Fo Guang Shan 2026 Book Fair and Vegetarian Food Expo
A book fair and a vegetarian food expo don’t often share a venue, but at Fo Guang Shan they are two halves of a single experience. The 2026 edition of the annual event returns to the Buddha Museum with the theme “Auspicious Animal Party—Auspicious to Look At, Auspicious to Eat, Auspicious to Play,” a playful echo of the concept of “Harmonious Coexistence.”
The theme continues the spirit of “always starting from care” and the “Three Goods and Four Givings” (doing good deeds, saying good words, thinking good thoughts; giving confidence, joy, hope, and convenience) that Fo Guang Shan has promoted over the years. To give the theme physical form, artist Hong Yi has been invited to decorate the park with colorful, rounded animal sculptures. The works carry the festival’s message of diverse coexistence, inclusion, and understanding, expressed through reading, art, vegetarian food, and interactive experiences.
| Event Dates | 11/07 (Sat) – 11/13 (Fri) |
| Event Location | Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum, No. 1, Tongling Rd., Dashu District, Kaohsiung, Taiwan |
▶︎ Auspicious to Look At
The festival’s cultural program spans printed matter, visual art, and spoken word. At its center is the themed book exhibition, which gathers titles connected to this year’s animal theme. Outside, Hong Yi’s outdoor sculpture exhibition turns the grounds into an open-air gallery of large, rounded animal figures. Mobile book carts circulate through the venue, bringing reading material within easy reach of visitors between scheduled activities. Inside, art special exhibitions provide a more contemplative layer, and renowned speakers take the stage for lectures that take up questions of culture, blessing, and life care.
For those seeking a more active form of engagement, the thousand-person sutra copying session invites participants to hand-copy Buddhist sutras in a collective setting—a practice that combines concentration, reverence, and quiet reflection. Taken together, the program frames reading and aesthetic experience as routes to culture, blessings, and life care.
▶︎ Auspicious to Eat
November is World Vegetarian Month, and the expo aligns its culinary program with that calendar. The Vegetarian Expo assembles a wide range of plant-based dining options, demonstrating the breadth of contemporary vegetarian cuisine. Green dieting forms another strand of the program, examining the relationship between food choices, personal health, and the environment. The thousand-person tea Zen closes the section with a collective moment of tea meditation, anchoring the culinary side of the festival in stillness.
The point is simple: start with a vegetarian meal to practice a healthy, compassionate, and low-carbon lifestyle.
▶︎ Auspicious to Play
Families are the primary audience for the play side of the festival. The opera “Nine-Colored Deer” brings a classic Buddhist tale to the stage, while the storytelling house under the big tree gives younger children a shaded spot for read-aloud sessions. Dragon fire cars and carriages add a festive, kinetic element to the grounds, and the environmental education train introduces eco-consciousness through an interactive format. The Three Goods Children’s Experience Center turns the festival’s values into hands-on activities designed for young visitors.
Together, these elements allow parents and children to learn and play side by side, leaving behind auspicious memories full of laughter.
Fo Guang Shan is an international Buddhist order founded in 1967 by the Taiwanese monk Hsing Yun. The name translates to “Buddha’s Light Mountain,” a reference to the order’s stated aim of making Buddhist teachings applicable to everyday life. The organization is a prominent proponent of Humanistic Buddhism, a movement that emphasizes practicing the dharma through engagement with the world—through education, service, and ethical conduct—rather than through withdrawal from it.
The order’s main campus is in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. It includes a monastery, a museum, and a range of facilities used for teaching, conferences, and cultural events. The Fo Guang Shan Buddha Museum houses Buddhist relics and art, with exhibitions designed for both tourists and practitioners. The organization also maintains branch temples in several countries, as well as schools, libraries, and research centers. Its charitable work is coordinated through a separate foundation, and its publications arm produces Buddhist texts in multiple languages.
Fo Guang Shan is perhaps best known publicly for its large-scale events, including the annual Book Fair and Vegetarian Food Expo, which attract visitors from outside the Buddhist community. These events are presented not as devotional requirements but as open invitations to explore vegetarian food, books on Buddhism, and related topics. The organization’s vegetarianism is tied to the Buddhist precept of non-harm, and its educational programs are designed to explain Buddhist concepts without assuming prior knowledge. This combination of accessible programming and institutional structure has made Fo Guang Shan one of the more visible Buddhist organizations in the Chinese-speaking world.
