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Chinese New Year Celebration
- Updated:
- Sep 22, 2009;
- by:
- China Highlights;
- Clicks:
- 263;
China Festival Tours give you an opportunity to celebrate traditional Chinese festivals as local people. Please contact us and we will arrange an unforgettable tour for you! hot
Chinese New Year is China’s most important festival and national holiday. In 2010 there is a week of national holida. It is a time for families getting together, feasting together (to keep away the winter cold) and catching up on the family news.
Chinese New Year Celebrations usually last for 15 days. Celebratory activities include the Chinese New Feast, firecrackers, giving lucky money to children, the New Year bell- ringing and Chinese New Year Greetings. Most Chinese people will stop celebrating in their home on the 7th day of the New Year because the national holiday usually ends around that day, however celebrations in public areas can last until the 15th day of the New Year.
Different Celebrations for Chinese New Year
Chinese New Year's Feast: The New Year's Feast is "a must" banquet with all the family members getting together. People from north and south have different sayings about the food they eat on this special day. Southern Chinese eat "niangao" (New Year cake made of glutinous rice flour) on this special day, because a homophone of "Niangao", means "higher and higher every year". In northern China, a traditional dish for the feast is "Jiaozi" or dumplings which are shaped like a crescent moon.
Lighting Firecrackers: Lighting Firecrackers used to be one of the most important customs in the Spring Festival celebration. But because of the danger and the noise disturbance that firecrackers may bring the government has banned this practice in many major cities. However, people in small towns and rural areas still hold to this traditional celebration. Just as the clock strikes 12 o'clock, beginning a new year on the Chinese lunar calendar, cities and towns are lit up with the sparkle of fireworks, and the sound can be deafening. Families stay up for this joyful moment and kids with firecrackers in one hand and a lighter in another cheerfully celebrate by throwing the small explosives one by one into the street, whilst plugging their ears.
Lucky Money: It is the money given to kids from their parents and grandparents as a New Year gift. The money is believed to bring good luck and ward off evel spirits, hence the name "lucky money". Parents and grandparents first put the money in small, especially made red envelopes and give the red envelopes to their kids after the New Year's Feast. They choose to put the money in red envelopes bacause Chinese people think red is a lucky color. They want to give their children both lucky money and lucky color. This activity is often the kids' favorite.
Chinese New Year Greetings: On the first day of the new year, everybody wears new clothes and greets relatives and friends with bows and Gongxi (congratulations), wishing each other good luck, happiness during the new year. In Chinese villages, some villagers may have hundreds of relatives so they have to spend more than two weeks visiting their relatives.
Waiting for the First Bell Ringing of Chinese New Year: The first rising bell is a symbol of Chinese New Year. Chinese people like to go to large squares where there are huge bells set up on New Year’s Eve. As the New Year approaches they count down and celebrate together. The people believe that the ringing of huge bell can drive all the bad luck away and bring fortune to them. In recent years, some people have begun going to mountain temples to wait for the first ringing of a bell there. Hanshan Temple in Suzhou, is very famous temple for its first ringing of the bell to herald Chinese New Year. Many foreigners now go to Hanshan Temple to celebrate Chinese New Year.
- Chinese New Year Food: Want to know Chinese New Year Foods? There are quite a few. See why Chinese Dumplings, Fish, Spring Rolls and Nian Gao are so popular during Chinese New Year Celebration.
- Spring Festival: Spring Festival is the most important Festival to Chinese People. Family members will go home to celebrate Spring Festival together no matter how long they stay away.
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