Adventure in ChinaTown~

Xin Nian Kuai Le 新年快乐

Happy New Year

The Chinese New Year is the most important celebration of the traditional Chinese holidays. The festival begins on the first day of the first month of the Chinese calendar, and ends on the 15th day. In 2010 the festival started on February 14th, and in 2011 it will begin on February 3rd.

The New Year has been celebrated for countless years before today. The story for how this festivity came about is as follows...

“According to tales and legends, the beginning of Chinese New Year started with the fight against a mythical beast called the Nien (Chinese: 年; pinyin: nián). Nien would come on the first day of New Year to devour livestock, crops, and even villagers, especially children. To protect themselves, the villagers would put food in front of their doors at the beginning of every year. It was believed that after the Nien ate the food they prepared, it wouldn’t attack any more people. One time, people saw that the Nien was scared away by a little child wearing red. The villagers then understood that the Nien was afraid of the color red. Hence, every time when the New Year was about to come, the villagers would hang red lanterns and red spring scrolls on windows and doors. People also used firecrackers to frighten away the Nien. From then on, Nien never came to the village again. The Nien was eventually captured by Hongjun Laozu, an ancient Taoist monk. The Nien became Hongjun Laozu's mount.”

Similar to the New Year we are accustomed to, the Chinese New Year is a time to start over and begin the year with a fresh start. The Chinese families do an extensive ‘spring cleaning’ during this time. They clean every corner of their home, symbolizing cleaning out all of the evil in their lives to start the year off with good fortune. In addition, for the new start, people sometimes buy new clothing to wear and get a new haircut.

For the celebration, the whole town is decorated in red. Red is the festival color, not only because according to legend it warded off the ‘Nien’ –the evil spirit, but because red is the emblem of joy, virtue, truth, and sincerity. The color is used to describe a loyal person, or a great emperor. The Chinese (Mandarin) word for red, which is “hong” ( 紅), also means prosperous. Therefore even the word red sounds fortunate in Chinese. Another tradition is the red diamond-shaped posters with the character 福 meaning “auspiciousness”, on them. These signs are hung on doors and around the house. An interesting fact about these posters is that they are usually hung upside-down. This is because the Chinese word 倒 (pronounced dào) meaning “upside-down” sounds the exact same as 到 (pronounced dào) meaning “arrive”. Therefore the upside-down character for auspiciousness symbolizes the arrival of luck, happiness, and prosperity.

In ancient China, bamboo steams filled with gunpowder were burnt to create small explosions, and were used to drive away evil spirits. Today firecrackers are used during the festive season (they were banned in some of the major cities in China during the 1990’s; the ban has recently been lifted). Each firecracker is rolled up in red paper with gunpowder in its core. Strung together by the hundreds, the firecrackers are known for their deafening explosions. These firecrackers symbolize the joyful time of year.

For the celebration, markets are set up throughout the city or town. There is a practice of shopping for the perfect plum tree, which is rather similar to the Western tradition of buying a Christmas tree. The flowers bought at these markets symbolize different things. For example the plum blossom symbolizes luck, the chrysanthemum symbolizes longevity, and the sunflower symbolizes having a good year. Gifts are bought here for friends and family. The most common gift is the red envelope or red packet. The decorative envelopes are filled with money ranging from a few yuan to hundreds of yuan bills. The amount of money in the red packet is always even (determined by the first digit), for odd numbers are unlucky, and are normally associated with the money given to the grieving family at a funeral. Sometimes chocolate coins are put in the red envelopes instead. It is common for the elderly or for married couples to give red packets to unmarried juniors, or for adults or young couples to give them to children. If one were to refuse one of these gifts they would be out of luck for the year. Children sometimes jokingly use the phrase 恭喜发财，红包拿来 (pronounced in Mandarin: gōng xǐ fā cái, hóng bāo ná lái), which means "Congratulations and be prosperous, now give me a red envelope!" J

On February 14th our class went to Chinatown in Chicago to see the New Year’s Parade. Going down to Chicago was fun. I’ve ridden on the train down to Chicago before, so I knew what to expect on the train ride there. Once we got to the city, we left the train station and began walking to the Redline railway. We got on the and off that train and were placed in the heart of Chinatown. I had never been to Chinatown before, and it was absolutely beautiful. Everything from the creative decorations, the loud and joyful crowd, the small crowded shops, and the sweet smells coming from the restaurants, made my first trip to Chinatown memorable. We had some time before the parade started, and got to walk up and down the main street. Natalie (http://www.nataliewchina2010.blogspot.com/), Megan (http://meganrchina2010.blogspot.com/spot.com/), Nick (http://nicholasachina2010.blogspot.com/), and I went around to some shops and looked at the different things they had. We also looked and took pictures of the interesting architecture style that can only be described as the beautiful Chinese design.

Before the parade began we switched our viewing spot about three times. The first two were rather crowded and hard to see the street. There were so many people there; I can hardly imagine what it will be like in China. The population is so much greater in China than in the U.S. that everywhere we go, there will be an unbelievable crowd. The last spot that we came to was a great location. We stood there for about 15 minutes listening to the hustle and bustle of the crowd, eating our packed sandwiches for lunch, trying to warm up our frozen toes on the icy pavement. It was February in Chicago… yup you guessed it… it was cold. There was a stereo and some amps at the end of the street, which was playing the same four songs repeatedly. Hopping from one foot to the other, Natalie and I probably looked like we were dancing to that music, where as in actuality we were trying to shake off our chills and get some blood back into our limbs.

Soon some police officers came over and told everyone to move back and out of the street. The parade began. All of the floats looked fantastic and the energy of the crowd was high and excited. Where we were standing was the absolute perfect spot. We were on the front row and got to see everything. It was a little past midday and the sun wasn’t directly overhead. This caused shadows across the street. We were standing on the side of the street with the shadows (unfortunately this made it colder!), which made it perfect for taking pictures. My favorite part of the parade was the dragons. There were a lot of smaller dragons and a few large ones. There were many high school marching bands, and some interesting floats (there was one with puppets, a few emperors, and lots of people!). There were tons of different types of drums and loud music; it was great! And of course there were plenty of tigers, this year being the Year of The Tiger. The only thing that really surprised me was there were Scottish bagpipers playing together in traditional clothing. They looked a little out of place; playing in Chinatown. Not quite sure where that one came from but it was interesting all the same.

Before we got back to our group, we went to some more shops after the parade was over. I bought some chopsticks and a red envelope. We went home the same way we came in; we got on the Redline, and then walked to the train station, on the train, and home. Getting on the Redline train was tricky because that was the preferred transportation system for most of the people leaving the parade. The line was incredibly long, but it was nice because we got to spend some more time in Chinatown. I had a great time and would love to go again.

This experience showed everyone in our group how we work together, who hangs out with whom, and how it will actually be on the trip. We got to see how to travel around with a backpack and be responsible with our money and items. We got a taste of our adventure.