This year’s Chinese Laba Festival, the festival on the 8th day of the 12th lunar month, falls on Wednesday 20th January. As such, the Jade Buddha Temple, one of the Buddhist temples in Shanghai which distributes congee each year for the Laba Festival, has given out 4,000 bowels of Laba congee to nursing home residents in Putuo, Jing’an and Changning districts, instead of holding the normal massive congee-distribution event in front of the temple.

Volunteers wrap up the Laba congee. [Photo/ Sun Zhan from thepaper.cn]

As a symbol of blessings from the Buddha, the Laba congee distributed by Buddhist temples is a festive treasure for the general public in China. This year, as part of a more stringent pandemic prevention effort, the temple, together with others, have canceled the annual grand distribution ceremony.

Staff members move the congee bucket onto a bus for transport to nursing homes. [Photo/ Sun Zhan from thepaper.cn]

The Laba festival has been celebrated in China for around 1,500 years with the most widely accepted food--Laba congee. Traditional ingredients are usually grain, dried lotus seeds, longan, ginkgo, and dried red dates.

Monks and volunteers distribute congee in a nursing home. [Photo/ Sun Zhan from thepaper.cn]

Elderly people enjoy the Laba congee. [Photo/ Sun Zhan from thepaper.cn]

An elderly woman receives a bowel of Laba congee from a monk. [Photo/ Sun Zhan from thepaper.cn]