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The Chinese Spring Festival lasts for fifteen days. The first week is the most important and most often celebrated with visits to friends and family as well as greetings of good luck. The celebrations end with the important and colorful Lantern Festival on the evening of the 15th day of the first lunar month. However, Chinese believe that on the third day of the Spring Festival it is not appropriate to visit family and friends, and call the day "chi kou", meaning "easy to get into arguments".
The date of Spring Festival is determined by the Lunar Calendar. The same calendar is used in countries that have adopted the Confucian and Buddhism tradition and in many cultures influenced by the Chinese,
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notably the Koreans, the Japanese, and the Vietnamese. Spring Festival starts on the first day of the first lunar month containing a new moon (some sources even include the Spring Festival's Eve) and ends on the Lantern Festival fourteen days later. This occurs around the time of the full moon as each lunation is about 29.53 days long. In the Gregorian calendar, Spring Festival falls on different dates each year, sometime between January 21 and February 20.
The days before Spring Festival
On the days before Spring Festival celebration, Chinese families give their home a thorough cleaning, believing that the cleaning sweeps away bad luck and preparing their homes for good luck to arrive. All brooms and dust pans are put away on Spring Festival's Eve so that good luck can't be swept away and some people give their homes, doors and windowpanes a new coat of red paint.
Homes are decorated with paper cutouts of Chinese auspicious phrases and couplets (short phrases) that speak of "happiness", "wealth", "longevity".
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Reunion dinner
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A reunion dinner is held on the Eve of Spring Festival where members of the family, near and far, get together for a celebration. The Spring Festival's Eve dinner is very large and traditionally includes chicken and fish, which is included, but not eaten up entirely (the remainder is stored overnight), as the Chinese phrase 年年有余, which means "may there be surpluses every year", sounds the same as "may there be fish every year", since "yú" is also the pronunciation for 余 ("leftover" or
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"surplus"). A type of black hair-like algae, pronounced "fat choy" in Cantonese, is also featured in many dishes since its name sounds similar to "prosperity". Hakka will serve pork. Because certain things and/or food sound alike to certain Chinese well-wishes, the belief is that having one will lead to the other.
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Most Northerners and most other Chinese around the world serve dumplings as the main dish in this festive season because it is believed that dumplings are wrapped in the semblance of Chinese Ancient Gold Nugget used in ancient China.
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Mandarin oranges are the most popular and most abundant fruit during Spring Festival among Chinese simply because of, among other things, the way the name of the fruit is phonetically similar to gold --- jīn jú.
Clothing
Red clothing is worn throughout Spring Festival, as red will scare away evil spirits and bad fortune. Also, people typically wear new clothes from head to toe to symbolize starting anew in the New Year.
Money Given to Children
On the night before the first day of New Year, parents or grandparents usually put "yā suì qián" or "end of year money" under children's pillows. The most common story of the origin of this tradition is below:
There once was a monster called Sui（祟） that would come out the night before the first day of New Year and touch the forehead of sleeping children. Once touched, normal children turned insane and smart children become mentally retarded. To avoid this, parents usually stayed up the whole night to watch out for Sui. One couple loved their bright son very much, and decided one year to keep the son awake by having him playing with coins wrapped in red paper. However, both the parents and the boy eventually fell asleep, with the paper wrapped coins fallen beside the boy’s pillow. At night, Sui came in looking for the boy.
The parents woke up, but it was too late for them to stop Sui. As Sui got close to the boy, a light flashed from the paper wrapped coins, scaring Sui away.
The next day, the story spread throughout the village, and people believed that having coins wrapped in red paper would keep Sui away at night. So it became a tradition to put money by the pillows of children on that night, and the money is then called Sui Suppressing Money. And since Sui sounds similar to the word 岁 which means year, it is then called yā suì qián, for people believed this money would keep their children safe for the rest of the year.
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Greetings
In Spring Festival, greetings of good luck are the first thing people do when they meet each other.
See our Weekly Chinese Phrase below for all kinds of greetings.
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Weekly Chinese Words |
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春节
Transcription:: chūn jié
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Spring Festival
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粤语
Transcription:: yuè yǔ
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Cantonese
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客家
Transcription:: kè jiā
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Hakka
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金元宝
Transcription:: jīn yuán bǎo
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Chinese Ancient Gold Nugget
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压岁钱
Transcription:: yā suì qián
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Sui Suppressing Money
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Weekly Chinese Phrases |
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过年好
Transcription: guò nián hǎo
Meaning: happy Chinese New Year
Topic: greeting to all
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春节快乐
Transcription: chūn jié kuài lè
Meaning: happy Chinese New Year
Topic: greeting to all
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恭贺新禧
Transcription: gōng hè xīn xǐ
Meaning: happy Chinese New Year
Topic: greeting to all
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恭喜发财
Transcription: gōng xǐ fā cái
Meaning: congratulations for getting rich
Topic: greeting to businessman
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学有所成
Transcription: xué yǒu suǒ chéng
Meaning: harvest your studies
Topic: greeting to student
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