China and Chinese communities over the world are all geared up to celebrate the most important festival of the year, Chinese New Year.
Celebrated with the first new moon of the lunar calendar, the 15-days event is kicking off on January 29.
Chinese New Year is also known as Spring Festival in China, Seollal in Korea and Tet in Vietnam.
The new year time highlights the importance of communities, love, good food, and rituals that differ in each region.
Preparation of the spring festival begin weeks before the event, with everyone coming together to clean their homes to remove bad luck and decorating homes with red banners, lanterns to invite good fortune.
Animals of Chinese zodiac and its origin
In Chinese calendar, each year is represented by an animal based on the Chinese zodiac.The 12-year cycle is assigned an animal, in the order, rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig.
As per the legends, god invited all animals to bid him farewell before he was leaving the earth, the zodiac system honours the 12 animals that said their goodbyes.
The Year of the Snake
2025 is the year of snake while 2024 was the year of dragon, in the Chinese culture it is believed that the year a person born in, plays a major role in their personality and who they are.
In Chinese mythology, snakes are known as "little dragons," and the skin they shed is known as "the dragon’s coat," which symbolises rebirth and good luck.
The snake also represents the pursuit of love and happiness, previously the year of snake fell in 2013, 2001 and so on with 12-year difference.
Traditions of Lunar New Year
There are countless folktales attached to Chinese New Year, one well-known legend is about the gruesome monster, Nian, who ate people on new year’s day.
As the beast was afraid of loud noises, fire and red colour, people burned lanterns all night, set off firecrackers and put red paper on their doors to ward off the monster.
Along with that in many Asian cultures, the colour red symbolises happiness and good fortune, so people chose to wear red during festivities, use some variation of the colour to decorate their homes and gift red envelope with money to their loved ones for the new year.
Food for the new year
The menu of the new year is different in each culture but the staple items include, rice cakes, fish, dumplings, spring rolls and meat.
In China, "changshou mian" or long-life noodles are eaten with a wish for a healthy, long and happy life.
Lantern Festival
The Lantern Festival represents the end of Spring Festival and will fall on the final day, February 12, concluding the two-weeks celebrations.
Marking the end of winter and to welcome spring, people light lanterns to drive out darkness and bring hope in the coming year.
