Chūnjié kuàilè! - Happy Spring Festival!

This year we celebrate the Chinese New Year on the 18th of February. According to the Chinese calendar, the new year starts on the day of the second new moon after the winter solstice. As the Chinese name of this event, chūnjié, "Spring Festival" implies, New Year is the starting point of spring. From an astrological perspective, we will now wag our tails to say bye bye to the Year of the Dog and enter the Year of the Pig, zhū nián.

Chinese celebrate the new year mainly within the family – eating dumplings, jiaŏzi, and watching the CCTV New Year-concert, Chūnjié liánhuān wănhùi. All major performing artists of China wish to show up in this major gala event of the year - if you make it there, you are a Star. Also the overseas Chinese wish to gather together to watch this concert in all corners of the world.

There is a folk legend in China telling about a horrible beast called Nián. It had a bad habit of spooking around people's houses and sneaking in to do some evil deeds. However, people very soon noticed that Nian got really scared if it saw any red colour or heard any loud voices. Therefore Chinese learned to decorate their homes with red paper slips, called chūnlián, and adopted the habit of setting off fire crackers, fàng biān pào. In order to bless the coming year with all things good, it is wise to avoid any hazards (like Nian) during the new year time - that's why Chinese make a lot of noise and decorate with red during Spring Festival.

This time of the year Chinese often hang the character fú, "happiness" upside down in their houses. The word "upside down" is dào in Chinese, and as the word for "come, arrive" also happens to spell dào, the meaning of an upside down character fú is "happiness arrives," fú dào!

Red colour manifests itself during the Spring Festival also in "red envelopes," hóng bāo. Hóng bāo is a small envelope filled with more or less money (maybe only a symbolic coin). Chinese grandparents especially like to spoil their grandchildren with these new year presents.

So, wishing you all a very merry Spring Festival - chūnjié kuàilè!

春 节 快 乐 chūnjié kuàilè! - Happy Spring Festival!
猪 年 zhū nián - year of the pig
春 节 联 欢 晚 会 chūnjié liánhuān wănhùi - New Year concert
放 鞭 炮 fàng biān pào - setting off fire crackers
春 联 chūnlián - New Year posters by the door
红 包 hóng bāo - "red envelope"
福 fú - happiness