Chinese Lunar New Year Culture - Traditions and Customs

 

The Chinese Lunar New Year, also known as the Spring Festival, is the most important time of a year in Chinese culture. It is the time to shrug off the past, and plan for the new start for the coming year. It is also the festival of reunion and love, which are the core value of Chinese families.

Grand celebrations will be carried out through out the vast country. People will conduct various forms of traditional practices to express good wishes and love. It is a time of great excitement for all Chinese people around the world and the best occasion to experience the richness of Chinese culture in depth and comprehensiveness.

Read this section, you will know some of the most important and interesting traditions and customs of Chinese Lunar New Year.

* Top recommended Chinese New Year Tours

 

 

Chinese Dumplings

Dumplings are a traditional Chinese food for thousands of years. Chinese people like it very much. There is an interesting Chinese saying goes "if you want to eat delicious food, dumplings are your first choice, if you want to make yourself comfortable, sleeping will do". Dumplings also represent "luck" in Chinese. There is another saying says "eat dumplings with liquor, your life will be full of fortune", Eating dumplings in the New Year has already become a conventional custom for Chinese people. People choose to eat dumplings to connote their best wishes for the New Year. Dumpling is more than a type of food. It is a part of Chinese culture and tradition. If you come to china, do not leave without tasting the delicious dumplings.

COT-XAT-N06: 3 Days Xian Culinary and Cultural Tour

 

 

Lantern Festival

Lantern festival takes place on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. It is the follow-up festival after the New Year. So people call this day the "Second New Year". Lantern Festival, as the name depicts, is a festival of lanterns. People hang red lanterns on their houses, gardens, and on the streets and the temples. Chinese people believe the red lantern is the symbol of reunion, harmony and happiness. So appreciate lanterns has became the main activity in the festival. The whole street will be decorated with thousands of lanterns in various styles. Some are made by paper and some are made by wood and silk.

At night, people will get together to appreciate the beautiful lanterns along the street. Children will hold their self-made or bought lanterns to stroll with their families. Ice lantern fairs will be held in the northern part of China, which are more fantastic to see.

Another interesting activity in Lantern Festival is guessing the riddles. Lantern owners write a riddle on a piece of paper and paste it on each lantern. Anyone who is smart enough to resolve the riddle on a lantern, he or she will get a gift from the lantern owner. This is the essential part of the festival enjoyed by everyone.

On the lantern festival, people eat a kind of small sticky rice balls. Although small, they usually have fillings in various types, such as sesame, dry fruit, walnut, etc, or even meat. They could be boiled, fried and steamed and taste delicious. In Chinese, these sticky rice balls are called "YuanXiao" or "Tang Yuan".

Lantern Festival is also the day for Chinese young lovers. In ancient China, girls were not allowed to go out to meet boys freely except on the Lantern Festival. On this day, both young girls and boys were beautifully dressed up and met at the streets decorated with lanterns. If a boy and a girl interested in each other, they would pick a same lantern, and were usually allowed by their parents to date in the future. So it is a perfect time of choosing the spouse. Till today, lantern festival is still one of the two Chinese Valentine's Days.

Drum performance, dragon and lion dance, and various folk dances will be seen on the streets, lantern fairs, or temple fairs. It used to be believed that these dances will expel illness and bad luck in the coming year. Eventually these performances and activities had become tradition, the Chinese style New Year carnival, carried out during every first lunar month. Why not come to China, and join in these fantastic events?

 

 

Red Couplet

Red couplet is Chinese New Year's special doorframe decoration. It is written on the two strips of red paper. The contents of the red couplet are auspicious and poetic. The words should be perfectly matched in rhyme with each other, and should be easily understood by both young and old. It is a form of art combined Chinese calligraphy with poetry.

Every New Year, Chinese people will particularly write or choose red lucky couplets and paste them on the frames of the entrance doors of the house or the courtyard. Some people also paste red couplets on the doorframes of kitchen, bedroom, and lounge. Some drivers even paste red couplets on their cars to bless for a safe driving all the year. Usually the red couplets will be kept on for at least two months, sometimes all year round. During the first lunar month, China is in a sea of red. Every house is full of the red couplets, and other New Year decoration in red, such as red lantern. If the red couplet pasted on a house's entrance door has well written content and is perfectly rhymed. Most likely, people who passing it will stop their steps, read it out, and share it others. This is a Chinese way of community life, connecting people and passing good wishes.

Red couplet is a deep-rooted Chinese culture. Chinese people express their best wishes through small red couplets for over a thousand years. If you travel to China during the Spring Festival, write your own red couplet take it with you. It will bless you for the whole year.

 

 

 

Shehuo

Chinese people have various ways to celebrate the Spring Festival (Chinese lunar New Year). One of the most interesting ways of celebration is called Shehuo. Shehuo fair is a folk art fair extremely popular in the northwest of China. Its history can be traced back to the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). It is a kind of variety show performed by the local farmers. The show includes folk performances such as the stilt walking, dance with boat model and artificial horse, and singing. The stories of the performances are often form Chinese legends, myths, and fairy tales. Lion and dragon dance is popular throughout China which will also be seen a Shehuo fair. However, people in northwest of China make and dance their lions and dragons differently.

The name of Shehuo comes from the names of two Chinese Gods: She, the god of earth, and Huo, the God expels evil spirit. The songs originally sung in Shehuo fairs were prayers for good harvest and health, and the animals would be sacrificed to gods. Today Shehuo fairs is no longer for sacrificial purpose, instead a New Year carnival which involves a great deal of performers to entertain the public.

It is not only the natural outpouring of enthusiasm and love for the life but also a demonstration of farmer's talents and vitality. Most of the actors are well prepared and could be as fabulous as professional actors.
The best place to appreciate Shehuo is Pingyao. Every New Year, Pingyao villagers will choose the most talented actors to perform in the Shehuo fair, the marvelous performance has attracted many tourists to appreciate it every year. Go to Pingyao and be part of this great event.

 

Take a Chinese New Year Tour to experience a Real China another way.