Happy Spring Festival!

chūnjié    kuàilè  

春节快乐

HAPPY SPRING FESTIVAL

Spring Festival

The Spring Festival is the most important festival for the Chinese people and is when all family members get together, just like Christmas in the West. All people living away from home go back, becoming the busiest time for transportation systems of about half a month from the Spring Festival. Airports, railway stations and long-distance bus stations are crowded with home returnees.

The Spring Festival falls on the 1st day of the 1st lunar month, often one month later than the Gregorian calendar. It originated in the Shang Dynasty (c. 1600 BC-c. 1100 BC) from the people's sacrifice to gods and ancestors at the end of an old year and the beginning of a new one.

Strictly speaking, the Spring Festival starts every year in the early days of the 12th lunar month and will last till the mid 1st lunar month of the next year. Of them, the most important days are Spring Festival Eve and the first three days. The Chinese government now stipulates people have seven days off for the Chinese Lunar New Year.

NEW YEAR WISHES FROM PB TEAM

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Customs

Many customs accompany the Spring Festival. Some are still followed today, but others have weakened.

Before the New Year comes, the people completely clean the indoors and outdoors of their homes as well as their clothes, bedclothes and all their utensils.

Then people begin decorating their clean rooms featuring an atmosphere of rejoicing and festivity. All the door panels will be pasted with Spring Festival couplets, highlighting Chinese calligraphy with black characters on red paper. The content varies from house owners' wishes for a bright future to good luck for the New Year. Also, pictures of the god of doors and wealth will be posted on front doors to ward off evil spirits and welcome peace and abundance.

The Chinese character "福fú" (meaning blessing or happiness) is a must. The character put on paper can be pasted normally or upside down, for in Chinese the "reversed fú (倒福dàofú) " is homo phonic with "fú comes", both being pronounced as "福到了fúdàole ." What's more, two big red lanterns can be raised on both sides of the front door. Red paper-cuttings can be seen on window glass and brightly colored New Year paintings with auspicious meanings may be put on the wall.

People attach great importance to Spring Festival Eve. At that time, all family members eat dinner together. The meal is more luxurious than usual. Dishes such as chicken, fish and bean curd cannot be excluded, for in Chinese, their pronunciations, respectively "鸡jī", "鱼yú" and "豆腐dòufu," mean auspiciousness, abundance and richness. After the dinner, the whole family will sit together, chatting and watching TV. In recent years, the Spring Festival party broadcast on China Central Television Station (CCTV) is essential entertainment for the Chinese both at home and abroad. According to custom, each family will stay up to see the New Year in.

Waking up on New Year, everybody dresses up. First they extend greetings to their parents. Then each child will get money as a New Year gift, wrapped up in red paper. 

People in northern China will eat "饺子 jiǎozi" (dumpings) for breakfast, which is a traditional food for Spring Festival. It is also a cultural custom of the festival. On the first day of the New Year every household will have jiǎozi made the previous night. Without eating jiǎozi you are not celebrating the festival in the real sense of the word.

Originally jiǎozi referred to the moment "across midnight". The Chinese name for the period between 11:00 midnight and 1.00 the next morning is called zǐ and jiāo means "across" and later jiǎozi became the name of the food made before midnight and eaten after it. In sound it means "bidding farewell to the old and ushering in the new". Also, the shape of the dumpling is like gold ingot from ancient China. So people eat them and wish for money and treasure.

The Chinese people have been eating jiǎozi for the past 2000 years. It is a small piece of dough pressed thin with a roller and then wrapped up with fillings inside which are usually of minced pork, beef or mutton mixed with chopped vegetable and spiced with onion, ginger and salt.

饺子 jiǎozi

They also eat "年糕 niángāo" (New Year cake made of glutinous rice flour) on this occasion, because as a homophone, niángāo means "higher and higher, one year after another." 

Southerners prefer "馄饨 húntun", developed from jiǎozi. With some slight alteration jiǎozi was reshaped like a gold ingot, ancient Chinese money, a symbol of prosperity. Both jiǎozi and húntun are favorite delicacies for Spring Festival. They are also found on daily menu.

