Spokesperson for Your Culture:

I've been thinking a lot about Chinese New Year since I've been asked to speak about it to my son's nursery class. I remember my own teachers asking me to speak to my classmates and I can't help a wry smile.

The Lunar New Year is the most visual image of Chinese culture to Westerners and, being raised in the West, British-born or raised Chinese (BBC) bear the burden of being the so-called "experts" to teachers, classmates and friends, or so it seemed to me growing up.

As I think about what to say to my son's class, I question what I really know about Chinese New Year and what I feel about the traditions. It matters more to me now as my son, Marcus (4.5), and daughter, Lauren (3), are at an age when they're beginning to understand and question the world in which they live.

My Memories of Chinese Lunar New Year:

Growing up in the UK, the Lunar New Year wasn't an official holiday (certainly no 15-day traditional celebrations or the modern 4-day public holiday in some Asian countries); just a few colourful images of the dragon or lion dance on TV or, if we were lucky, a visit to Chinatown on a cold day to see the dragon dance, eat dim sum, buy Chinese groceries and receive "Lei Sei" or "Hung Bao" (red packets) from relatives and family friends we saw that day.

As a child, the best part about New Year was getting lots of Lei Sei (as I suspect for many BBCs!) Of course, I remember other things as well, like three weeks before New Year my parents would start to spring clean the house and nearer to New Year the kitchen altar. The house looked bright with red decorations, vibrant flowers, sometimes kumquat trees and scented with the smells of burning incense and citrus fruits in big bowls.

We prayed to the Kitchen God on New Year's Eve and to our ancestors on New Year's Day. We wore new clothes to visit and pay our respects to our grandparents and uncles and aunts. Whether visiting relatives or family friends, we'd always be invited to eat some food; maybe a slice of "Nian Go" (New Year pudding) or have some "Tong Yuen" in "Tong Sui" (Sweet Glutinous Rice Flour Balls in Sugar Water) - I never did get used to the texture of Nian Go or Tong Yuen, but was always told to eat it so I'd grow taller and add one more year to my life (well, I'm not sure Nian Go worked as I'm still only 5-foot, but obviously the Tong Yuen did as I'm at the start of my 4th decade!)

A Barometer of Views on Chinese New Year:

I think BBCs are divided on how they feel about Chinese New Year. It doesn't seem to matter to some BBCs and just a family meal to others. To test my theory, I asked my siblings, cousins and BBC friends, and just as I suspected their comments ranged from positive to indifferent or negative.

One of my brothers thinks Chinese New Year superstitions are "stuff and nonsense" (actually, he said ruder words I can't repeat here!)

A cousin said, "It's not something I get too over excited about, which perhaps sounds a bit awful, but guess that's part of growing up in Britain. As Mum makes a big deal of it then it becomes important. Mum did all the preparation and warned us well in advance that we should be home for dinner for the occasion."

A friend shared her good memories of New Year: "I love Chinese New Year! Growing up we always observed the tradition of eating together on New Year's Eve and eating leftover dishes from the previous night and using up what's in the fridge. On New Year's Day, as part of the cleansing act, we only have hot water and vegetarian food (vegan if possible) and then on the 2nd day of New Year the feast begins...My grandmother used to try and get the red goodwill phrases to put up by the doorway and my mum would get kumquat trees and peach blossom if she came across them."

Even as some of us have a cynical or dismissive attitude towards all things traditional, I believe deep down we can't ignore where we've come from - much as some BBCs choose to have a Chinese wedding banquet when they marry non-Chinese out of respect for their parents and to honour something deep inside them. I would argue, no matter how much we rebel or how far we've moved from home, our connection to our culture is inherent within us.

It Matters to Over 20 % of the World:

The Lunar/Chinese New Year or Spring Festival is the most important celebration for Chinese and other Asian people (over 20 % of the world's population). It's also part of the story of immigration; a bond linking overseas Chinese and their descendants to their heritage, even though they live thousands of miles away from their ancestral homelands.

Saying "Gung Hei Fat Choi" at New Year is our connection to millions of others like us who speak Cantonese (or other dialects, such as Hakka) in S.E. China, Hong Kong and around the world where people have settled, such as New York City, Toronto, London, Birmingham, Manchester and many smaller towns and villages in the UK.

Chinese Lunar New Year is the Main Event Not the Postscript:

It's a shame that Christmas and New Year (Gregorian calendar) have replaced the Lunar New Year in importance with many BBCs. The Lunar New Year becomes an afterthought or a postscript to the main event when it should be a significant event in of itself. Perhaps, because it's not a public holiday in the West or, maybe, we've accepted it as something our parents do that is separate to our lives. I don't think we should take the celebrations for granted because, as each generation progresses, we're in danger of losing the verbal histories that exist within families. Do we really know why we do certain things at New Year?

