Experiences Abroad: Xīnnián kuàilè!

So the Chinese New Year has come and gone which means it is back to work as usual, but without giving an account of the biggest holiday in China would make me a bad traveler of China. Chinese New Year doesn’t fall on the same day of the Gregorian calendar but instead the same day of the lunar calendar. It is now the year of the Goat according to the Chinese zodiac signs. There are 12 different animals (rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, pig) that each one has a year for that particular animal. The origin of these animals is folk lore and so there are various different stories but pretty much all the stories have a couple things in common. Each story had some sort of race and these twelve animals were the first ones to complete the race.

The holiday in China is known as Spring Festival and it does involve various different activities over about 23 days. Typically there are about seven official days off according to the government starting right around the actual day of the New Year. During this time almost everyone is off of work and goes home for the festivities. Going home does mean heading to smaller villages outside of the major metropolitan areas. This phenomenon has led to the largest human migration in the world that happens every year and even has a word for this migration: ‘Chunyun.’

Before the actual holiday there is some preparations that needs to happen for it to be a good year. Cleaning their homes is definitely a part of this process. Also decorating the home for the festival is extremely important. Red posters are posted up on doors with poetic verses on the posters. Also hanging up lanterns is a common thing to do, especially in the north. This decorating isn’t just for the house but also around the city. Before the holiday began my city did hang up stuff around the public squares and in some trees that lined a couple of the roads.

People try to be home for Spring Festival Eve because this is an important night. Since everyone is home a big meal is prepared. Then this is the night that everyone stays up till midnight waiting for the New Year to roll in and when that happens everyone can hear it. Just today around noon, I heard some fireworks going off right outside my window. No it isn’t Chinese News Years anymore but having fireworks go off in the middle of the day is quite common in China. They usually are celebrating something but it doesn’t have to be that big of a celebration; however, on New Year’s Eve there are tons of fireworks that go off. It was so many that after ten minutes all I could see was smoke and no more fireworks. Here anyone can shoot fireworks and there isn’t really a big show put on by the city or anything of that nature.

On the first day of the New Year it is simply a party all day long. I heard up in Jining (I was down south in Yangshou) near a big public park there were a lot of carnival type games and activities. I didn’t see anything like that down in Yangshou. I think it still is a day to catch up with family and old hometown friends. One thing that most people do up north is to eat dumplings on New Year’s Day. While in Yangshou I was able to make some dumplings on New Year’s Eve at the hostel I was staying for the night. It is harder than it looks to make but they turned out pretty good. Another item to eat on New Year’s is some sort of fish. With the fish dish though you aren’t supposed to finish it and instead leave some. This is because the word for fish ‘yu’ also could mean ‘surplus.’ These words have different Chinese characters but are pronounced the same which happens quite a bit in Chinese.

One neat thing that I was able to see that doesn’t happen all over was a lion dance. I showed one of my Chinese co-workers pictures and she said that she had never seen a lion dance. These individuals carried around two longer costumes that looked like a lion. Two people were under the lion at one time and they would move together to make it do some actions that a lion does. Meanwhile a cart was following the lions and was being played along with some cymbals. These two lions would dance in front of a store eventually making their way into a store until the climax of the music would happen and then both lions would bow. Next they would make their way out of that shop and go into every single shop doing the same type of music beat and with the bowing. This whole performance is to pray for good luck and good fortune for that store. This is because the lion is an animal that is believed to bring good luck.

With the holiday being so long (around 23 days) there are different things that need to happen on specific days. I don’t know that much detail about the rest of these days and besides it is smaller days because most people are back at work after about seven days off. One of these days that I will talk about that was real neat to participate and see it first hand is Lantern Festival. The Lantern Festival occurs on the first full moon of the New Year. New Year itself is on a new moon and so usually the Lantern Festival is about 15 days later. It is hard to trace down the origin of this festival. In modern times though, after work people gather to take part in different activities that vary regionally. Some of these activities include lighting lanterns to let them go, setting off fireworks, guessing riddles written on lanterns, and possibly dragon dances or lion dances. Here in Jining that night a friend and I went out to an area near a lake. This is the main area for people to go in Jining and there were tons of people out there. After getting out of the cab we walked for a long time but while walking we saw the lanterns floating in the distance. Eventually we were still walking and the lanterns were above us and it was pretty surreal. After making it to the main area we ended up buying a couple lanterns and did set them off there and also back on the roof of our apartment. It was a fun night.

So in a nutshell that is some things that do happen during Spring Festival. A couple times I did mention what happens in the north or the south and that is because China is a huge country with different traditions depending on the region. Plus for the seven days off I was in the southern part of the country but I do actually live in the north, and so I was able to see some differences for the short time I was down south. I had planned to post this account earlier but I did get caught up with planning and taking a couple more trips. A couple weeks ago I went to both Nanjing and Suzhou while this last week I was up in Beijing. The weather is really nice now and so it is a great time to travel and see some places. I will write later.