Why do Wenzhou people keep the traditional customs of the Spring Festival?

China New Year is a very important festival for China people. Every place has its own characteristics, and Wenzhou also has its own unique Chinese New Year culture. Since the winter solstice, Wenzhou people have been preparing all kinds of new year's goods, such as sauce chicken, sauce meat, cooking muffins and so on. In this thick Chinese New Year flavor, Pan Yigang, executive vice president of Wenzhou Folk Writers Association, told reporters about some Chinese New Year customs in Wenzhou. Some of these customs have disappeared, some have changed, and some are still circulating among the people.

Eat jiaozi on the solstice in winter.

The solstice in winter is called "solstice", commonly known as "winter festival". On this morning, every family will eat glutinous rice balls or sesame seeds. There are sweet sugar or sesame seeds in the dumplings, and there are preserved meat dumplings. However, glutinous rice should be cooked first, mashed into pieces, and then rolled in bean flour to make it stick with bean flour. This is a winter snack, commonly known as "rolling sesame". Eating sesame paste and glutinous rice balls symbolizes reunion and celebration. There is a folk proverb, "Eat the winter solstice pill, and you will grow one year old".

Sun-dried soy sauce meat and eel owl

Wenzhou people are used to drying sauced meat and eel in November of the lunar calendar. Soaking raw lean meat and raw chickens and ducks in soy sauce and then drying them to eat have a special flavor. In the months before drying these wax goods, nails were nailed to the rafters of every household, and there were sauce meat, sauce duck and sauce chicken hanging on them. Homemade sauced meat and chicken are delicious and of high quality, so people are willing to do it themselves even if there are ready-made ones on the market. Eel is a specialty of Wenzhou. Wenzhou people usually go to the food market to buy some larger eels, cut them open and dried them, and they become what we call "eels". Eel is more delicious than fresh eel, and it is a good accompaniment to New Year's Eve.

Dao rice cake

Also called "mashed sugar cake", glutinous rice is mixed with some indica rice, brown sugar or white sugar, steamed, mashed in a stone mortar and then made into a rectangle. Ryan is called "slow food". If placed in a printing plate with different patterns, it can be pressed into sweet cakes with peony, flat peach, Kuixing, God of Wealth, champion, carp, unicorn and other patterns. , can also be made into ingots, weighing about 3kg at most. It can be placed on the long table with silver flowers in the nave or in every room. This is also called "making rice cakes", which means increasing year by year.

Sacrifice to the kitchen god

On the 24th of the twelfth lunar month, every household will also "worship the iron pot Buddha". It is said that this day is the day when Kitchen God reports the merits and demerits of ordinary people to the Jade Emperor. It is said that the kitchen god is greedy, and he will be silenced as long as he has sugar to eat, so maltose is indispensable to sacrifice to the kitchen god, so that the kitchen god will not speak ill of the jade emperor.

Shanxin

Every year around the 24th of the twelfth lunar month, following the custom of "dusting the old" in the twelfth lunar month, every household in Wenzhou should sweep away dust and dirt, decorate their rooms with white walls, wash clothes and hang things. Every household takes this opportunity to wash away the dirt accumulated at home and welcome the Spring Festival.

paste up Spring Festival couplets

Another common custom of New Year in China is to paste Spring Festival couplets. As early as the Song Dynasty, posting Spring Festival couplets has become a popular custom. In Song Dynasty, Spring Festival couplets were called Fu Tao. The ancients believed that peaches could ward off evil spirits, so they often placed some items made of peach wood in front of the door as decorations, which were called peach ornaments, and later gradually evolved into Fu Tao, that is, Spring Festival couplets. In the past, Spring Festival couplets were written in black on red paper with ink. In recent years, red paper and gold-printed Spring Festival couplets are popular in the market, which is quite popular among people. On New Year's Eve, all doors, columns and windows are pasted with red paper for Spring Festival couplets, commonly known as "door pairs". There are four words posted on the lintel, commonly known as "horizontal approval", and the word "Daji" is posted on the single door. Spring Festival couplets with different contents are posted in the main room, hall, study, pigsty, sheepfold and cowshed, mostly to pray for good luck and peace and a bumper harvest in all walks of life.

Aged wine

On New Year's Eve, the whole family will have dinner and drink, or invite relatives and friends to eat and drink to their hearts' content, which is called "Fenjiu". Because New Year's Eve is the dividing line between the new year and the old year, it means that the old year and the new year are divided from this night. Therefore, this meal, rich or poor, should be as rich as possible. Wenzhou people are very particular about eating "vintage wine", also called "New Year's Eve".

It's lucky to drink at the age of seven. In the past, ten tall cinnabar bowls and ten kinds of cold dishes were used at banquets, which were called "stone springs". Besides chicken and meat, there should be peanuts (fruits), oranges (good luck), carp (jumping the dragon gate), tofu (cleaning the house) and so on. And each bowl must have a round carrot head cover with the top sliced to show appreciation. After drinking too much wine, people often stay up all night for entertainment, commonly known as "guarding the old age" or "looking forward to the New Year's Eve".

Open the gun

In the early morning of the first day of the first month, the first thing that every household should do is to play "opening the door" in a hurry, and firecrackers in the whole city are ringing, symbolizing the farewell of the old year and the welcome of the new year, commonly known as "closing the year". It is also customary to play "opening the door". Generally, a string of small firecrackers is put first, which is called the "Hundred Zi Gun". Two firecrackers were set off again, and only three firecrackers were set off, indicating that the plague of one year can be lifted and the New Year is coming. It is required to ring three times, and the sound is loud and clear, which is the most auspicious.

Pay new year's call

On the morning of the first day of the first month, first in their own homes, the younger generations bow down to their elders in order, which is called "New Year greetings". From the second day of the first month, neighbors, relatives and friends come and go to worship the festival. According to the old custom, Wenzhou people don't visit relatives on the first day of the first month. Generally speaking, New Year greetings are from the second day to the tenth day, and some are extended to the fifteenth day of the first month. Before the 1950s, it was relatively simple to pay New Year's greetings, mostly longan, litchi, red dates, yuan dates, brown sugar, dried persimmons and so on. They are wrapped in special papyrus paper with red paper on it, so they are called "paper Bao Peng".

Put on new clothes

On the first day of the first month, people have to wear new clothes, which also means seeing off the old and welcoming the new. Because people regard red as a symbol of good luck, children wear big red clothes, young women are of course all red, and even old women wear big red skirts. Nowadays, people have changed a lot in their clothes. Colors are not limited to red, but become more colorful and diverse.

After the Lantern Festival on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the year is over.

In recent years, the life of citizens has become more colorful, and the way of celebrating the New Year has also changed. Some families choose to travel in the first month, and some young people are becoming more and more indifferent to the New Year. Their enthusiasm for the new year is not as good as that of some western festivals. In this regard, Pan Yigang still believes: "The Spring Festival cannot be represented by any festival, and the change of concept only proves the progress of civilization." (Reporter Wang Chunxia)