...sounds like something to do with an overweight cabbage, but it's a Chinese New Year exclamation meaning something like "luck and prosperity!"
Here are Kate's 10 top facts about Chinese New Year:
1. This year is the year of the Rat (Chinese years are based on a lunar calendar with 12 zodiac signs – all animals)
2. CNY is one of the most important celebrations of the year. It is a time for the Chinese to spend with their families. The period around Chinese New Year is the time of the largest human migration, when migrant workers in China, as well as overseas Chinese around the world, travel home to have reunion dinners with their families on Chinese New Year's eve.
3. People set off firecrackers and wear red to celebrate (originally these were used as deterrents to evil spirits)
4. FOOD is very important at CNY:
- Long noodles represent longevity
- Fish is eaten because the Chinese character for money came from the character for fish
- Round foods indicate wealth (coin shape)
- Other round foods such as meatballs emphasise togetherness
- Sometimes a soup with hair like black sea moss is served (This is because the name sounds like ‘get rich’ in Chinese)
- Sweet foods eg candies and seeds are eaten to symbolise a new year filled with sweetness
5. Married people give away new money in red packets to children and single people. This symbolises wealth and prosperity in the coming year. (Some would argue that this should be fact#1)
6. The streets and shops are all decorated with special lights, flowers and even special New Year trees which symbolise wealth and prosperity. Flower markets are open all night (until 5am) on Chinese New Years Eve so that families can buy fresh flowers and plants for their homes.
7. People often clean house and throw out “old” items before Chinese New Year (This is part of the reason why Crossroads does so well in Hong Kong as there really is no second hand market.) Shops also have big sales to clear out stock from last year.
8. People use Chinese New Year to calculate their age rather than their actual birth date
9. All food must be prepared before New Year’s Day. People don’t use scissors or knives on New Year because it might sever the luck or the prosperity.
10. Chinese people make lots of different visits during CNY, with a special timing for each. A reunion dinner is held on New Year's Eve where members of the family, near and far away, get together for the celebration. The venue will usually be in or near the home of the most senior member of the family. The New Year's Eve dinner is very sumptuous. The first day of Chinese New Year is a time when families visit the oldest and most senior members of their extended family, usually their parents, grandparents or great-grandparents. The second day of the Chinese New Year is for married daughters to visit their birth parents. There are 15 days of visits and celebrations, culminating in a Lantern Festival on the 15th day. These are the traditional red Chinese lanterns, and are different to the lanterns that we see at mid-Autumn festival.
To help us to get into the festive mood at Crossroads, apart from having a 5 day long weekend, we had a large group hotpot night. The authentically Chinese version of this consists of having a plastic cloth covered table with all-plastic bowls and utensils and a toilet roll in the place of serviettes. Then we have a boiling pot of water with some sort of tasty broth in it, and plates of raw meat and veg (like thin strips of beef and pork, fish balls, cabbage leaves, lotus root, noodlesque mushrooms, tofu, rice noodles etc...) Then the one/s closest to the pot make sure that what's cooked gets distributed and what's not cooked goes in the pot, hopefully in one lovely continuous movement of raw and cooked food passing back and forth between all concerned. It's great fun once the first lot has gone around and the supply begins to exceed demand, so that you just keep refilling as required. Some say you end up so full on such 'light' food cos you eat it slowly in little lots... but my person theory is that it's simply so tasty and there's absolutely no way to keep track of how much you've eaten, that actually in the end it amounts to Rather A Lot.
Some of us enjoyed the hot pot night so much that we had another go at Philski's place a few days later:
Other than hotpot, it was interesting seeing the sudden emergence of the many fruit trees, flowers and lanterns that decorated all the local shops and apartment buildings (see photo at top)... I enjoyed a long weekend of pottering around the house, painting one of my walls blue and seeing The Kite Runner which I can highly recommend - although it's not a light and fluffy, you might need to take some tissues.
I've been flat out at work ever since the CNY break, trying to get as much done as possible before I go away (Australia / Thailand / Cambodia). The main project I'm working on at the moment is the artwork for Helen Mottee's new album which is currently being recorded in Hong Kong and Australia. It's full of songs addressing many humanitarian issues (child soldiers, refugees, AIDs, orphans, poverty, landmines etc.) and the proceeds will be going to support some of the organisations dealing with these issues. It's an exciting project to be involved in and I'm really enjoying the process of putting together the 16 page booklet that will accompany the disc.
My update wouldn't be complete without a brief weather update. It's definitely warming up. Even the birds are sounding more perky in the morning. I've done away with my thermals, although (whimp that I am) still warming the bed up with the electric blanket at night. But summer is definitely on the way. Meanwhile, we've had some seriously 'hazy' days lately. Here is a photo I took last summer:
Here is the same view, last week:
