Happy Chinese New Year of the Tiger! 新年快乐!

Happy Chinese New Year or Spring Festival! This year is the year of the tiger. This is the most important holiday to all who are ethnically Chinese.

CNY is based on the lunar calendar and the first day always falls on a different date. The best part for me growing up was CNY is actually 14 days long! Yes, you read it right, CNY is two weeks long! Needless to say, it is my favourite part of the year.

The Legend:

Long time ago, there was a beast named "Nian" (Nian 年 means year in Chinese). He terrorised the village every year on the first day. The villagers would leave out food offering for Nian, so he would not eat the livestock, crop and small children. This went on for years and years, the villager grew more scared, but angrier too. Finally, they decided to fight back. They made firecrackers that made really loud noises to scare Nian off. When Nian came to the village, everyone was still very scared. But one brave little boy who wore a red jacket stepped forward and threw the first firecracker at Nian. It worked! Nian ran off with his tail tucked behind his back. Therefore, the villagers every year celebrated the win over the beast with red decorations and firecrackers to keep Nian aka evil spirits away.

The Customs:

• To prepare for CNY, each family would clean the house thoroughly, get a new hair cut and even try to get rid of all debts (that includes library books on loan) to ensure a clean start for the new year.
  
• CNY is a family holiday much like Christmas. It is all about eating a large family feast on NY eve.
  
• In northern China, it is customary to make dumplings (饺子) with vegetable and pork fillings. People also like to tuck a coin in one of the dumplings. Whoever is lucky enough to bit into the coin dumpling, it is said he or she is going to have a good year.
• In southern China, people likes to make a sweeter treat called new year rice cake (年糕).
• Children often receive red envelops containing cash from their older and married relatives such as parents, grandparents and etc.
• Chinese people considers themselves a year older on the first day of CNY, not on their actual birthday. Therefore, the Chinese population technically only has one birth date.

Year of the Tiger:

Chinese Zodiac is a series of 12 animals that represents every year. 2010 is the year of the Tiger. For people who was born as a tiger (1914, 1926, 1938, 1950, 1962, 1974, 1986, 1998), it is said :

Tiger people are sensitive, given to deep thinking, capable of great sympathy. They can be extremely short-tempered, however. Other people have great respect for them, but sometimes tiger people come into conflict with older people or those in authority. sometimes Tiger people cannot make up their minds, which can result in a poor, hasty decision or a sound decision arrived at too late. They are suspicious of others, but they are courageous and powerful. Tigers are most compatible with Horses, Dragons, and Dogs

My family and I will be celebrating in Vancouver amongst all the Olympics madness. I will be helping mom make won tons (since we are southerners) and other very yummy goodies. But no more red envelops for the very grown up me :(.