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Hi everyone and welcome back to Happy Hour.欢迎你回到酒馆.It's going to be our own 七夕 festival or double 7th festival this weekend.转眼又到七夕，in all of these lover related holidays in the past Chinese or western we have already done a few episodes, for example，we have done romantic love stories，romantic love quotes，we have done，tragic love stories even anti-love stories.



So when you guys were busy thinking about gift ideas，I've been trying to come up with a relevant topic; and then it dawned on me, although you see 七夕 related advertising everywhere, few people would actually dig deeper into the legend of love. I'm sure most of you would recognize Cupid，but if I ask you who are the gods and goddesses of love in our own legend and folklore，I'm sure many of you would be shaking your heads. 比起西方神话里家喻户晓的丘比特，如果问到中国爱神，想起很多人就有点儿摸不着头脑了。



And for those of you who got to know me throughout the years, you know that one of my biggest interests is folklore and mythology. So in today's special 七夕 episode，let me introduce you to some of our own gods and goddesses of love.今天的七夕特辑里，璐璐就带你认识一下我们自己的那些爱神，and interesting yet sometimes bizarre stories relating to them.



First of all，let's start with the story of 七夕 itself. I'm sure most of you know the story behind 七夕，there are two main characters，牛郎and织女. In English, they are often called the cowherd and the weaver girl.



如果你听到牛郎，首先脑子里面想到的是ホスト，那就建议你和璐璐一样去面壁思过一下，go back to the topic, cowherd and a weaver girl. Cowherd was a poor farmer boy，and the weaver girl was from the heaven. And they fell madly in love and got together like any other star-crossed lovers，and of course the emperor of heaven or the Jade Emperor玉皇大帝found out about this, and was furious.



So he got the weaver girl back to heaven when the heart broken cowherd decided to chase after her, the Queen Mother of The West西王母 drew a silver river in the sky and blocked his way. But then because their love was so great，the magpies decided to form a bridge over the silver river for them to meet. In the end, even a jade emperor was moved. So he allowed this couple to meet on the magpie bridge once a year on the 7th day of the 7th month according to the Chinese calendar.



And this was the origin of the 七夕 festival. And since thousands of years ago in the Han Dynasty，the tale of the cowherd and the weaver girl had already been celebrated.



And on this day，girls would go to local temples to pray to the weaver girl for wisdom，especially skills in needle work，which symbolize the traditional talents of a good wife.古代的七夕少女们会向织女祈求至巧，特别是做针线活这种心灵手巧的手艺，以求能靠手艺符合如意郎君。So七夕was also called“乞巧festival”，which literally means praying for wisdom and dexterity. On that day，girls would also dress up and make wishes for marrying someone who would be a good and loving husband.