Happy Lunar New Year 2024!

Lunar New Year or Spring Festival, is the most important festival in China and a major event in some other East Asian countries.

Chinese New Year is the festival that celebrates the beginning of a new year on the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar. Chinese New Year 2024 will fall on Saturday, February 10th. The date changes every year but is always somewhere in the period from January 21st to February 20th.

It was traditionally a time to honor deities and ancestors, and it has also become a time to feast and visit family members.

 

Happy Chinese New Year 2019

1. Cleaning and Decorating Houses with Red Things

People give their houses a thorough cleaning before the Spring Festival, which symbolizes sweeping away the bad luck of the preceding year and making their homes ready to receive good luck.

Chinese New Year Wall Decorations

Spring Cleaning

2. Offering Sacrifices to Ancestors 

Honoring the dead is a Lunar New Year's tradition that's kept to the word. Many Chinese people visit ancestors' graves on the day before the LunarNew Year's day, offer sacrifices to ancestors before the reunion dinner (to show that they are letting their ancestors "eat" first). 

Chinese New Year Lanterns

3. Enjoying a Family Reunion Dinner on Lunar New Year's Eve 

Lunar New Year is a time for families to be together. Lunar New Year's Eve is the most important time. Wherever they are, people are expected to be home to celebrate the festival with their families.

 

4. Exchanging Red Envelopes and other Gifts 

Lunar New Year is a season of red envelopes (or red packets, lìshì or lai see in Cantonese). Red envelopes have money in, and are often given to children and (retired) seniors.

Red Packets 

For Chinese New Year, they are always cut out of red paper and designs include Chinese characters, motifs like mandarins or gold ingots, and the zodiac animal of that year. Each character, motif, and animal has an auspicious meaning, including longevity, honour, wealth, and prosperity for the coming year.  

Chinese Knots

In traditional Chinese cultures, knots have a long history as an integral part of traditions. Historians have discovered that prior to written language, many cultures used different knots to convey messages. Today, lovers often give knots as a symbol of commitment and dedication. They’re also used as a part of the New Year decorations to signify good luck.

Firecrackers

Don’t think that Chinese New Year celebrations are limited to quaint little paper-folding activities you can do with your grandma. Firecrackers are involved. Many people actually make the fireworks themselves and then set them off throughout the season.