Hi All: with the new ginseng season upon us, I would like to share some good news with friends of this board. Last October we teamed up with China's PBS, CCTV ( China Central TV) and coproduced a four episode documentary \"Ginseng\" of 50 min each which are being shown. The first episodes is \" Legends\" which featured wild ginseng hunting trips in China and Wisconsin, contrasting rituals and styles, with some scientific explanations for traditional myths. The second episode is \" Ginseng gardens \" featuring personal stories in ginseng cultivation and their ordeals including efforts in woods grown ginseng in NE China. The Third episode is \" Original Flavor\" documenting ginseng in medicine and foods in China, US and Korea. The fourth episode is \" Secret Code\" documenting ginseng research advances, to be shown Monday Aug 18 9 am EST on CCTVdotcom Channel Ten \" science and education\". You need to install CBOX app to view it. Unfortunately it's in Chinese and not bilingual or English captioned as it's promised to be. We helped produce the parts relating to American Ginseng.
In the first episode, it opens with the traditional Festival for the Lord of Ginseng Digger on March 16 in Fusong NE China, on the birthday of the legendary digger Sun Liang, followed by all the rituals like promises before and offering after a successful hunt, for good luck and protection in the wild. For wild ginseng hunting in Wisconsin, it starts with Registration with DNR and rules of harvest, followed by some stunning late fall sequences in the woods with Flint, Steven and my buddy. Viewers were shown how we protect the young and small plants and harvest the bigger and older one. Throwing in some guns and firing to spice it up to show case our gun culture for the Chinese viewers who are not legally allowed to own any.
Overall it's a significant endeavor by CCTV and good publicity with the Chinese public for American Ginseng.
Happy Sanging 2014!
