Chinese New Year

新年快乐 (Xīn Nián Kuài Lè)! Happy New Year!!!

Chinese New Year, also known as Spring Festival, is by far the most important holiday of the year. According to wikipedia, this holiday involves the largest annual mass human migration in the world. And honestly, we would have to agree. During the few evenings I went out to some of the touristy places in our city, I can’t begin to tell you how many people there were.

On the subway… this picture was about average. Any more than this and I couldn’t get my phone out of my pocket in order to take the picture.

A night out on the town. This street is about a mile long and this was the least crowded part.

This holiday is based on the lunar calendar and the festivities run from the evening before the first day of the new year, and end with the Lantern Festival on the 15th day of the new year. Traditionally, it is a time for gathering with family and honoring ancestors as well as household deities. Much of the traditions are focused on the household and are thought to bring good luck and prosperity. Houses are cleaned, sacrifices are made to their ancestors or gods, and lucky messages are posted outside their doors and are left up for the entire year.

This is the intersection right outside our bedroom window. You can see several fires where they are burning fake money, food and other things. The thought is that their ancestors will be able to use whatever is burned in the afterlife.

Here is our neighbors door with the “lucky” messages surrounding it.

Other well-known traditions include eating dumplings, getting new haircuts and new clothes, giving money in red paper envelopes, and setting off lots and lots of fireworks. However, with the recent push to clean up the air quality, fireworks were banned in most large cities, including Xi’an. At least we got to experience it in the city we used to live in. Below is a short clip from this year, recorded by a friend from that city… This lasts all night…

And then there is the famous Chinese zodiac and its repeating 12-year cycle. I’m still somewhat confused, but I’ll do my best to explain it briefly. Each year has its own animal and each cycle begins with the year of the rat (that’s Kristen and me) and ends with a the year of the pig. There’s an old folktale involving an emperor that explains the order. I’m not completely sure of all the details but basically the emperor asks the animals to race across a river to determine their order. There is a lot of drama, like when the rat betrays his best friend, the cat, by drowning him in the river (which also explains why rats and cats are now mortal enemies and why there isn’t a year of the cat). The dragon knows he’s way more awesome than all the other animals, so he messes around saving villages and literally making it rain before strolling in for 5th place. It’s a pretty fun story.

Now each animal has a set of character traits and compatibility rankings with other animals… similar to the western zodiac. However, to make things more interesting, each 12 year cycle is associated with one of five elements: wood, fire, earth, metal, and water. That’s sixty years of fire monkeys and metal rats. 2018 is the year of the earth dog. If this is your year then you are expected to wear something red (everyday of the year) to ward off bad luck and it’s also recommended to not get married… because that is bad luck as well. That’s pretty easy to understand right? 😉

For us, the holiday was a great time to relax as a family, catch up with friends, and to just enjoy the sights. Excluding the dragons, doesn’t this look like Christmas? …