Instead of being indifferent to Chinese New Year, we should sit up and pay attention. As BBCs, we could argue our grandparents or parents never taught us about New Year, but did we ask the questions of our elders and even more so now as we're adults. There's no excuse for being in ignorance today when we have easy access to other resources, such as the Internet, to educate us.

If you go home this New Year, why don't you ask your relatives about what New Year means to them (don't take their surface answers, but dig deeper) or watch them cook the traditional foods. My friend, Pauline, recalls her mum making New Year cookies: "My mum makes these deep fried cookies (I used to help) that are shaped like really small Cornish pasties and stuffed with a mixture of desiccated coconut, peanuts and sugar. We call them �Gnou Kok Jai' (Little Ox Horns)".

New Year Stories and Rituals:

My children have an interesting road to navigate being American-born of BBC parents with a Chinese (Guangdong Hakka) and Hong Kong (New Territories Hakka) ancestry. If it was hard for me being a BBC, imagine the cultural questions my children may have. I don't want them to grow up in a cultural void so I'll start with the New Year stories; I'll tell them the legend of "Nian" - a ferocious beast that attacked people thousands of years ago. Nian was afraid of noise, fire and the colour red so people hung red peach wood on their doors, made campfires with bamboo to make cracking sounds and beat metal utensils to scare Nian away. These are the origins of the New Year traditions of decorating with red paper with lucky phrases written on them and lighting firecrackers to scare off evil spirits.

In Cantonese, New Year's Eve is called "Guo Nian" - "Guo" means passing and "Nian" in modern Chinese means year so, in essence, the New Year is about surviving Nian (the beast) and starting anew. From honouring our past through veneration of ancestors to "fasting" (eating root and fibrous vegetables and gluten, "Jai") on New Year's Day; from sweeping the old dirt away to wearing new clothes, we're symbolically going back to beginnings and reenergising ourselves for the year ahead. Before you dismiss such rituals as hocus-pocus, ask yourself how is this any different to saying goodbye to the old and welcoming in the new and making resolutions at New Year in the Gregorian calendar?

Indeed, you may be surprised though I'm born and raised in the West (and many of my peers are spiritually sceptical), I feel positive about ancestor worship. Saying prayers in a ritualized way to my deceased grandparents and my husband's grandparents (despite our differences), and my brother, David, (who died too young at 22), strengthens me as they're my link to my history and I'll ask them to guide me in the coming year.

You may also be surprised (as I'm a product of a more cynical generation) I don't dismiss centuries old superstitions outright, much as some people in Western societies wouldn't purposely walk under a ladder. Hence, part of New Year's Eve will be spent preparing food for the next day as it's commonly believed using a kitchen knife on New Year's Day will cut off one's luck. Nor will I sweep the house on New Year's Day as that would mean sweeping away my good fortune.

Teaching my children the stories and traditions is part of my learning too. Being a mother and far from family networks, and certainly being more patient now I'm older means I want to know more about my roots: you don't know what you miss until you're standing where I'm standing. Teaching my children to say "Gung Hei Fat Choi" is as if my parents are passing on the parenting baton to me and the very act of teaching them to say this greeting is something, which symbolically ties three generations born on three different continents together.

My Life and Chinese New Year:

We live in a small city away from a Chinatown and there are ways I'm adapting Chinese cultural norms to the realities of our life here, like adapting recipes to the ingredients I can buy. Being away from family, we're creating our own traditions and adapting them to a new culture, such as incorporating Thanksgiving into our rituals in the same way we did with Christmas when we were growing up in England. Chinese New Year is a visible catalyst to start teaching Marcus and Lauren about their roots. At their age, they're like sponges wanting to learn by doing, so as I clean the house ready for New Year, they'll have dusters in hand ready to help me. As I tell them New Year stories, they'll use their natural imaginations in role play.

Last year, I made Nian Go from scratch; no mean feat if you imagine me on the phone with my parents as I mixed! Even if my children don't like the texture or taste, they will have tried it and know why they eat it. This year, I'm going to master the classic dish of "Baak Chit Gai" (White Cut Chicken) served with salted and mashed ginger, spring onions and oil dipping sauce ("Goeng Chung") and present it at a New Year's party for close friends. Check out my article in the Food section as I talk about setting up a Chinese kitchen and give you the recipe for my family's White Cut Chicken dish and other recipes.

The Lunar New Year matters more to me today than it's ever done and I'll willingly explain the traditions to friends, my son's classmates and people in the community by speaking and writing articles in the local newspaper.

Excitement and Pride for New Year:

In China, people travel far and wide for several days, and as I've been reading recently in terrible weather, to see their families at the New Year. Realistically, we can't make this journey every year because families may live in different countries. But, even as we can't celebrate with family, I feel we should be excited and proud about Chinese New Year and make greater efforts to acknowledge this visible and symbolic connection to our heritage.

Do you have similar feelings about Chinese New Year or do you think I have it entirely wrong? Please share your thoughts below or email me directly at This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it .

GUNG HEI FAT CHOI!

Susan S. Cheung