one block wide. There are walkways through it, lots of plants and trees. It is a social place for people to get together both day and night. It is really busy in the evenings with many activities especially on weekends. You will see groups of people in exercise classes. There is also a stage up off the ground where people dance. Recorded music is played for that, not a band. There are play areas for children. There is a big TV screen up in the air at one end. It is a very popular place. All ages go there from young to old.

There is a maternity hospital by Peony Square and three hotels; The New Friendship Hotel, The Companionship Hotel and The Peony Plaza Hotel. When I went with the delegation to Luoyang in 2002, we stayed in the New Friendship Hotel. If you have a room on the south side of the hotel, you can look over Peony Square. There are many restaurants and places to shop close by.