The Spring Festival Customs

Traditionally Xiaonian is an important time for people to give sacrifices to the Kitchen God. He looks after the family’s fortunes.Besides, don’t forget to clean your home. Sweeping the dust means wiping away the old days and welcoming a new start. Now, the last thing for you to do is to wait for the coming Spring Festival!

Chinese characters that are auspicious for the coming year are generally written on two pieces of red paper with ink and a brush, and glued by the sides of the doors.

The character fu, or “happiness” is usually written on red diamond-shaped posters. They are usually stuck upside down on the doors. This is because the Chinese character dao (upside down) has the same sound as another dao, which means “arrive”. Placing fu upside down symbolizes the arrival of happiness.

Chinese people traditionally set off fireworks during Spring Festival, in the belief that this helps scare off the Nian and brings good fortune at the beginning of the year and good luck throughout the year.

It’s important that you pay relatives and friends a new year’s call during the holiday. This is done at people’s homes from New Year’s Day to the 15th day, or the Lantern Festival. People give each other best wishes and gifts. This is also a time for the younger generation to bow or kowtow to the elders for health, good fortune, work, and so on and to get a red package in return.

For many young people, Chinese new year is just as much about Hongbao — money in red envelopes traditionally given to children. On the Chinese mainland, kids get red envelopes at home from their parents and relatives.

 Words can reflect New Year taboos. People tend to, for example, avoid negative words, such as “failing”, “dying”, and “illness” during New Year’s celebrations. Breaking a dish is another taboo in some places, because it implies that you will not have a thing to eat.

People usually get a haircut before the lunar new year's eve because it is said that getting one's hair cut in the first lunar month puts a curse on one's maternal uncles.