Chinese New Year

Spring Festival, widely known as Chinese New Year in the West, is the most important traditional festival in China and a public holiday. Spring Festival 2014 starts on January 30 (Chinese New Year's Eve). 2014 is the year of the horse.

The festival falls on the first day of the first lunar month (always somewhere in the period January 21 to February 20), and ends with Lantern Festival which is on the 15th day.

The festival is celebrated grandly across the country with various cultural activities. Firework shows, dragon dancing and lion dancing are the most common Chinese New Year activities. Even days before the festival, Chinese families clean their houses. The practice of house cleaning before the New Year is believed to sweep away bad luck and bring good fortune in the coming year.

Chinese New Year is a time for families to be together. Wherever they are, people come home to celebrate the festival with their families. The busiest travel time in China happens during this period. Travelers who plan to visit China during the New Year time are recommended to book everything in advance.

History

The Spring Festival has a history of more than 4,000 years. It is said that the custom of Spring Festival originated from belief in deities. When the solar terms changed, dictating farming activities, especially at the end of a year, people would sacrifice to the deities and pray for good harvests.

Nian (年 'year') was not a word for describing time originally. It was used to describe the cycle of crop cultivation until the Xia Dynasty (2070–1600 BC).

The beginning of a year changed during different dynasties until the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD). For example, people in the Xia Dynasty celebrated New Year’s Day in the first lunar month of a year, while people in the Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC) celebrated New Year’s Day in the tenth lunar month.

The exact celebration period of Spring Festival was fixed in 104 BC and was given the name suishou (a.k.a. nian, the beginning of the year), when China was ruled by Emperor Wudi (156–87 BC), and the lunisolar calendar was promulgated. The calendar made the beginning of a year and the 24 solar terms coincident. So, in ancient China, the first day of the lunisolar year was called yuandan (元旦, 'first dawn').

On January 1, 1912, the Republic of China introduced the Gregorian calendar, and named January 1 yuandan. The traditional New Year’s Day was given another name — Chun Jie (春节 'Spring Festival').

The Chinese New Year Legend and Traditional Customs

According to traditional customs, people stay up late or all night with the lights on during Spring Festival’s Eve, and will set off firecrackers as soon as the first second of New Year’s Day comes. There is an interesting legend for the origin of the custom.

Almost every traditional Chinese festival has its own legend, including Spring Festival. In traditional Chinese culture the Spring Festival is also named guonian (过年 'passing a year').

So, since then, people use red Spring Festival couplets, lights, and firecrackers to drive away the monster every Spring Festival’s Eve.

The legend is related to a fierce monster called Nian (年) which ate an animal a day cruelly, sometimes a human being. People's faces turned pale at the mention of the monster. Nian appeared in human society every 365 days after dark, and when dawn came, it went back to a wooded mountain. People found that it was very scared of the color red, light, and loud sounds.