Are you celebrating the Chinese New Year?

@thyst07 (2079)
United States
February 14, 2010 3:10pm CST
Everyone's talking about Valentine's Day, but did you know that today is also the first day of the Chinese New Year? How are you celebrating Chinese New Year? I'm American, but this year my husband and I decided to learn a little bit about Chinese culture and have a New Year's dinner. We visited an Asian market for the first time, and cooked some really good Chinese food. It was really fun, and I learned a lot.
4 responses
peerincle
@peerincle (19)
• China
11 Mar 10
Yeah, Chinese new year is very interesting. I enjoy the great fire work during the spring festival. And, there is a little tip in eating. People doesnt eat up the whole fish in the dinner at New Year's Eve. It means "Surplus Year after Year"
1 person likes this
thyst07
@thyst07 (2079)
• United States
11 Mar 10
I did read about that when I was researching traditions. Unfortunately, with all the other foods we bought and prepared, we didn't have room in our budget or on the table for the fish. Maybe next year.
pinklady227
@pinklady227 (285)
• Philippines
11 Mar 10
Sorry i know this is a late response to the discussion. I just wanted to share our simple way of celebrating chinese new year since we are not purely chinese. We also sweep our house the day before chinese new year to drive away all the bad luck. We light up the chinese insense sticks and eat also tikoy or masi on chinese new year.
1 person likes this
thyst07
@thyst07 (2079)
• United States
11 Mar 10
Hmm, I didn't think of incense, although it probably would have been a good idea after dinner! Our apartment smelled like Chinese food for days!
Fulltank
@Fulltank (2882)
• Philippines
14 Feb 10
Nope, but I respect the celebration. Just as my fellow Chinese friends respect Christians celebration like the Holy week. Some of my friends even give me lucky charms and I accepted it happily. Though I don't believe in it, I still treasured it as it comes from my friends.
1 person likes this
thyst07
@thyst07 (2079)
• United States
14 Feb 10
It's great that you respect your friend's different beliefs and are open to learning about them.
rojgen
@rojgen (1)
• Philippines
14 Feb 10
Kung Hei Fat Choi! Chinese new year is highly regarded as very important celebration for chinese people. With new year, comes all kinds of superstitious beliefs that chinese people believe would be helpful in the coming year. They will do anything to obey those beliefs. But chinese new year is really fun. with all the dragon dance etc.!
1 person likes this
thyst07
@thyst07 (2079)
• United States
14 Feb 10
I did find some of the superstitious traditions that the Chinese practice during the New Year, and found them to be very interesting. One is to clean your house thoroughly before the New Year to sweep out the old year's bad luck, so I spent some time getting my apartment cleaned yesterday.