Carla's Chinese New Year's Page

The Chinese New Year has a great history. In other traditions, by this time in the year, most resolutions - made on December 31 - have been subtly forgotten and placed in a cupboard marked "maybe next year." However, all hope is not lost, as there's a second chance to start afresh with the celebration of Chinese New Year on February 5th.

The Chinese New Year is very similar to the Western one, swathed in traditions and rituals.

The origin of the Chinese New Year is itself centuries old - in fact, too old to actually be traced. It is popularly recognised as the Spring Festival and celebrations last 15 days.

Preparations tend to begin a month from the date of the Chinese New Year (similar to a Western Christmas), when people start buying presents, decoration materials, food and clothing. A huge clean-up gets underway days before the New Year, when Chinese houses are cleaned from top to bottom, to sweep away any traces of bad luck, and doors and windowpanes are given a new coat of paint, usually red. The doors and windows are then decorated with paper cuts and couplets with themes such as happiness, wealth and longevity printed on them.

The eve of the New Year is perhaps the most exciting part of the event, as anticipation creeps in. Here, traditions and rituals are very carefully observed in everything from food to clothing. Dinner is usually a feast of seafood and dumplings, signifying different good wishes. Delicacies include prawns, for liveliness and happiness, dried oysters (or ho xi), for all things good, raw fish salad or yu sheng to bring good luck and prosperity, Fai-hai (Angel Hair), an edible hair-like seaweed to bring prosperity, and dumplings boiled in water (Jiaozi) signifying a long-lost good wish for a family. It's usual to wear something red as this colour is meant to ward off evil spirits - but black and white are out, as these are associated with mourning. After dinner, the family sit up for the night playing cards, board games or watching TV programmes dedicated to the occasion. At midnight, the sky is lit up by fireworks.

On the day itself, an ancient custom called Hong Bao, meaning Red Packet, takes place. This involves married couples giving children and unmarried adults money in red envelopes. Then the family begins to say greetings from door to door, first to their relatives and then their neighbours. Like the Western saying "let bygones be bygones," at Chinese New Year, grudges are very easily cast aside.

The end of the New Year is marked by the Festival of Lanterns, which is a celebration with singing, dancing and lantern shows.

Although celebrations of the Chinese New Year vary, the underlying message is one of peace and happiness for family members and friends.

It seems that people show much more enthusiasm toward the new year's eve. So what is happening on the new year's eve?

Members of a family are supposed to stay up as late as they can at the New Year's eve. Long ago, it was believed that gods in Heaven would spread gold over to each family so they kept awake, active and ready to seize it with door closed.

The new year's eve is also the best time for the members of a family to talk with each other, report about their experiences and achievements, and exchange their ideas and plans for the next year.

For most of the northerners in China, making Chinese dumplings is a must at the new year's eve. As you know, making dumplings for a large family needs more than one person to fulfil. So it is also the time for the family members to chat around the table throughout the cooperation on the job. And the talk can often go back to their past when they were very young. I usually spend the Festival in my hometown with my parents. I can see the delighted faces of my parents when we sit down to work at the dumplings. The scene often brings my mother back to the old days we had together and she treasures those days very much though we were not so well-off as today. I still have a vivid picture of how our brothers and sisters in our childhood played joyfully in the new year's eve.

If the new year's eve is the time for families of the year, the new year eve's dinner will certainly be the hour of the new year's eve. The dinner is full of symbolic meaning, such as Chinese dumplings implying wealth since they have the shape of ancient Chinese gold or silver ingots. Everyone, even kids, drinks a little Jiu (usually hard liquor), which symbolizes longevity since Jiu has the same pronunciation as longevity in Chinese.

Like Christmas, the Chinese New Year or Spring Festival is the most important holiday in the year and a good time for the family to get together. In recent years, the Spring Festival Evening Party on TV has become another most involved festivity for Chinese apart from the big dinner, the fireworks and firecrackers.

