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The Spring Festival, the Lunar New Year,
is the most important traditional national
festival in China. It is called nian or
xinnian (New Year) in Chinese. As originally
written, the Chinese character nian means
“harvest.” The Spring Festival
always falls sometime before or after
lichun (the beginning of Spring).
The celebration of the Spring Festival
is more or less similar across the country.
People set off firecrackers, which enliven
the festival and bring great joy to people,
especially to children. Chunlian are spring
couplets posted on gates during the Spring
Festival. They contain auspicious words
such as: “The Best of Things and
the Treasures of Heaven”; “Days
of Peace, Year In, Year Out”; “A
Spring of Good Fortune, This Year, and
Every Year.” In addition, New Year
pictures are a unique part of the New
Year celebrations. Today, farmers and
citizens in small towns still keep the
customs of posting these on their doors
or on the walls inside their rooms.
During the Spring Festival, the Chinese
people eat a lot of good food. In North
China, the most popular food is jiaozi,
or dumplings. In South China, for breakfast
on New Year’s Day, round rice glutinous
dumplings are served to signify family
reunion.
On the eve of he Spring Festival, it
is a folk custom to stay up late or all
night and pray for peace in the coming
year. That night every house is brightly
lit in the hope that anything that might
bring people bad fortune will disappear
under the dazzling light. New year is
ushered in at midnight, 12 o’clock
sharp. On that day, everybody, men and
women, old and young, put on new clothes.
When the younger generation extend their
New Year greetings to their seniors, the
latter give them money wrapped in red
paper that is called yasuiqian (money
to keep for the year). On the second day,
after breakfast, there are exchanges of
visits between friends and relatives who
bring each other New Year cakes, oranges,
tangerines, and crunchy candy as gifts.
All in all, everyday from New Year’s
Eve to the fifteenth day of the first
month, there are various entertainments.
Lion dances and drum and gong contests
are grand events in the New Year celebrations,
especially in the countryside in the South.
Wedding ceremonies also abound in cities
and villages throughout the land at this
time.
This
article by Yang Tianqing and Daniel Kister.
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