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Life in China Chinese New Year in Mainland China
Life in China Chinese New Year in Mainland China | Chinese New Year in Mainland China |
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| Friday, 09 February 2007 | |
 Chinese New Year, or Spring Festival, is the most important festival in Chinese culture. Following Hui’s memories, Dimsum is delighted to invite you onboard this journey of Chinese New Year in Mainland China.The legend ‘According to legend, in ancient China, nian ("Nyan"), a man-eating beast from the mountains, could infiltrate houses silently to prey on humans. The people later learned that nian was sensitive to loud noises and the color red, so they scared it away with explosions, fireworks and the liberal use of the color red. So guo nian actually means surviving the nian. These customs led to the first New Year celebrations. ‘Chu means "get rid of" and xi is the day of the legendary man-eating beast, nian, that preys once a year on New Year Eve. When nian arrived, people used firecrackers to scare him away. Once nian ran away, people joined together to celebrate for another year of safe life.’ --Wikipedia.com Pre- and Post New Year Spring festival (chun jie) is a long period. In southern China, it usually begins from 23rd December in the lunar calendar, for the preparation, to 15th January for the Lantern festival. In Mainland China, spring festival is one of the three week-long public holidays of the year (the other two are May Labour Day and October National day). These factors contribute to the two distinctive phenomena during the spring festival period— Chun Yun (Spring Transport) As Chinese New Year is traditionally the biggest festival and the time for family gathering, there is always a huge demand on transport by people rushing to go home for the ‘Reunion Dinner’ in the New Year. ‘Chunyun refers to the extremely high traffic load of transportation in China around the time of Chinese New Year. The high traffic load usually begins 15 days before the Lunar New Year, and lasts for around 40 days. There’s such a great demand on transport that most of the coaches and trains are overloaded with people who have looked for work in the cities and are returning home by public transport. People are cramped in the sleeper coaches like caged animals; on the train, as there aren’t enough seats, many are sleeping on the hallway, or sitting outside the toilet or any public standing space. There had been many reports of accidents due to overloading. Different local governments have to set up many check points to inspect those transport companies if they are meeting health and safety standards. However, this also causes some overlapping of inspection at various city borders, which results in the delay for those who are desperate to go home. New Year travel Although it’s not traditional, it has become an increasing popular tradition for the young generation or urban families who have certain disposable income to travel during this period. The tropical island of Hainan, Southeast Asia or the country’s northern most province, Harbin, are among those popular destinations. Most of the hot destinations are reportedly fully booked well in advance. Preparation for the New Year Now forget about the pre- or post- New Year period, what do we Chinese really do in these days? There are mainly three things to prepare: Cleaning – To sweep away bad luck and make the home ready for good luck to arrive. Shopping – To buy new clothes, red envelopes, firecrackers and fireworks (only allowed in rural areas) chunlian (poetic couplets), narcissus, chrysanthemum, mandarin oranges and more importantly, lots and lots of food! Decorating – Homes are decorated with paper cutouts of auspicious Chinese phrases and couplets that speak of happiness, wealth and longevity. Mandarin orange trees are one of the national favourites as it symbolises luck and good fortune. New Year’s Eve – the most amazing time of the year! Welcome to the big day of the whole festival ! This is the biggest family day of the year. Family members from near and far, are all gathering in the house of the most senior member of the family, for a sumptuous and symbolic ‘Reunion dinner’. Depending on the region, there are different menus for this dinner. In northern China, people usually have dumplings, jiao zi. This is because the shape of dumplings resembles the Chinese gold ingots used in ancient China. Another saying is that the pronunciation of Jiao zi, is similar with the first Chinese paper currency (jiao zi). Anyhow, this symbolises people’s best wishes for the year to come. In Guangdong province and Hong Kong, people usually have a big meal containing chicken, pork, fish (symbolising surplus) and vegetables. It sounds very superstitious, but almost every dish has a symbolic meaning or name that sounds like Chinese characters for fortune, happiness, longevity and prosperity. Everyone, even kids, drinks a little jiu (usually hard liquor), which symbolizes longevity since Jiu has the same pronunciation as longevity in Chinese. However, nowadays people are less