This Spring Festival will come on January 24, 2001. A few days before that, people work or study away from home will hasten back as if drawn by magnet. And those at home will buy a large quantity of food and prepare for the sumptuous feast on the eve of the Spring Festival. So on the eve of the festival, the whole family will gather round the table and chat over the rich dishes. In addition to this joyous atmosphere, the Spring Festival Evening Party on CCTV (China Central Television) provides a all-round spiritual enjoyment. This is a Chinese characteristic product catering for the festive and happy occasion.

It starts at 8 PM in the ardent expectation from people all over the country. At that time, all the people will move their attention from the table to the TV. It is said to be the program with the highest receiving rate. Six hours as it lasts, it is still the focus on which the audience concentrate. There are various kinds of items on the program, such as singing, dancing, conjuring, cross talks, acrobatic shows, short plays, and so on, just like the famous assorted cold dish on Chinese banquet. Among all these, the cross talk and the short play are two main forms of art loved by the people. Because they connect with the reality closely, sing the praise of the good and speak ill of the bad. The cross talk is a traditional performance, and has a history of more than a hundred years. The two performers talk funny words and use exaggeration and irony to make the audience laugh. The short play is a newly emerged item. It utilizes simple stage property and several performers on this specific occasion act out an interesting or instructive story. It contains many jokes and sometimes is sidesplitting. In the happy laughters, people are filled with joy and forget all the troubles and cares in the last year. So soon after it appeared, it became one of the most welcomed performances. Since the Evening Party is televised nationwide and now is even worldwide, being transmitted by satellites, it is believed to be a cradle of stars. Many unknown performers turned famous overnight. But with the interest of the people varies and developes day by day, the Evening Party is placed a higher expectation. The directors have to rack their brains, looking for inspiration.

Together with the main program, there are another two focusing on songs & dances and traditional operas respectively. And it is said in the newspaper a major difference is taking place this year. In the past, the program was determined by the related leaders. But now a large audience is invited to the studio and their comments will play an important part. This act proves a simple truth that it is not a success until the people clap their hands. To some extent, it also reflects how deep the market economy is taking root in the society. Watch it on TY or Internet, and tell us your own view.

A distich is composed of two poetic lines matching both sound and sense. Every year when the Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) is coming, households in the country and town put spring festival distiches onto the door or wall facing the door in the sitting room. This is done to express the people's wish for a peaceful and happy new year.

The custom originated from ancient times when people were ignorant of the law of the nature. They couldn't explain such events as droughts, floods, earthquakes and accidents in a scientific way. They believed that it was the devils that brought them misfortunes. They also believed the devils could be avoided or driven away in a magic way. So at the beginning of each year, each family would hang two peach boards on both sides of the entrance into the house. The figures of gods carved on the boards were said to be powerful to prevent the devils from entering the house.

There is also a story about why peach boards were used. According to a legend, in the East Sea there used to be a beautiful mountain named Dushuo. On it there was a 3000-year-old peach tree. The tree was so tall that a branch bent with its top touching the ground. The bending branch formed an entrance. Devils had to go through this entrance to go out of the mountain. The Celestial Ruler knew that they would go out and do wrong to people. To stop the devils, he ordered two of his generals to guard at the entrance. They were empowered to arrest any devil going out.

Villagers around learned this. They copied this practice and placed two peach boards on either side of the door. At first they carved images of gods on the boards. Later they simplified the work by drawing the images. Still later, they simply wrote some words on two sheets of paper. The words were mostly incantations, which were thought to be magically effective to stop devils.

By Five Dynasties (907-960), someone in the royal court began to write distiches on paper instead of carving or drawing pictures or writing incantations. The lines are vertically arranged with the same length. As distiches usually express people's wish for prosperous life and appear in a very beautiful artistic form, hanging distiches in the Spring Festival soon became a popular practice throughout China.

In Chinese, Laba means 'gold eighth' and refers to the traditional start of celebrations for the Chinese New Year - the eighth day of the last lunar month.

On this day a special hot rice porridge, called Laba Zhou, is eaten, which contains glutinous rice, red beans, millet, Chinese sorghum, peas and some other ingredients, such as dried dates, chestnut meat, walnut meat, almond, peanut, dried lotus seeds and etc. On the previous night, people will begin the preparation and stew the porridge at about midnight. It won't let out an attractive smell until the next morning. The flavor varies from place to place, in the North, it is a dessert with sugar added; in the South, salt and seasonal vegetables are put in.

