Chinese New Year

Happy Chinese (Lunar) New Year!  2017 is the year of the rooster.  CNY is a time of family gatherings and a holiday rich with traditions, but having lived away from home for so many years and residing in a country where lunar new year is not a public holiday, the holiday usually passes without much fanfare.

I was in Hong Kong last week for work, and perhaps all the decorations and overall ambiance of everyone getting ready to celebrate the new year rubbed off on me, so I decided to take yesterday off work and host my own new year's eve dinner.  Different regions (even within China) have different traditions, but here are some of the most common ones.

New Year's Eve Dinner (除夕/年夜飯):  Also referred to as the "reunion dinner," this is the most important meal and officially kicks off the festivities.

Fish is a staple, as the character for fish  (魚 yu) is a homonym for surplus (餘 yu).  The tradition is to serve a whole fish but not to finish it, leaving extra for the next year (年年有餘 nian nian you yu, meaning "to have plenty each year").

Dumplings are also common in Northern China.  The shape of the dumplings resembles traditional Chinese money (元寶 yuan bao), so it's symbolic for prosperity.  For extra fun, you can wrap new/clean coins inside the dumplings, and those that get dumplings with money will be extra lucky.  (That was fun as a kid, although now I personally question the hygiene of money inside food...)

The ruyi dish (如意菜) is made with ten different ingredients.  如意 means to fulfill one's wishes, so it's a dish with a very auspicious name.

There are many others, but I'll just note one more -- rice cakes.  The Chinese name for rice cakes (年糕 nian gao) is a homonym for high (高 gao).  The well wish to accompany your dessert is therefore 年年高升 (nian nian gao sheng), which means to rise higher each year.

Shou Sui 守歲: After the reunion dinner, everyone stays up the entire night until the new year arrives (this is called shou sui).  Legend has it that there was once a beast called 年 nian ("year"), and it would eat the villagers and cause much destruction.  Everyone used to hide in fear when the year was going to come, but then someone discovered that the beast was afraid of the color red, loud noises, and fire.  And that is why to this day, Chinese people have the tradition of wearing red, decorating their homes with red scrolls and red lanterns, and setting off fireworks at midnight.

Greetings: There's no shortage of 4-character Chinese greetings and well wishes, so here are (lucky number) eight to get started.

1. 新年快樂 xin nian kuai le -- happy new year
2. 萬事如意 wan shi ru yi -- may all things (lit. tens of thousands of things) go according to your wishes
3. 心想事成 xin xiang shi cheng -- may you achieve everything your heart desires
4. 身體健康 shen ti jian kang -- wish you good health
5. 步步高升 bu bu gao sheng -- wish you reach new heights with each step (similar to 年年高升 nian nian gao sheng rice cake saying)
6. 恭喜發財 gong xi fa cai -- wish you wealth and prosperity
7. 歲歲平安 cui cui ping an -- wish you peace at every age
8. 大吉大利 da ji da li -- wish you great luck and profit

Lantern Festival (元宵節 yuan xiao jie):  The lantern festival is the 15th and last day of the new year.  As the name suggests, lighting and viewing beautifully decorated lanterns is the main activity.  People also eat a sweet glutinous rice ball (usually a dessert soup) called 湯圓 tang yuan (or 元宵yuan xiao), which sounds similar to the phrase for reunion, 團圓 tuan yuan.  The rice balls are typically filled with a sweet filling such as black sesame, red bean, or peanut.


Other Traditions:

• Red Envelopes (紅包): The red envelopes are filled with lucky money and are typically given by adults to children, or senior managers to employees.
• Cleaning: Before the new year, people will clean their homes to symbolize "out with the old, in with the new."
• Decorations: There are way too many, so I'll just highlight two.  1) You'll often see the character for good fortune 福 (fu) written on a red square and hung upside down.  That's because the character for upside down (倒 dao) sounds very similar to the character for arrived (到 dao),  so hanging 福 upside down symbolizes 福 has arrived.  2) Couplets hung on opposite sides of a door are also very common (very traditional Chinese, although you don't see it much these days except as a CNY decoration), and sometimes there's also a complementary third scroll that goes across the door top.  My mother sent around this one in English, which I thought was quite cute:

All in all, wishing everyone a very happy Year of the Rooster!