Romantic Legend of Qixi Festival

The Qixi Festival, also known as the Qiqiao Festival, is a Chinese festival that celebrates the annual meeting of the cowherd and weaver girl in Chinese mythology. It falls on the seventh day of the 7th month on the Chinese calendar. It is sometimes called the Double Seventh Festival, the Chinese Valentine's Day.

A young cowherd, hence Niulang ( "cowherd"), came across a beautiful girl—Zhinv ( "weaver girl"), the Goddess's seventh daughter, who had just escaped from boring heaven to look for fun.

Zhinv soon fell in love with Niulang, and they got married without the knowledge of the Goddess. Zhinv proved to be a wonderful wife, and Niulang to be a good husband. They lived happily and had two children.

But the Goddess of Heaven ( Zhinv’s mother) found out that Zhinv, a fairy girl, had married a mere mortal. The Goddess was furious and ordered Zhinv to return to heaven. (Alternatively, the Goddess forced the fairy back to her former duty of weaving colorful clouds, a task she neglected while living on earth with a mortal.) On Earth, Niulang was very upset that his wife had disappeared.

Suddenly, his ox began to talk, telling him that if he killed it and put on its hide, he would be able to go up to Heaven to find his wife. Crying bitterly, he killed the ox, put on the skin, and carried his two beloved children off to Heaven to find Zhinv.

The Goddess discovered this and was very angry. Taking out her hairpin, the Goddess scratched a wide river in the sky to separate the two lovers forever, thus forming the Milky Way between Altair and Vega. Zhinv must sit forever on one side of the river, sadly weaving on her loom, while Niulang watches her from afar while taking care of their two children.

But once a year all the magpies in the world would take pity on them and fly up into heaven to form a bridge.