Chinese New Year Celebrations

CNY celebrations starts with a reunion dinner on the eve of CNY. This is where family members get together, no matter where they are in the country or the world, and sit down for the most important meal of the yearl. Reunion dinner is always celebrated at home but in recent years, more and more families tend to have their reunion dinner in a good restaurant.
After dinner, true to the Chinese nature, playing cards and mahjong tiles will appear and a gambling session amongst familiy members will start. Once the clock strikes twelve, this is where you will hear firecrackers and fire works being fired off everywhere. The firecrackers mark the official start of CNY.

In recent years, the Chinese government has clamped down on firecrackers and fireworks in the cities because of fire hazards. Today, the lighting of fireworks is most likely to happen in the villages and countryside only.
Chinese New Year is celebrated with visiting of relatives and friends. Junior members of the family will need to visit senior or elderly members of th family. Everyone is expected to wear new clothes and shoes and the popular color is obviously RED or anything bright! There is always good food and drinks and children are rewarded with red packets or ‘hong-pow’from adults. These red packets will contain money and is a major source of ‘wealth’ for children for the rest of the year.
Adults will chit-chat and catch up with one another. They are also likely to have gambling sessions with friendly stakes. Meantime, children will be having new year goodies, games and playing with fireworks.

Chinese‑New‑Year

In town centres and TV stations, there will be displays of dragon and lion dance, acrobats, traditional chinese dance and songs, stilt walkers, Chinese Opera, wushu performances and other traditional chinese performances.
In the olden days, festivities will last for 15 days while today, most people will celebrate for 3-4 days and spend the rest of time at home. Most other Asian cities outside of China merely celebrate for two days.

Traditional Beliefs for CNY
There are many beliefs and taboos associated with Chinese New Year. Some of these include:

No sweeping or housekeeping during Chinese New Year
This is to avoid sweeping ‘wealth’ and ‘health’ out of the house

Children cannot sleep on the eve of Chinese New Year
It is believed that the longer children stay up late on CNY eve, the longer their parents will get to live

Children cannot be scolded during Chinese New Year
Parents will avoid scolding children during this period or back luck will fall on their children

Only red or bright clothes can be worn during Chinese New Year
Black or dark clothes will bring disaster for the new year

Chinese‑New‑Year-Money Tree

Chinese greetings for Chinese New Year
If you have Chinese friends, do visit them at home during CNY and you will be most welcomed. Make sure you learn a word or two of CNY greetings.
The most common festive greetings for Chinese New Year are:
“Gong Xi Fa Cai” – Have a prosperous new year
“Zhu Ni Nian Nian You Yu” – Wishing you an abundant year
“Sing Nian Kuay Le” – Happy New Year.
Also, you may like to bring two mandarin oranges when visiting someone during Chinese New Year. Oranges. looking like gold ingots, symbolizes that you are bringing wealth to the family. If the Chinese family is someone that you are familiar with, you may even want to give red packets (containing a token sum of money) to their children. If you have children, you are most likely to recieve red packets for them as well.
Remember to wear bright colors when you visit!

Chinese New Year is included in many China Holidays itineraries – please contact us or visit our website www.BookChinaOnline.com for further details.