We survived Chinese New Year in China! This was the loudest,
longest holiday I have ever participated in. The Chinese celebrate this holiday
by spending a lot of time with family, eating tons of food, and fireworks.
The holiday is celebrated for two weeks in China. This means
that most people get two weeks off work to travel to their hometown to visit
family. This also meant that most grocery stores, convenience stores, etc. were
closed. So we had to stock up on a lot of food before the holiday started.
To celebrate the actual
night of the Chinese New Year the Chinese will eat dinner with the husbands’
family. They also spend the next day with his family, but after those two days
they can visit the wife’s family or go on vacation.
Dinner is a big deal for the Chinese. My friends and their
moms spent days cooking special dishes. They all ate fish, which signifies
prosperity. They only ate half of the fish because if you eat the whole thing
it means that there isn’t enough to go around and the next year will not be
bountiful. They also serve a lot of other dishes that sound similar to the
words lucky, prosperity, etc. When each dish is placed on the table people will
often cheer with joy and appreciation.
After dinner, people will visit and children are given red
envelopes filled with money. People will then spend the next few days watching
a telethon of performances by famous actors, singers, etc. that is sponsored by
the government.
When visiting family and friends it is customary to take
mandarin oranges as a gift and in return they give some back to you. The
oranges signify wealth and good will.
The Chinese New Year decorations were beautiful! The people
put red banners on the outside and tops of their doorways. These banners have
lucky sayings on them and keep bad luck and evil spirits away. These banners
will stay up all year. Stores, light poles, bridges and even personal
residences put up red lanterns that were lit at night.
We went to the Xi’an city wall to see a display of lanterns. They were beautiful. A
lot of children were carrying lanterns as they walked along the wall.
Fireworks were constantly going off for the two weeks of
Chinese New Year. When I say constant, I mean they started daily at 6 am and
would go off all hours of the day until 2 am most nights. While some fireworks
fly into the sky like American fireworks, many of the fireworks here are like
our firecrackers. Loud!
The last night of the festival, people gathered in local
parks to light of fireworks, firecrackers and lit off floating lanterns. It was
a spectacular sight.
Xi'an city wall
View of Xi'an from the city wall
Floating lanterns
