{"id":4838,"date":"2018-02-16T13:29:07","date_gmt":"2018-02-16T13:29:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/?p=4838"},"modified":"2018-02-16T13:29:07","modified_gmt":"2018-02-16T13:29:07","slug":"gong-xi-fa-cai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/?p=4838","title":{"rendered":"Gong Xi Fa Cai!!"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nHappy Chinese New Year! \u00a0It is the Year of the Dog!!<\/p>\n

Chinese New Year Facts<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

1 The festival date changes every year.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is because it follows the lunar calendar,\u00a0based on the movement of the moon. Usually, it falls on a day between mid-January and mid-February. This year Chinese New Year falls on February 16.<\/p>\n

2 It is also called Spring Festival.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The festival usually falls after the solar term, Beginning of Spring (Li Chun), and is a festival in the spring, hence the name.<\/p>\n

3\u00a0Chinese New Year starts a new animal\u2019s zodiac year.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In China, each lunar cycle has 60 years and 12 years is regarded as a small cycle. Each of the 12 years is defined by an animal sign: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Sheep, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, and Pig.<\/p>\n

4\u00a0The celebration lasts for 15 days till Lantern Festival.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The peak time of the entire celebration is on Chinese New Year’s Eve and the first day of the lunar new year. The 15th day is called Lantern Festival,\u00a0marking the end of the celebration.<\/p>\n

5 One sixth of the world\u2019s people celebrate it.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is not only celebrated in Mainland China, but also observed in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, Singapore and some other Asian countries as well as Chinatowns around the world.<\/p>\n

6\u00a0It is the longest public holiday and the whole country is on the move.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most employees have 7-12 days off the work, and students have one month winter vacation. The 2018 Chinese New Year holiday is from February 15th to 21st.<\/p>\n

No matter where they are, people try their best to return home for a family reunion, like westerners attempting to spend Christmas with their families. Meanwhile, some families travel together during the holiday. This makes the world\u2019s largest annual migration, known as the Spring Festival Travel Rush.\u00a0The total trips made by plane, train, bus and ship can reach nearly 3 billion.<\/p>\n

7 Reunion dinner is a ritual.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The reunion dinner on Chinese New Year’s Eve is a big feast to commemorate the past year. This is the most important time to be with families.<\/p>\n

After the reunion dinner, families sit together to watch the Spring Festival Gala,\u00a0while chatting. As the most watched TV program, the gala collects various well-selected performances, targeting audiences of different generations.<\/p>\n

8 Then comes the annual largest usage of fireworks on the planet.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Fireworks\u00a0are an indispensable part of the celebration to liven up the air of Spring Festival. All families set off fireworks to celebrate the festival. The biggest firework show is on Lunar New Year’s Eve.<\/p>\n

9 The celebration decorations are mostly in red.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Houses are decorated with red couplets,\u00a0red lanterns, and red paper cuttings; city streets are lit up by red lanterns; and numerous people are dressed in red.\u00a0This is\u00a0because red in Chinese culture is the symbol of happiness, wealth and prosperity,\u00a0and can ward off evil spirits and bring good luck. These red decorations are to the festival what Christmas trees are\u00a0to Christmas.<\/p>\n

10\u00a0\u201cGuo Nian Hao\u201d is one of the most used Chinese New Year greetings.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is like the westerners saying \u201cMerry Christmas\u201d to each other on Christmas Day.\u00a0It means \u201cHappy New Year\u201d.<\/p>\n

Why is the celebration also called “Guo Nian”? “Nian\u201dis the Chinese word for year. In folk culture, the Spring Festival celebration is also called \u201cGuo Nian\u201d (meaning \u201cpassing a year\u201d). In a Chinese New Year story, \u201cNian\u201d is a fierce and cruel monster which eats livestock and kids, but it is scared\u00a0of red color and cracker sound. Therefore, people use red decorations and fireworks to drive away \u201cNian\u201d.<\/p>\n

From the ChinaTravelGuide.com<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Happy Chinese New Year! \u00a0It is the Year of the Dog!! Chinese New Year Facts 1 The festival date changes every year. This is because it follows the lunar calendar,\u00a0based on the movement of the moon. Usually, it falls on a day between mid-January and mid-February. This year Chinese New Year falls on February 16. … Continue reading »<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,2,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-food","category-live","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4838\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livefoodtravel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}