Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is one of the most exciting festivals in the world. It is based on the lunar calendar and therefore begins at a different time each year according to the calendar we are familiar with. Sometimes it starts in January and sometimes in February. This year the festivities began the night of Feb 2nd...Chinese New Year's Eve. Chinese families gather together this day and eat around 4:00p. Now this meal is not a simple meal but includes numerous dishes and therefore takes all day to prepare (everything is from scratch). They then shoot off firecrackers that night – many believe this chases away the evil spirits and “clears the house” to bring good luck for the following year. Some families burn incense just outside their home for the spirits. And finally, at midnight, every family eats dumplings together. That's just New Year's Eve.

Chinese New Year marks the beginning of the Spring Festival which lasts for 2 weeks (until the first full moon which comes 15 days later). Many businesses are closed for 5 days and some for 2 weeks. Those who live in the back of their stores usually close for only a day or two. Friends and family busy themselves during this time making the rounds sharing meals together. Hospitality is very important for the Chinese, so they go above and beyond with meal preparations. There is never, ever a lack of food. Many save money all year for this occassion. In every town and city across China, firecrackers can be heard each day for a month and a half surrounding the New Year. It's pretty crazy. The 15th day of the Spring Festival marks the Lantern Festival (yes, there are countless holidays in China!).
On this day, everyone eats what is called “yuan xiao” which are little rice flour pastry balls filled with various yumminess. You boil them in water and eat them like a soup. The streets are filled with vendors selling these sweet treats! The roundness of the yuan xiao symbolizes reunion, therefore families and friends eat them together. The The night of the Lantern Festival is especially fun. A section of town is blocked off and there are traditional dances performed (in this region of the country with the highest population of Korean-Chinese due to the Korean War, there are both Korean and Chinese dances) and a huge firework show. Now, these fireworks are far louder and higher than those in the States. The stuff they blow off would definitely be illegal in America. It's awesome! There are loads and loads of people out on the streets celebrating including those who have come in from the villages. You can also see lanterns floating in the air – so cool! The lanterns symbolize different things for different people, but mainly represent hope and love.


This year was pretty wonderful as I'm even more settled in here. On New Year's Eve Zaibin, Lori, Ryan and I were invited to eat with a welder who has helped us out with one of our farm projects. We ate with his entire family and set off fireworks together. Then Ryan, Lori and Rachel came over to my place to watch a movie (although it was tough to hear at times because of the firecrackers outside). After the movie, we walked around to get a view of all of the festivities going on and came upon a man down the alley setting up his assortment. I asked him when he would be setting them off and he said “soon” and invited us inside to wait. He and his family gave us snacks to eat while we waited :) and he asked me if I would help him set off the fireworks – uh yea! I got nailed several times while lighting them but enjoyed every second of it, ha! After that we tried to go home but they kept saying “you have to eat dumplings! It's Chinese tradition!” So, we went back inside and ate dumplings with these friendly neighbors! (That was actually the 3rd invitation to eat dumplings at midnight – the people here are so hospitable!) I couldn't go to sleep that night until 1:30a because of the noise! In the following week, I was able to enjoy meals with several different Chinese friends including an overnight stay with my dear friend Tina in her village.


Lori, Ryan, Rachel and I also braved travel during the Spring Festival (the absolute busiest time to travel in China) to visit Harbin and its famous Ice Festival...the 4th largest in the world. Harbin is north of Hunchun and therefore is even colder, but no wind. Thank God! We took an overnight train which was extremely cold on the way there. No heat in our car!!! The windows were iced over; the facet in the bathroom had a frozen drip of water hanging out of it; the, uh, bathroom stuff was frozen. But we made it in one piece! We also got lucky getting train tickets back home on the day we wanted! The ice festival was pretty amazing but I admit that the city experience wasn't my favorite. Harbin has 10 million people (the 10th largest city in China...New York City, America's most populated city, has 8.4 million) and no subway system! People were extremely helpful telling us what numbered bus to get on for where we were trying to go, but 3 different times we got on going the wrong direction! Remember that all things are communicated in Chinese – where we want to go, what number of bus, where to go to catch that bus, how much it is, how long it takes to get to our destination. So, I'm pretty excited that I was able to understand/ask/communicate all of that successfully but it was still frustrating to get all that accomplished only to end up going the wrong way. And there are many people cramming on the bus at once so it was inconvenient at times to ask the bus driver if we were going the right way, plus ask how much per person and tell him I'm paying for 4 people AND not hold up the bus, ha! Once the chaos would settle I'd ask a fellow passenger what stop my friends and I should get off the bus...those 3 times we got the “ah, you're going the wrong direction!” response. No major harm done – just had to get off, cross the street, and get back on. And the rides were only 15 cents/person. But, needless to say – my brain reached a point of extreme fatigue. But we got to eat American food so that made up for it! We found a Holiday Inn hotel (so shocking to see that here in China) and they had a Western menu! I had salad with REAL salmon on it. A-m-a-z-i-n-g. We had to literally run to get to our train on time but we made it and found ourselves in a mildly-heated train car. Woo-hoo! (Bathrooms are at the end of the cars so those were still frozen over, ha)

Hope you enjoyed this little peek into Chinese culture!