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Traditional Chinese Festivals--Chinese New Year

The first day of the first month of the lunar calendar is the Chinese New Year every year. It is one of the most important and lively festivals among the traditional Chinese festivals. It is also called the "Spring Festival" because it is celebrated at the end of winter and the beginning of spring.

The Chinese celebrate the Spring Festival with many traditional customs. From the 23rd day of the Lunar New Year, people start to prepare for the New Year. During this time, families clean up, buy New Year's goods, put up window decals, hang New Year's paintings, write Chinese New Year couplets, steam New Year's cakes, and make all kinds of food in preparation for the New Year.

The night before the Spring Festival is called "New Year's Eve". New Year's Eve is a time for family reunions. The family sits together, eats a sumptuous New Year's Eve dinner, talks and laughs until dawn, which is called the New Year's Eve. When the clock strikes zero on New Year's Eve, people also eat dumplings. In ancient times, zero o'clock was called "Zi Shi", and Zi Shi on New Year's Eve was the time when the old and new years changed, so people ate dumplings at this time to take the meaning of "changing the year into a new one". This is also the origin of the name "dumpling".

After New Year's Eve, there is the first day of the Lunar New Year. Starting from the first day of the Lunar New Year, people go to visit their relatives and friends to pay New Year's greetings to each other. Paying New Year's visit is an important custom of the Spring Festival. When paying New Year's greetings, everyone has to say something auspicious to wish for happiness and health.

Customs of the Spring Festival - firecrackers

When the clock strikes midnight, the New Year's bell rings, the whole China over the land, the sound of firecrackers ringing the sky. In this "year of yuan, the month of yuan, the time of the yuan" of the "three yuan" moment, some places also in the courtyard of the base of the "fire", to show that the prosperous gas through the sky, prosperous and prosperous. In the blazing fire around the fire, the children set off firecrackers, happy to jump around, this time, the house is bright lights, in front of the court is brilliant sparks, outside the house is the sound of the sky, the New Year's Eve atmosphere pushed to the climax of the bustling.

The sound of firecrackers is a sign of the old and the new, the flow of the festive mood. The businessman's family. Firecrackers also have another meaning: they are in the New Year's Eve firecrackers is for the new year a great deal of profit. However, according to the old custom, to honor the God of Wealth should be the first, and firecrackers should be the last. Legend has it that if you want to make a fortune, the firecrackers must be set off last before you can be considered sincere. In the old days, from the night of the Spring Festival to open the door of wealth, there will be a God of Wealth, holding a piece of paper printed by the God of Wealth outside the door, yelling: "Send the God of Wealth to the master!" At this time, the master of the house, in order to welcome the God of Wealth, will take the reward money to the person who comes, send the God of Wealth in the mouth, of course, always have to say some auspicious words. For example: "Gold, silver and treasure roll in"! "There is a pair of golden lions on the left and a pair of golden phoenixes on the right"! And so on. There is another kind is dressed up in the appearance of the God of Wealth, dressed in red robes, wearing a hat, mouth with a fake beard, carrying a yellow bag to collect money, followed by a few gongs and drums, to distribute the image of the God of Wealth, in order to ask for reward money. Whenever they arrived at the door of a house, they sang: "The left side is full of gold and silver, the right side is full of treasures." After the hosts happily accepted the red paper statue of the God of Wealth and gave them some money, the people pretending to be the God of Wealth thanked them profusely, then they beat vigorously for a while and moved on to other houses with the sound of gongs and drums.

The first thing everyone does when they return to the house after setting off the firecrackers is to worship heaven and earth, welcome the gods, and pay homage to their ancestors. In ancient times, this ritual was very popular. Because of the different rituals and customs of different places, the form of ancestor worship also varies, some to the field to visit the ancestral tomb, some to the ancestral temple to worship ancestors, but most of the ancestors at home will be placed in the ancestral tablets in order in the main hall, display offerings, and then worshippers according to the order of the eldest and youngest on the incense and kneeling. Southerners also after ancestor worship, check the calendar contained in this year's auspicious direction, burning lanterns and torches, pots of wine, incense ringing firecrackers, open the door to travel to meet the God of joy, called "out of the sky" or "travel", Zhejiang called "out of searching for In Zhejiang, it is called "out searching", and in Shanghai, it is called "touting the God of Happiness". This custom is to seek good luck and pray for the gods to bless the year. On New Year's Eve, people stay up all night long to observe the New Year's Eve. During the night, housewives are busy hanging lanterns, posting spring couplets, cutting window decorations, sticking up New Year's paintings, and decorating the house with red and green to add a rich atmosphere to the festival. Perhaps the thing that children look forward to most is the New Year's money. In some families, after the New Year's Eve dinner, everyone sits at the table and is not allowed to leave. After everyone has finished eating, the elders give the money to the younger ones and encourage their children and grandchildren to learn and improve in the new year. Some people are parents in the night when their children are asleep, put them under the pillow, more people are children gathered in the main hall, shouting grandparents, parents Happy New Year, kneeling in line; and then reach out for the red envelope. Even to the bedroom of grandparents, all ran to the edge of the bed, yelling: "New Year's money, New Year's money!" The old man is still not lively enough, pretending to be petty, from bargaining to the siege of groping, and finally the old ancestor's red envelopes to dig out, everyone looted, before they scattered. The old man was so happy to see this that he thought it was a good omen for the New Year.

People's traditional concepts, always like in the New Year, more good luck, I hope everything goes well, which has many old customs. Such as everywhere there is a ban on the use of broom custom, that the use of brooms in the New Year will sweep away the luck, sweep away the fortune, the new year will be difficult to make good luck. If you have to sweep the floor, you have to sweep from the outside to the inside. In order to popularize this custom, the first day of the first month of the year was designated as the "Broom Birthday". Children must not be scolded on New Year's Day, and special care must be taken in what they say. If a child carelessly breaks a rice bowl, we will never scold him, but rather say that he is "safe for years to come", because "broken" and "years to come" harmonize with each other to wash away the ominous atmosphere. In the New Year, adults are most afraid of children said slipped out of the mouth, the beginning of the year to say some less auspicious words, in addition to horizontal care vertical care, some places also use a piece of red cloth or straw paper to the children's mouth wiping, which means that the mouth as a buttocks, even if the words of bad luck, but also equal to a fart. Others put oranges, lychees on the pillow, called "pressure year fruit". Oranges and lychees are harmonized with the word "jili" in order to have good luck in the coming year. In some areas, there is also a custom to steal the statue of the God of Fortune and hide it in the crotch of the pants after stealing it in order to take the meaning of the idiom of "the God of Fortune into the treasury (pants)". In these whimsical and interesting customs, buried in how many generations of hard working people to pander to the God of Fortune's good intentions.

On the morning of the Spring Festival, when the door opens for good luck, firecrackers are set off first, which is called "opening the door to firecrackers". After the sound of firecrackers, broken red all over the ground, brilliant as a cloud of brocade, known as "full red". At this time, the street is full of auspicious gas, joyful.