This tradition has its roots in the Buddhist faith. It is said when Sakyamuni left home and strived for virtue, he fainted on the way because of hunger and tiredness. A shepherdess passing by saved him and cooked for him some porridge with glutinous rice and nuts. Then Sakyamuni sat under a bodhi tree in meditation and found Buddhism. So later the believers formed the habit of cooking Laba Zhou to commemorate it.

There is another interesting story about Laba Zhou. In the past there was a man who led a wasteful life and eventually he ran out of food one winter. His neighbor gave him the grain he dumped before and cooked the porridge.Afterwards eating Laba Zhou is to teach children thrift in managing household.

Another custom is to prepare Laba vinegar for Jiaozi on the New Year Eve. People will skin some garlic and put them in the vinegar. It will have a distinctive flavor with time passing by.

Days before the New Year, every family is busy giving its house a thorough cleaning, hoping to sweep away all the ill fortune to make way for the in-coming good luck. People also give their doors and windowpanes a new paint, usually in red color. They decorate the doors and windows with paper-cuts and couplets with the very popular theme of "happiness", "wealth", "longevity" and "satisfactory marriage with more children."

On the 24th day of the last lunar month sacrifices are to be offered to the Kitchen God, for he returns to heaven to give a report to the Jade Emperor (which is the ruler of heaven in Chinese mythology) about the family's activities over the past year. This day is marked by acts of appeasement to the Kitchen god so that he will give a favorable report. Traditionally images of the Kitchen god are burned as a symbolic act of departure. From the 24th the Kitchen god will be absent from his shrine in the kitchen, and during this time it will be cleaned in preparation for his return on New Year's Eve.

During the build up to Chinese New Year Gate Gods are placed on the external doors of houses. This is a tradition can be dated back to the Tang Dynasty (618 - 907 AD). The legend says two generals, Qin Qiong and Yuchi Gong, stood guard against ghosts outside the Emperor Taizong's bedroom. In the eagerness to share the protection of these 'Gate Gods' the common people made their paintings and placed them on doors. The tradition has continued ever since.

The Eve of the New Year is very carefully observed. Supper is a feast, with all members coming together. Light will be kept on the whole night. At midnight, fireworks will light up the whole sky and firecrackers make everywhere seem like a war zone. People's excitement reaches its climax.

Very early the next morning, children greet their parents and receive their lucky money in red packets. The symbolic giving of the money represents a wish for fortune in the coming year. Then, the family starts out to say greetings from door to door, first to their relatives and then their neighbors. During and several days following the New Year's day, people are visiting each other, with a great deal of exchange of gifts. The New Year atmosphere is brought to an anti-climax fifteen days away when the Lantern Festival sets in. It is an occasion of lantern shows and folk dance everywhere. One typical food is the Tang Yuan, a kind of dumplings made of sweet rice rolled into balls and stuffed with sweet fillings.

The Lantern Festival marks the end of the New Year season and afterwards life becomes daily routines again. Yet, the spirit underlying is the same: a sincere wish of peace and happiness for the family members and friends.

The Chinese Lunar New Year is the longest chronological record in history, dating from 2600BC, when the Emperor Huang Ti introduced the first cycle of the zodiac. Like the Western calendar, The Chinese Lunar Calendar is a yearly one, with the start of the lunar year being based on the cycles of the moon. Therefore, because of this cyclical dating, the beginning of the year can fall anywhere between late January and the middle of February. This year it falls on February 5. A complete cycle takes 60 years and is made up of five cycles of 12 years each.

The Chinese Lunar Calendar names each of the twelve years after an animal. Legend has it that the Lord Buddha summoned all the animals to come to him before he departed from earth. Only twelve came to bid him farewell and as a reward he named a year after each one in the order they arrived. The Chinese believe the animal ruling the year in which a person is born has a profound influence on personality, saying: "This is the animal that hides in your heart."

Would you like to know what your Chinese Astrological sign is?
Put the year of your birth in the box below and find out what Chinese animal you are!
Please enter your birthyear in the long form, such as "1965".

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