Hi everyone! I hope you're starting the Lunar New Year in an auspicious way. In this special feature of Fearless Predictions Real Psychics, I would like to share with you how we celebrate the new year the chinese way, which we believe bring good luck the whole year :)
2 Days before New Year Eve - House Clean-up
Clean up all the cobweb, need to change into anew bed sheets, pillow cases, new towels, and even new tooth brush ! Clean up all the dusts and throw away or donate stuff that you don't need. Don't forget new sleepers. Brings good luck, new page of the year and closed all the old files, create a new page for the new year!
New Year's Eve Dinner (Family Reunion dinner)
Kick off the New Year with a hearty dinner, and more generally begin after the New Year's Eve worship. New Year's Eve family reunion can be said to be a very important event of the year, however, due to the busy lifestyle these years, you can just go out to the restaurant or do a potluck. In the old days, it was a such a big deal for home cook. The traditional hearty dinner generally feasts chicken, fish, meat, etc., and each dish will also have the name of a Jixiang gas, such as Annual Surplus (fish), Backgammon, Five Blessings, Bamboo Safety, Longevity, Grains Harvest, Good Luck and so on.
Bring Along Your Sweetheart
During the dinner, if you bring your girlfriend or boyfriend along, that means the relationship is already stable, and you wanted to introduce your sweety to the family, treat as family members, it is a kind of recognition or commitment! So you need to be sure of who you bring along!
By the way, we also have to finish our bath or shower before 12 midnight!
Red Money Envelope
After the dinner, younger ones receive "lucky money" from their elderlies in a red envelope i think you call them "ang pow" in the Philippines. We would stay up until we receive the money, keep them under the pillow, and then happily fall asleep. Open the red envelope the next day and use the money in New Year!
Fireworks, firecrackers
Comes from the traditional customs, from ancient legend we use firecrackers to drive the beast way. Driving over the beast of fireworks, firecrackers also becomes an exciting showcase during the Chinese New Year. The blogger told me its called "paputok" in the Philippines. Be careful!
On New Year's Day
The first day of the New Year, we have to go visit the elder relatives and bring gifts along. Normally, during this day, we have to visit all the people very close to us.
Temples are always packed with people. They worship the Buddha and also ask for good luck. They usually use chinese fortune sticks. If they drew a bad luck stick, they have to ask someone in the temple to burn something to ask for Buddha's protection and change their luck. Otherwise, they will have to burn incense for 1 year, and write down the names of those they wish to be protected for the whole year.
There are few popular dishes on New Year day: egg dumpling (in egg crepe) that symbolizes gold, turnip cakes or yam cakes for job promotion or good school marks, candied sweet lotus for fertility, sweet sesame dumpling for family reunion and safety. We pour tea for our parents and wish them Happy Chinese New Year. I also kneel down before them :)
And for buddhists, New Year is a vegetarian day!
Red Underwear for Good luck!
On New Year's day, wear red underwear for good luck. You see a lot of vendors selling them on the street, malls, lots of red underwear everywhere! Beside Chinese New Year, most chinese people believe red underwear bring in good luck, so, when they go to casino, they put on red undergarments.
Do not clean house, do not wash hair, and no new shoes, please!
Do not wash hair on New Year's day!
We can not greet anyone when they are still in bed, because that may bring bad luck to the person and make this person sick for the whole year!
Be careful not to break things on New Year's Day. So, what happens if you break a dish or a glass? That actually may bring bad luck, so, there is a way to clean it up -- pick up all the broken pieces, and wrap in a red paper or red plastic bags to throw away.
Also, watch what you say, no negative words! But you see, children they are all very naive, they say whatever they feel like, so, what should parents do? They will in the morning, after the children brush their teeth, they will use “toilet paper” to wipe their moouth once, that means that any bad words that will come out of their mouth, will be "flushed out" in the toilet. So bad words begone!
The second day, we normally visit the second important relatives or very good friends. The lunch is very important, which is also called the "open year" lunch. We must have fish -- fish brings money and means you will money left after, no debt,s more money or more good things left from last year to bring over to the new year.
The third day is the "stay home" day, never want to meet any friends. Because it also called the "quarrel day". If you see friends on that day, we believe it may bring arguments or issues with those friends in the future!
During the first 15 days, we cannot buy shoes! This is why at the time, most of the shoe stores do their crazy sales, because business is not good those days! Big discounts attract the younger generation, because they are not that superstitious!
On the 15th day of the New Year, also called Chinese Valentine's day, we eat sweet, sticky sesame dumpling.
There you go, guys, there are lots of traditions we enjoy and look forward everytime the lunar new year comes, but these are the key and memorable ones. Have a lucky Year of the Goat to everyone. Kung Hei Fat Choi!
Regards,
Psychic Gu
Photo: Various Sources, Oranum
