Mugwort & Friends: Dragon Boat Festival

About Facilitator

Yun Hai 雲海 offers a selection of premium ingredients for Taiwanese and Chinese cooking. We source directly from artisans, farms, and soy sauce breweries in Taiwan. Terrain, technique, history, and humanity come together in the traditional foods we distribute.

Field Meridians is an artist collective committed to strengthening local food ecologies. Through site-specific programming, publishing, and radio broadcast, Field Meridians engages the Crown Heights community to lay the foundations for food sovereignty in the heart of Brooklyn.

The Naval Cemetery Landscape (NCL) is the site of the former Naval Hospital Cemetery at the Brooklyn Navy Yard has a memorial landscape and a native plant meadow and pollinator habitat, Mugwort will be harvested at the NCL which is fully operated and made open as a public space by Brooklyn Greenway Initiative (BGI) through the generosity of supporters. Stop by and enjoy the NCL’s native pollinator habitat and contemplative memorial urban meadow and learn about the NCL and the Greenway and what goes into maintaining their beauty and accessibility for everyone! 

Objective

The Dragon Boat Festival, a holiday celebrated across the Chinese diaspora with dragon boat racing and eating zongzi, sticky rice stuffed with a mix of flavorful additions, wrapped in bamboo leaf, and steamed, is celebrated on the 5th day of the 5th month of the lunar calendar. Although the origins of the festival are unclear, themes of filial piety, devotion, and a relationship with the waters tie traditions together. The pungent smell of mugwort, and its Artemisia genus cousins, is used in decorative talismans to ward off evil and bad luck.

Ahead of this year’s festivities, join us for a mugwort harvest and plant walk at the Naval Cemetery Landscape (NCL), a public space built and maintained by Brooklyn Greenway Initiative (BGI). We’ll learn more about mugwort and its ecological considerations from an NCL gardener, receive training to harvest the plant, and then make Taiwanese mugwort decorations in honor of the festival.

Mugwort is for dreaming. This rhizomatic, perennial is a persistent and common “weed” found across North America. Called the “mother of herbs,” it is also used across different cultures for medicinal, spiritual and culinary purposes. 

What's Included

Materials for making Dragon Boat Decorations

What to Bring

• Gardening gloves (optional)
• Pruners (optional)
• Pants and long-sleeve shirts for harvesting in the meadow (optional)
• Hat (optional) 
• Water bottle (encouraged! there is no water on site)

Requirements

The Naval Cemetery Landscape is wheelchair accessible. The mugwort harvest will take place in the meadow. Those who wish to participate in the harvest need full range of motion to minimize damage and compaction to the ecology of the landscape.

Disclaimer

In case of inclement weather, we’ll notify participants 2 hours before the start of our program.