How do you empty the largest Chinese cities within and make them become a nice, quiet and (in the beginning) cleaner living space? Just celebrate Chinese New Year more often and it can happen!
It is really unbelievable how much of a difference a few million people less in the city make to the atmosphere here. There are no traffic jams, the noises of the city are reduced to a minimum and there a only loads of people at certain hot spots.
Beijing is celebrating Chinese New Year, and I am celebrating with Beijing and its people.
Chinese New Year is the most important festival in Chinese culture and most people have up to a week off work and can celebrate amongst their families.
Food is important in Chinese everyday life already but that really climates during the Chinese New Year, which is also called Spring Festival (as marking the beginning of spring). Yesterday was New Year's eve and we went out to restaurant first, after that set up fireworks, returned home and ate the special Chunjie (Springfestival) Jiaozi (dumplings).
Another Chinese cultural characteristc also climaxes during Chunjie, which is the pleasure of being together with your family and being noisy and cozy. It can happend that a mere of 20 or more family members gather together and chat, relax and drink bai jiu (strong alcohol together).
Chunjie is just as important for Chinese, as Christmas for Westerness. Another shared element is the tradition of exchanging gifts. Children get hong bao (red envelopes), filled with money from their parents, grand-parents, other relatives and friends. The amount in the hong bao grows probably at the same rate as the Chinese economy is growing, and mirrors the increasing standard of living, which can be monitored throughout the city (but the distribution of wealth is not at all equal yet, and you can see a plenty of Mercedes Benz cars racing through the streets, where waidiren, people from the countryside outside of Beijing, take care to remove the garbage and clean up everything with their bikes). Adults usually give boxes full of traditional Chinese food to their relatives.
This year is the year of the Pig, or zhu in Chinese. The pig is the last animal in the 12 year circle of astrology and marks a year full of wealth and good fortune. Of course it does, as I "belong to pig" (literally translated from Chinese), too.
But just for those who are born in the year of the actual symbol attentionis required. You need to take good care of yourself, go to a temple to pray (at least in Taiwan) and wear a red coloured belt to protect oneself. I got one as a gift, so everything should be ok... :-)
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