Chinese New year 2011 ushered in with fresh hope
With the first New Moon day of the New Year, Chinese's New Year starts which will end on the full moon day exactly after 15 days . This period of 15 days, which are full of fun and frolic is called as the Lantern Festival.
AT MY office, all my Chinese friends have left for their country to celebrate and welcome their traditional New Year 2011. According to the Chinese Zodiac which revolves every 12 years, the Chinese New Year will fall on February 3, 2011. The Chinese New Year falls on a different dates each year because of the fact that it is based on a combination of lunar and solar movements and usually occurs in the month of January or February. This year the Chinese New Year will start on February 3, 2011 and continues till January 22, 2012.
Each Chinese Year is symbolically represented by an animal. This Chinese Year 2011 is the year of the Rabbit.
With the first New Moon day of the New Year, Chinese’s New Years starts and it ends on the full moon day exactly after 15 days . This period of 15 days, which are full of fun and frolic is called as the Lantern Festival which is celebrated with great enthusiasm.
New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day are celebrated in a flamboyant way. Chinese believe in maintaining semblance between their present and past. Therefore, it has been ensured that the ancestors should be duly remembered as they were responsible for laying the foundations for the fortune. On New Year eve, all the family members, without the married daughters and their families gather together and take part in a religious ceremony. To let the old year go, at midnight people open up their windows and doors in each household.
At night, people take part in ceremonial parade by carrying lanterns in their hands. Such parades are organised throughout the country to welcome New Year. Chinese people generally prefer to wear red clothes and symbolical red masks. Chinese masks are the inseparable traditional aspects of Chinese culture. Being one of the favorite colours of Chinese, red color is used extensively in the preparation of mask. Red colour is used by Chinese in all their all celebrations that it appears as if every thing would hide under red fabric.
People from all across China visit the Taoist ‘White Cloud Temple’ in Beijing. One of the rituals which is followed as an old tradition is that the Chinese tie their New Year wish to a "wishing tree” at the temple with a hope that this will bring prosperity to them.
A famous ancient custom call ‘Hong Bao’ which means Red Packet is interestingly practiced on the day of Lantern Day in which married couples offer money to children and unmarried couples, usually in red envelopes. This is probably their way of passing good luck to the next generation.
Though there are many dishes which are cooked on the New Year eve, the most famous dish which is specifically included in the traditional buffet on New Year eve is “Jai”. It is a combination ginkgo nut, black moss, dried bean curd, bamboo shoots, vermicelli and scallion. Chinese people love to offer traditional dishes to their guests.
Chinese people are very presumptive and they try to avoid doing few things on the New Year Eve like they don’t wash their hair, they avoid greeting people who are in mourning, they don’t drop their chopsticks and they avoid saying number four as number four is Chinese homonym for death.
I don’t know how my friends are celebrating their New Year but where ever they would be; I would like to say them “Gung Hey Fat Choy” which means "Wishing You Prosperity and Wealth".
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