Honored Chinese equivalent of Valentine’s Day

Love is celebrated all over the world. In Germany and the rest of the western world, Valentine’s Day on February 14 is considered the festival of love, while in China it is the Qixi festival on the seventh day of the seventh month according to the Chinese lunar calendar. So this year, Qixi falls on August 4th. So today’s Google Doodle honors the festival and features an image of the legend Qixi is based on.

Again and again, the search engine uses the logo on the start page, called Doodle, to draw its users’ attention to commemorations, anniversaries, special people or events.

What is legend behind Qixi?

According to folk tale, a cowherd and a weaver who have been separated and still love each other fiercely can only be together for one night on the evening of the seventh day of the seventh month. The shepherd lived a hard life: After his parents died long ago, he worked in the fields and tended cows. One day a fairy fell in love with him, they had a daughter and a son. While he tended the cows, she wove. They were happy until the Emperor of Heaven got angry and sent the Empress of Heaven to bring the fairy back to Heaven.

The shepherd wanted to follow her, but the empress of heaven separated the two by drawing a celestial river with a golden hairpin. Magpies watched the shepherd and the weaver face each other with tears in their eyes, so they formed a bridge for the two to be reunited. Even the Empress of Heaven was touched that the two lovers defied all obstacles to be able to be together. Therefore, she allowed them to meet on the Elster Bridge every year on the seventh day of the seventh month.

The Shepherd and the Weaver represent two stars – Altair and Vega – separated by the Milky Way. However, the doodle shows the two lovers in their human form, meeting between the clouds on the Elster Bridge. The doodle was not created digitally: it was printed in red on a white cloth – and finally photographed and uploaded digitally.

What are Google Doodles?

Not everyone knows their name, but almost all internet users have seen them: the Google Doodles. These are graphics that can appear on the Google homepage and in the search result lists at the top left. They often represent the Google logo, which is enhanced with various extras or effects. Clicking on the graphic often triggers an animation or even an interactive game.

Basically, Google Doodles are always created for a specific event – whether it’s Mother’s Day, the World Cup, a holiday or the commemoration of a well-known personality. On the one hand, they commemorate a special event, but on the other hand they also offer further information. With a further click, users go directly to an automatic search query that explains the background of the doodle in more detail.

They are created by the Doodlers, a special team of artists at Google made up of graphic designers and illustrators. Sometimes Google invites guest designers to design the doodles for the Google homepage.

Is the Google Doodle the same worldwide?

No, the Google Doodles differ from each other internationally or are only played in certain regions and countries. National holidays, for example, are only played out in the respective country, such as King’s Day on April 27 in the Netherlands or the freedom day that takes place at the same time in South Africa. The doodle with the doctor Tôn Thất Tùng from May 10, 2022 was shown on the Google homepage in Vietnam as well as in Germany.

Internationally important commemorations, public holidays or other exciting events such as Earth Day or the first picture of a black hole, on the other hand, are played out internationally.

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