IN HARBIN, CHINA, FREEZING WEATHER MEANS IT IS FESTIVAL TIME

 The Washington Post 10 January 2022 - by  Christina Barron

© Str/AFP/Getty Images An aerial photo shows visitors to this year's International Ice and Snow Festival in Harbin, China. The city in northeastern China known for its cold winters has held the festival for 38 years. Blocks of ice are taken from the nearby Songhua River and turned into massive sculptures.

Harbin, China, embraces the cold. And by cold we don’t mean winter temperatures near freezing (32 degrees Fahrenheit). In Harbin, a city of 6 million people in northeastern China, winter brings many weeks with high temperatures of 15 degrees or lower. Nearly 40 years ago, city officials decided to use the frigid weather to their advantage. They created an ice- and snow-filled festival.

What’s now called the International Ice and Snow Festival started as a celebration of ice lanterns, according to the festival website. The lanterns, hollowed ice blocks with a light inside, were formerly used to help fishermen on the city’s Songhua River. Later, the lanterns became works of art. The city began to host an art show of the ice lanterns in the 1960s.

In 1985, the city turned the show into a festival with more exhibits, along with outdoor performances. It’s now known around the world for its huge, glowing ice sculptures. For several weeks, workers pull blocks of ice from the ice-covered river. They stack and carve them to form towers, castles and, this year, buildings related to the Olympics, which will be held next month in Beijing, China. At night, LED lights strung in and around the ice make the sculptures look like the setting for a fairy tale.

© Afp Contributor#afp/AFP/Getty Images Children pose with an ice sculpture of three astronauts at the festival.

The festival also includes activities and competitions, including a series of winter swimming races. If you picture swimmers diving into a heated pool, think again. They dive into what looks like a pool, but it’s actually part of the Songhua River with ice removed. That’s a sport for people who truly love the cold!

The festival, which officially began Wednesday, is scheduled to stay open until the end of February or until Mother Nature turns the ice marvels into a melty mess.