年糕 niángāo

馄饨 húntun

Burning fireworks was once the most typical custom on the Spring Festival. People thought the spluttering sound could help drive away evil spirits. However, such an activity was completely or partially forbidden in big cities once the government took security, noise and pollution factors into consideration. As a replacement, some buy tapes with firecracker sounds to listen to, some break little balloons to get the sound too, while others buy firecracker handicrafts to hang in the room.

China has 56 ethnic groups. Minorities celebrate their Spring Festival almost the same day as the Han people, and they have different customs.

Temple Fair

During the festival period,the lively atmosphere not only fills every household, but permeates to streets and lanes. A series of activities such as lion dancing, dragon lantern dancing, lantern festivals and temple fairs will be held for days.

Beijing has several fairs during the period. The fairs are held at various ancient temples, so they are called temple fairs. Temple fairs, originated along with the development of Buddhist and Taoist activities, are a kind of mass gatherings that integrate religious worship, entertainment and commerce. They offer visitors a chance to enjoy traditional folk performances, handcraft works, and local snacks. As they are scattered across the city, visitors can easily go to the nearest one. Here are some of the places: Ditan Park, Longtan Park, Summer Palace, Old Summer Palace, Grand View Garden, Chaoyang Park Temple Fair, Shijingshan Amusement Park etc.. 

    Ditan Park Temple Fair    

Ditan Park, known as the Temple of Earth, opened up a unique Intangible Cultural Heritage Square, where the representative inheritors of over 10 intangible culture heritage projects demonstrate respectively the production process of pottery, paper cutting, shadow play, homespun weaving, etc. The imitation of the sacrifice ceremony to the earth reproduces the scene that emperors of Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) prayed to God of the Earth for blessing. The special imitation performance starts at 10:00 am from the Chinese New Year's Eve to the seventh day of the first lunar month, opening a window of civilization of Qing Dynasty. In addition, authentic unique skills such as diabolo, ancient magic and ventriloquism are staged, together with Tibetan folk songs and dances, traditional Chinese comedic crosstalk and other folk artistic shows.

Time: 

Feb. 16th - Feb. 20th, 2018 (the 1st to the 5th day of the first lunar month)

Opening hours: 08:00 - 17:00

Ticket: CNY 10

Location: 

Ditan Park, Andingmen Outer Street, Dongcheng District

Transportation: 

Take subway line 2 or line 5 to Yonghegong Station, get out from Exit A and walk around 250 meters (300 yards) toward north; take bus Te 11, 18, 75, 104, 108, 113, 119, 124, 125, 301, 426 or 430 to the west gate of the Temple of Earth; bus 125, 117 to the east gate of the Temple of Earth.

    Longtan Park Temple Fair    

It is famous for its particular fitness-featured project. You can watch the wrestling, judo, tae kwon do, free combat performances made by professional players, as well as sports stars exercising with visitors. In addition, visitors can play the game or go and chess with national players. Other interesting activities include performances of minorities with unique ethnic customs as well as carnival themed by snow culture including snow-capped mountains surfing, snow sculpture viewing, snow playing, sledding, snow farm, snow live CS ( A game named Counter-Strike), etc.

Time: 

Feb. 16th - Feb. 21st, 2018 (the 1st to the 6th day of the first lunar month)

Opening hours: 08:00 – 17:00

Ticket: CNY 10

Location: 

Longtan Park, No. 8, Longtan Road, Dongcheng District,

Transportation:

Take bus no. 12, 34, 35, 36, 41, 54, 72, 139, 352, 561, 957 or 958, get off at Guangminglou Station and enter park form the North Gate.

Take bus no. 6, 12, 60, 116, 139, 352, 684 or 958, get off at Longtan Park Station and enter park from the Northwest Gate.

Take bus no. 34, 36, 51, 91, 122, Te 3, or Te 12 Outer, and get off at the west of South Jinsong Street Station and enter park form the East Gate.

Take bus no. 12, 139, or 684, get off at the Longtan Lake Swimming Pool Station and enter park from the West Gate.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us.

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See you next time.

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