This year, the Taiwan Tourism Bureau held its official celebration, the Taiwan Lantern Festival, in Solar City, a new town near the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The theme lantern in honor of the Year of the Rat(2008) was a huge 25-ton depiction of the spinous country rat, a species endemic to the mountains and forests of Taiwan. The giant rat lantern, holding a golden ingot in its paws, was mounted on a three-meter pedestal, and was set aglow using high-tech methods including optical films and holographic images. The Year of the Rat is an auspicious one, incidentally, and people born in a rat year are considered inquisitive, hard working, active, and ambitious. The Tainan event organizers also made 120,000 hand-held lanterns that were distributed to festival-goers.

The official Tourism Bureau festival, first introduced in 1990, has skyrocketed in popularity over the years and the international media has taken notice. A team from the Discovery Channel, for example, visited Tainan during the Lantern Festival to film this year's celebrations. In the southern city of Kaohsiung, the Lantern Festival was held this year on the shores of Kaohsiung Harbor, rather than on the banks of the Love River as in years past. Also this year, the giant Kaohsiung theme lantern was designed to float on the sea, another first for Taiwan. Meanwhile in Taichung in the center of the island, Disney characters Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse fulfilled the role of the Rat. Two-meter lanterns of the famous cartoon rodents were on display, along with 300,000 specially designed lanterns distributed to spectators.

Then there are the livelier versions of the Lantern Festival, and Discovery Channel dispatched teams to these as well, including the hot-air lanterns in Pingsi, the beehive rockets in Yan- shuei Township (also in Tainan County), and the "bombing" of the god Han Dan in Taitung.

These annual events illustrate the vibrant and unique local cultures of Taiwan, and are always well worth seeing. The hot-air lanterns in Pingsi are an especially moving and serene sight. As darkness falls, hundreds of these lanterns float gently into the blue-black skies, carrying messages aloft. In days of old, the lanterns were sent up as a way to tell relatives on the coast that the valley-dwelling clans of Pingsi were safe. Today, the tradition continues, and it is one of the most popular of all the lantern celebrations.

The beehive rocket festival at the God of War Temple in Yanshuei is something else entirely. The event started this year on February 20, one day before the Lantern Festival, with the arrival of the god's sedan chair, accompanied by an ear-splitting cacophony of firecrackers and bottle rockets. The rockets shoot horizontally from large frames that resemble beehives; spectators at this wild and crazy event are advised to don motorcycle helmets, goggles, thick jackets and pants, and other protective gear.

In Taitung on February 21, visitors could watch the "Bombing of the Deity Han Dan," a no-holds-barred display of fireworks and rocketry that never fails to impress spectators. The "bombing" is a cleansing ritual for the spirit, in which volunteers strip down to shorts and safety goggles, and to the roar of firecrackers and the pounding of drums, subject themselves to a barrage of fireworks and bottle rockets. Meant to purge bad deeds, this is truly an only-in-Taiwan kind of event.

Regardless of the theme or the location, certain elements of the Lantern Festival are universal throughout Taiwan. The climax is held on the fifteenth and final day of the New Year period - February 21 this year - traditionally marking an end to winter and the beginning of better weather. It is the season's grand finale, and it always occurs on a full moon, two weeks after the new moon that heralds the arrival of Lunar New Year.

Once called the Yuansiao Festival, or Little New Year, it signifies the return to business after the holiday. Because people celebrated by parading about the roads and streets with lanterns, it became known as the Lantern Festival. Originally it was considered a night for lovers, when maidens made their debuts and marriages were arranged. But in modern Taiwan - aside from the occasional round of bottle rockets - it's more about eating traditional food and displaying round lanterns of red, orange, blue, green, and white.

Tangyuan (湯圓), a sweet dumpling made from glutinous rice with a choice of fillings (peanut and sesame flavors are the most popular), is also eaten at this time.

On the evening itself, just before the full moon rises, firecrackers resound through the streets and neighborhoods of the island to scare away ghosts, and at dusk the crowds pour into the streets, carrying lanterns and making their way to the celebration. This is one of Taiwan's favorite communal events, an ancient tradition that remains very much alive in the twenty-first century.