Chinese New Year Customs in Hanshan, Anhui Province

(1) Anhui celebrates the Spring Festival, commonly known as the Spring Festival, with a strong festive atmosphere. No matter where your family is, you should go home and reunite with your relatives before New Year's Eve.

(2) New Year's Eve is the most abundant meal in a year. People in northern Anhui eat jiaozi, while people in central and southern Anhui set off firecrackers, put up Spring Festival couplets and worship their ancestors before eating. The ancestor worship ceremony is very particular. Serve first, 10 dishes, there must be chicken and fish.

(3) Before eating, the elders should wrap the money in red paper for each child, which is called "lucky money". After dinner, the whole family get together, chat while eating melon seeds, peanuts and candy, and watch CCTV's Spring Festival Gala until dawn. This is called "Shousui".

(4) After getting up early on New Year's Day, you should set off firecrackers when you open the door to worship heaven and earth. Some places are called door gods. Family members pay New Year greetings together, congratulate each other, eat dates, chestnuts, tea, eggs and longevity noodles, and then go out to pay New Year greetings to other elders.

(5) Don't sweep the floor on the first day, pour the tea into a specially prepared basin, which means don't sweep (sprinkle) money. There is generally no work on this day, so there is a saying that "thirty nights are busy and the first day is free".

Spring Festival is an ancient and grand traditional folk festival in China. This festival has a history of more than 3000 years.

In Xia and Shang dynasties, people called Jupiter the year-old star, and Jupiter was called one year old when he walked once. At the beginning of each year, various celebrations are widely carried out, which is called Chinese New Year. In the Zhou Dynasty, our society changed from nomadism to farming, and people all hoped for a bumper harvest of grain and six livestock a year. The harvest is called "one year". People celebrate "Unitary Year" as a grand festival. After that, the custom of Chinese New Year was formed.

In order to distinguish the two "years" of the lunar calendar and the solar calendar, and because the "beginning of spring" in the 24 solar terms of a year is just around the lunar year, the Lunar New Year is changed to the Spring Festival.

The Spring Festival is a traditional festival for Hanshan people to bid farewell to the old and welcome the new. For a long time, on the 23rd day of the twelfth lunar month, offering sacrifices to stoves was a prelude to the Spring Festival. After that day, people almost went all out to prepare for the Spring Festival. After dinner on the 23rd of the twelfth lunar month, the whole family washed their faces and hands. A portrait of the kitchen god was posted on the kitchen temple next to the chimney of the kitchen stove, and a banner was hung with the words "Mercury shines high" to remind them of fire prevention. Then light three sticks of incense and prepare tea, rice and broken straw, which are the feed for the Kitchen God's mount. The layman set off firecrackers and walked from the kitchen to the patio. As he walked, he withdrew vegetables and grass, chanting: "Heaven performs good deeds, and the lower bound is safe." There are also beggars who run around doing business and send stoves on the 24th of the twelfth lunar month.

Farmers in Liuhengshan District, north of Hanshan Mountain, their ancestors moved here to escape the war. They kept the habit of celebrating the Lunar New Year on the 23rd of the twelfth lunar month in the north: every family moved a stone from the mountain and put it on the incense table, then lit firecrackers, and the whole family had a sumptuous meal. Since then, the China New Year has begun.

In Hanshan folk, the night on the last day of the Lunar New Year is called "Thirty Nights". On "New Year's Eve", people who are away from home have to rush home, commonly known as "rich and poor, go home for the New Year". On the morning of New Year's Eve, every household tore off the old couplets, put up new ones and hung up money (festive paper-cutting). Prepare a stove and brazier in the main room at home. Lay people burn incense in incense tables and kitchen temples, and worship the kitchen god with small bowls of food. At this time, farmers' families will use wooden boxes (holding plates) to hold pig heads to the land temple, burn incense and set off firecrackers to bow down and pray for a bumper harvest. From four o'clock in the afternoon, every family set off firecrackers and burned incense, and the whole family sat around a table for dinner. There are plenty of food and wine, mostly ten bowls of dishes (perfect). You must have a bowl of fish, but you can't eat it. You can't eat until the fifteenth day of the first month. This is called "leftover". I hope that my family will get more and more every year. On the annual New Year's Eve dinner, it takes a long time to talk over dinner and discuss farming arrangements and life planning. After dinner, the elders wipe their mouths with toilet paper and straws to prevent the children from saying unlucky things. There is a note on the wooden post of each room, which reads "Children talk nonsense, women talk nonsense". At about eight o'clock in the evening, my father and grandfather gave the younger generation lucky money. After that, the children went out to play, set off fireworks and firecrackers, and the adults played cards, four-character treasures and Pai Jiu. Before 0: 00 pm/kloc-2: 00 pm, adults and children should go home, close the door, and affix the seals of "Open the door to make a fortune" and "XX Year Seal" on the door bolt. On the morning of New Year's Day, the lay man washed his face, put on new clothes and shoes, lit incense sticks, then opened the door and said "open the door". The householder stood outside the door and set off a big firecracker first, then a small firecracker, a big firecracker in the middle, and finally a big firecracker. This is a complete "good or bad luck" opening gun. At this time, farmers in rural areas would go to the land temple to burn incense and set off firecrackers for the harvest of that year.

On New Year's morning, the whole family wears new clothes. Shoes and socks, wear new hats, girls should wear bright flowers and red ropes on their heads, and the younger generation should kowtow to their elders. The younger generation of the first day will not leave the village and honor their elders; On the second day of the second year, I began to worship my uncle; On the third and fourth day, I will pay New Year greetings to my uncle, aunt, aunt and uncle. In rural areas, firecrackers are not set off on the second day of the Lunar New Year, which means "making a scene". At this time, the merchants in the town opened their doors and set off firecrackers the next morning, more than the first day. The third day in the countryside is called "sending the year", commonly known as "after three days, restore the original set." The seventh day of the seventh lunar month is called "Men's Day", and it is said that "the seventh day of the first month is like a year". At this time, lay people light incense and candles, and knives, scissors, shovels, hoes and needles are not allowed at home. He doesn't go to the pond to wash vegetables and rice in the morning. One day is the end of the Chinese New Year.