Fun Fact 1: What is Chinese New Year? Chinese New Year is the most important festival in the Chinese calendar; it is also known as spring festival. Traditionally the Chinese New Year festival lasts for 15 days
Fun Fact 2: When is Chinese New Year? Chinese New Year falls on different dates each year as it is governed by the position of the moon and the lunar calendar. New Years Day usually falls between January 21 and February 20 each year
Fun Fact 3: Before the festival begins houses are traditionally given a good clean in order to sweep away bad luck. Brooms are then stored away so that the luck of the New Year is not accidently swept away
Fun Fact 4: Traditionally homes are decorated with red paper decorations and scrolls written with good luck phrases such as; happiness, wealth, good fortune and longevity
Fun Fact 5: Families gather and celebrate with festive foods, cuisine varies depending on region. Popular food choices include: Chinese Dumplings, Spring Rolls, Nian Gao (sticky, sweet rice pudding)
Fun Fact 6: People often wear new, red colored clothing to the festivities; new represents the New Year and red represents the symbol of fire, worn to scare away bad and evil spirits
Fun Fact 7: The colour red in Chinese culture traditionally represents joy, good fortune, happiness and sincerity
Fun Fact 8: One tradition of Chinese New Year celebrations includes giving gifts of money contained in red paper envelopes. It is considered lucky if the money given is of even value
Fun Fact 9: New Year's Day is Festival Day! Parades take place which commonly feature giant, brightly coloured, paper lions or dragons. The giant puppets dance to the beat of loud drums; the dragons and drums are believed to scare off evil spirits
Fun Fact 10: Chinese New Year activities include; lion or dragon dances, the lighting of firecrackers and fireworks, lantern festivals, family gathering, festive food and cuisine, decorating houses, visiting friends and relatives and the gifting of red envelopes
Fun Fact 11: The Lantern festival on the 15th day of the New Year is the highlight of the festivities. The lanterns are coloured red to symbolize good fortune and the lanterns themselves can be symbolic of letting the last year go and the New Year beginning. The lantern festival signals the ending of the Chinese New Years celebrations
Fun Fact 12: A popular kid's song for Chinese New Year celebrations is called "Happy New Year!" The music to the song is very similar to the popular American song "Oh My Darling, Clementine"
Fun Fact 13: The Zodiac signs that represent the Chinese calendar are animals. Each New Year is identified by one of twelve different animals; people born in a particular year are said to have similar characteristics of the animal of the year they were born in
Fun Fact 14: The 12 animals of the zodiac that represent the Chinese calendar are: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog and Pig
Fun Fact 15: The oldest and probably largest Chinese New Year Festivities outside of Asia is the San Francisco Chinese Festival and Parade. The festival was first held in 1858, as the years have progressed the festival has grown huge; recent highlights include a Golden Dragon measuring over 61 metres long and a grand finale of over 600,000 firecrackers! |