Spring Festival, also known as the Lunar New Year, falls on the first day of the lunisolar calendar. The festival goes by many names, one of them being “leaving of the Nian”, a reference to one of the original legends of Spring Festival – but we’ll get to that in a bit. The roots of the holiday lie in ritual worship of gods and ancestors originating in the Yin and Shang periods (1122-1766 B.C).

In 1912, when China first started following the Gregorian calendar as well, January 1st became known as Yuan Dan, or Solar New Year, and the Lunar New Year became known as Chun Jie.

 Spring Festival is around the corner and with it comes a celebration of rebirth and renewal, the time when seeds are sewn for this coming year’s eventual harvests (of course for most of us this is more metaphoric than literal – although many children are born in autumn every year). Having made it through a long cold winter (ignore this week’s weather forecast), everyone is looking forward to warmth and new flowers peeking their heads through thawing ground. Spring Festival is the time to celebrate the waning winter and the dawn of a warm new year. 
  
Over hundreds of years, Chinese people have developed rich and colorful Spring Festival traditions and celebrations. The last week of the lunar year is reffered to as “spring-welcoming days”, or, “dirt-cleaning days”, as houses are cleaned and the old is literally swept out to make room for the new.

Like any good festival, food plays a key role in Spring Festival celebrations. The ten days prior to Spring Festival are a bad time to be visiting the supermarket. Families stock up on chicken, duck, fish, other meats, vegetables, tea, wine, candies, nuts; anything and everything needed to sufficiently honor visiting guests and relatives. New clothes and hats are purchased for the kiddies so they too can go into the New Year fresh and clean.

 Words to welcome the New Year are painted in yellow on red paper and pasted to the doorways of houses before Spring Festival. Paintings for the New Years and beautifully intricate paper-cuts are pasted onto windows. Red lanterns are hung besides the entrances to homes and the character for happiness, auspiciousness, and prosperity – fu¬ – is emblazoned everywhere possible. The God of Wealth and the Door God, and their often impressive facial hair, stand guard on the doors of many homes.

The character fu (福) is often turned upside down - in line with a pun based on the Chinese language (‘upside down’ as the same pronounciation as ‘coming’) - to indicate happiness is on its way. It all adds up to a vibrant joyful celebration of happiness and a better year for all.

As previously mentioned, has yet another alias, “leaving (or passing by) of the Nian”. In days of yore Nian was an animal who dragged bad luck around like tail made of lead. If Nian (whose name has same character and pronounciation as ‘year) came by, the trees withered and grass shriveled back in to the ground, but when it left the flowers bloomed and grass was green. Great discussion was put towards devising a way to keep Nian away. The solution arrived upon was firecrackers. If Nian is anywhere near China during Spring Festival I almost feel sorry for the guy. Certainly enough fireworks are lit off to make sure the grass stays green on this side of the fence for at least a whole year.

 Although many of us don’t associate family reunions with times of happiness and peace, Spring Festival features both. Many children, or parents working in cities while their children remain with their grandparents in rural villages, join the world’s biggest annual migration and return home. Lunar New Years Eve is not a night to get trashed and wake up the next day with a hangover and no recollection of how you got home. The Lunar New Years is a night for reunion. Families stay up together in an import ritual transition from the old year to the new. Traditional foods loaded with symbolism and delicious goodness are consumed, el vino does flow, and the New Year is welcomed heartily as a family unit.

Northern Chinese eat jiao zi – dumplings – because their made by kneading dough. One of the characters meaning kneading dough has the same pronunciation as another character which means reunion. The character jiao in jiao zi has a pronunciation similar to a jiao that, by way of some quick-footed linguistic puns, means ‘transition between years’. As an added bonus dumpling happen to be exceedingly tasty. 

Southern Chinese eat glutinous rice cakes. The sticky sweet cakes symbolize sweet life and the name, in another series of character-pronunciation-gymnastics, indicates the new year will an improvement over the old one and the eater will reach new heights.

After the New Years bell tolls, the fireworks start popping off, which means one can start the New Year at 8am by awakened by explosions. Festive clothes are worn to greet the New Year, elder’s long lives are celebrated, and children receive red envelopes filled with cash. Dinners are eaten and more dinners are eaten. On the second and third day of the New Year visits are paid to friends and relatives, and they are received in turn. Blessings are exchanged and prosperous years are wished all around. But even while everyone looks forward to an auspicious New Year, ancestors are worshipped and commemorated as well.

The jovial festive atmosphere spills out of the houses and into the streets and lanes. Traditional lion dances liven up the streets along with plays refined by centuries of performance. Flower markets and temple fairs fill the streets and parks with people browsing stalls full of goods and stands packed with delicacies.

The Lantern Festival – 2 weeks after the Lunar Year begins – marks the end of the Spring Festival celebrations.

Spring Festival, for Han Chinese, is the year’s most important festival. A dozen ethnic minorities including the Manchu, Mongolians, Yao, Zhuang, Bai, Gaoshan, Hezhen, Hani, Daur, Dong, and Li nationalities all have their own Spring Festival customs, rituals, foods, and ways of welcoming a prosperous happy New Year.

Source: Xinhua.net

Related Links
Celebrating Spring Festival with a Chinese Family? Here Are a Few Tips
Spring Festival in February? Chinese New Year? What is Chun Jie?
Official Chinese Public Holiday Calendar for 2011

Warning：The use of any news and articles published on eChinacities.com without written permission from eChinacities.com constitutes copyright infringement, and legal action can be taken.