Chinese New Year 2012
Chinese New Year, usually called as Spring Festival, is the most significant and
ceremonious traditional festival celebrated by Chinese nation for over 4000 years.
Starting from the first day of the first Chinese lunar month and lasting for 15
days till the celebration of Lantern Festival, Spring Festival is no doubt the longest
Chinese festival with sufficient preparations from one week before the New Year’s
Eve (called除夕"Chuxi" by Chinese), which is the first climax of the festival.
It marks the pass of the previous year and a welcome to a brand new year, called
as Guo Da Nian (过大年, literally means to pass a big year). On that day, no matter
how far, people will go back home and the whole family will get together with great
happiness to make dumplings together, enjoy a reunion dinner, watch Spring Festival
Gala and stay up late (called “Shousui” by Chinese). Other unique celebration activities
during the Chinese New Year Festival include setting off fireworks, pasting spring
couplets and New Year paintings, worshiping to gods, enjoying dragon dances and
lion dances, paying New Year visits, holding kinds of New Year’s garden parties,
etc.
The Date of Chinese New Year 2012
The Spring Festival of 2012 begins from Monday, January 23 (the first day of the
first Chinese lunar month), and lasts for 15 days till Monday, February 6, the Lantern
festival.
The Year of Dragon 2012
The New Year 2012 belongs to the year of dragon according to the Chinese Zodiac.
As Chinese nation compare themselves to the descendants of dragon (an auspicious
symbol considered by Chinese), the year of dragon is always believed to be the luckiest
year which only happens every 12 years. In this year, more people will start their
new projects or careers, or marry and give birth to “a baby of dragon year”, and
definitely, the celebration of the new year of dragon will always grander and more
magnificent than ever…>>more