obsessed by the symbolic meaning of the dishes but the actual nutritious content. My favourite part of the New Year’s Eve is not the big meal or the firecrackers, but simply a Mandarin Orange Bath! You don’t normally have a mandarin orange bath any other time except the New Year’s Eve. As the pronunciation of this beautiful fruit sounds like Luck, it is said to wash away the old and bad things of the previous year and fresh anew for the year to come. As it’s in winter, a hot steamy bath with the sparkle of the refreshing fragrance is just wonderful. As soon as the clock strikes midnight, people begin to play firecrackers, to scare away the evil spirits and to celebrate the coming of the New Year. In the villages, men in the family are already waiting in the Buddhist temple fighting to put the first sticks of incense in the censers, which is believed to bring you extra good luck for the New Year. Women are not allowed to go at this time, and they will usually go the New Year’s Day morning, around 7am. There are superstitions that switching on the lights for the night is considered good luck to 'scare away' ghosts and misfortunate spirits that may compromise the luck and fortune of the New Year. For safety reasons, firecrackers and fireworks are banned in the urban areas of the Mainland. Private parties are not allowed to play with these ‘highly explosive materials’ in the city, and only the government can organise a big public display in one evening of this period. Therefore, in New Year’s Eve, those who experience the most original joy and ritual of New Year are those who live in the rural area. In contrast, there are deserted streets in the city and nothing is going on – quietly boring. Thus, most people just sitting in front of the TV and watch the national entertainment programme which has been prepared for months in advance by a group of the county’s most famous entertainers. To describe this type of show from a different perspective – one day, while watching the DVD of this programme, in a northern Chinese restaurant, my British husband reluctantly looked at me and said: do you think they can change to another channel? He just found it very noisy and couldn’t get the point! The New Year’s Day Imagine the feeling of a child waking up in the hope of seeing Santa’s presents: Chinese children waking up this day with the hope of wearing brand new clothes, receiving Red Envelopes – Hong Bao or 'leih síh’ – and further enjoyment of firecrackers and fireworks. There will be firecrackers before each meal in the day and you can see the red papers cover the whole ground. Wearing brand new clothes in the New Year has been an old tradition even well before Song dynasty. Why Chinese wear brand new clothes in New Year? This is because historically China is an agricultural society; there was a harvest once a year. For the majority of the farmers, the New Year was the only time that they could have the bonus to buy new clothes. Wearing new clothes also symbolises the good wishes they pray for themselves – may the new year bring me new beginnings, wealth and fortune. Red Envelopes, containing ‘lucky money’, are a gift from the senior and married to the junior and those unmarried, given in different occasions such as Chinese New Year, weddings or birthdays. Chinese love the form of ‘Red Envelope’ as this is the most practical way of giving your kind wishes to another, and you don’t have to kill yourself trying to work out buying what present to whom. For most of the children, the amount given will be usually kept by their parents as their educational fund (some of it is used to give other children lucky money – this is how the money circulate in the loop and keep the social harmony). A small amount will be kept by the recipients themselves to buy things they like. The red color of the packet symbolizes good luck and the amount of money in the packet is often some lucky number, and usually is an even amount, as odd numbers are related to cash given during funerals. In this day, sweeping the floor is forbidden, as this is considered bad luck, and will sweep away the good fortune and luck for the New Year. Similarly, you are normally not allowed to have a bath or shower in the New Year’s Day for the same reason. But nowadays, people just ignore the latter and have a bath or shower anyway. The first day of Chinese New Year is a time where family members, in order of their seniority, will pay a visit to their oldest and most senior member of their family, it’s called ‘Bai Nian’. Bringing some symbolic presents and red envelopes along, you will also receive similar presents-- ‘hui li’ – by the host. These are fun and harmonious periods as people are paying respect and give good wishes to each other. In the village, there is a Lion dance troupe touring around each family. This is a ritual to usher in the Lunar New Year as well as to evict bad spirits from the premises – the combination of a powerful animal and noisy instruments are consider an effective way to scare evil spirits away, much like firecrackers. Happy New Year to everyone! |
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