BEIJING, Sep. 27, 2004 (IPS/GIN) — Moon cakes, the traditional delicacy of the mid-autumn festival, were once regarded as symbols of family reunion and represented the round harvest moon. But in recent years as Chinese palates have become more fastidious and customers grown richer, the cakes have morphed into an ostentatious show of wealth.

They have even been branded by some as an urbane form of bribery. A presentable box of moon cakes these days comes with a French bottle of red wine or top-quality root of ginseng or even a diamond ring.

The festival, which this year falls on Wednesday, also celebrates the love story of moon beauty Chang E and her archer husband Hou Yi. As of such, jewellery companies have cashed in on it as the Chinese Valentine's Day — pairing heart-shaped moon cakes with heart-shaped diamonds.

The packaging of the moon cakes has become more elaborate and the boxes could either be draped with imperial-style golden silk and outfitted with wooden carvings or even silver-plated.

According to Guangzhou-based Nanfang Daily, competitive supermarkets in southern China have recruited well-known artists to contribute bronze sculptures and help the sales of their moon cake boxes.

The paper reported that the price per box, which also includes a miniature sculpture, starts at 1,888 yuan (US$227).

Even bakeries in backward inland provinces like western Shanxi are rolling out pricey cakes to cash in on the lucrative gift-giving tradition. The state media reported that supermarkets in the province were offering moon cakes containing real gold for 9,999 yuan (US$1,202) — the price being an auspicious sign of luck rather than a true reflection of value.

Purists of tradition have deplored the decline of Chinese moon cakes as an ancient symbol of family reunion and happiness. Bolstered by precious trimmings these cakes have now become a ready means for bribery, complained the official China Daily.

''Fancy moon cakes are popular because they are purchased and given as gifts to curry favour or outrightly bribe officials,'' said an editorial in the paper this month.

The paper added: ''Moon cakes present those officials with hard-to-detect guise. Presenting cash would be too obvious while presenting food is not".

But Sheng Xiwen, a construction company manager has a different view.

''I would not call it an outright bribery but just a convenient way to oblige someone in a position of power,'' he explains to IPS.

Sheng's long list of moon cake gifts for the season includes everybody from the local urban planning bureau to the district bureau of the state gas company.

''For us, it makes things much easier when you need to obtain certain building permissions,'' he says.

But things were not always so mercantile.

For a thousand years, the Chinese have eaten moon cakes at the mid-autumn festival - the 15th day of the eight lunar month, which celebrates the end of the harvest and the most spectacular moon.

There are records of yuebing (as the moon cakes are known in Mandarin) from the Tang dynasty (609-960). It is said that messages concealed in the cakes fomented a peasant uprising against the foreign Mongols of the Yuan dynasty (1279-1368).

As the mid-autumn festival is an occasion of reunion, the round moon cake symbolises the family circle and the flavor brings to mind the sweetness of filial ties.

Traditionally, the flaked pastry encloses a variety of fillings — white or red lotus seed, orange peel, cassia bloom or red bean paste. And while each province in China produces its own version, the moon cakes of southern Guangdong are most popular with fillings of egg yolk — which in their yellow roundness represent the moon.

But what was once a delectable treat, packed in a modest brown paper bag and shared with the closest members of the family, has nowadays become an elaborately packaged gift traded back and forth and often laden with complimentary goodies far exceeding the price of the moon cakes.

''The mid-autumn festival used to be one of my favourite festivals,'' says Beijing woman Bai Yan. ''You could celebrate it outdoors, watching the moon with friends and family and it costs very little to feel festive — you only needed to buy some fruits and a few moon cakes. Nowadays buying and giving moon cakes has become a costly affair.''

Since the traditional moon cakes are baked with lard, young people tend to avoid them as too sugary and lacking freshness of flavor. But fervent competition has spurred the emergence of all kinds of exotic moon cake varieties — filled with cream cheese and raisins, ginseng and bird's nest, shark's fin and abalone.

The battleground for the young yuppies market is where multinationals like Starbucks and Haagen Dazs are winning in the competition against Beijing's old and famous bakery shops like Fangshan and Daoxiangcun.

''My mother likes the traditional cakes so every year I buy one of Fangshan's boxes for her,'' says Xiao Xia who works as a beautician. ''As for myself, I prefer the small moon cakes with green tea flavour from Starbucks.''

The moon cakes dished out by Haagen Dazs in downtown Beijing are perhaps the most sought after modern version of the Chinese traditional treat. Made with chocolate crust and filled with different flavors of ice cream, Haagen Dazs' red and gold gift boxes sell like hot cakes, indeed.

''Any chance one can get a box of them in the week before the festival?'' asks this correspondent.

''You must be joking,'' replies a Haagen Dazs staff member whose name card reads Fisker. ''Our clients begin to place their orders in July. In September it is virtually impossible to get any of our moon cakes,'' the staffer quips as he busily deals with a long queue of people lining up to collect their pre-ordered moon cakes.