97 Fun Facts About Chinese New Year

How many animals are in the Chinese zodiac cycle?

12 animals make up the cycle, one per year, but the animals came second: they were attached to the twelve Earthly Branches, an older Chinese system for counting years and hours.

The eighth zodiac animal's Chinese name, yang, covers goats and which other animal?

Sheep: the Chinese word yang covers sheep and goats alike, so the same zodiac year turns up in English as the Year of the Goat, the Ram or the Sheep.

In the best-known telling of the zodiac legend, which deity called the race that ranked the animals?

The Jade Emperor, ruler of heaven in Chinese folk belief, usually calls the race and hands out places in finishing order; other tellings give the job to the Buddha, or swap the race for a banquet.

The Chinese name for firecrackers, baozhu, literally means what?

Baozhu literally means 'exploding bamboo': the earliest firecrackers were hollow bamboo stalks thrown on a fire until the air inside burst the segments; gunpowder versions kept the name.

In 1967, official Chinese New Year celebrations were banned during which political campaign?

During the Cultural Revolution old customs were targets: official celebrations were banned in 1967, and it was the 1990s before the holiday became the week-long break it is today.

What are the red envelopes given during Chinese New Year called in Mandarin?

Hong bao means 'red packet'; givers fill them with crisp new notes, because handing over worn or wrinkled bills is considered bad form.

Which Chinese New Year food stands for wealth because it is shaped like the old ingots once used as money?

Dumplings (jiaozi) are folded to look like yuanbao, the boat-shaped silver and gold ingots of imperial China; some families hide a coin in one for extra luck.

On the Gregorian calendar, Chinese New Year always falls in which two months?

January or February: the festival lands on the new moon between 21 January and 20 February, usually the second after the winter solstice, so the Gregorian date shifts from year to year.

What Chinese New Year dance features a long puppet operated by many people?

The dragon dance sends a long dragon puppet snaking along on poles held by a line of dancers; the longer the dragon, the more luck it is believed to bring, so communities compete to build the longest.

What is the family meal held on Chinese New Year's Eve called in English?

The reunion dinner on New Year's Eve is the year's most important family meal, and getting home in time for it is the main reason for China's huge holiday travel crush.

Which mythical creature is said to have inspired the Chinese New Year celebration?

The Nian was said to come out at each year's end to prey on livestock and villagers; the everyday phrase for celebrating, guo nian, 'passing the year', is popularly read as surviving the beast.

Chinese New Year falls on a different date each year because it follows which kind of reckoning?

Lunisolar calendars count months by the moon but add a leap month about every three years to stay in step with the sun, so the festival drifts by weeks yet never leaves late winter.

In the New Year's Eve custom of shousui, what do Chinese families traditionally do?

Stay up past midnight: shousui means keeping watch over the year. Families once sat up until sunrise; most now call it a night when the midnight firecrackers die down.

Which event marks the final day of Chinese New Year celebrations?

The Lantern Festival on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month closes the celebrations; families hang lanterns under the year's first full moon and solve the riddles written on them.

What is the Chinese character commonly displayed upside-down on doors during Chinese New Year?

The character fu, meaning fortune or blessing, is often hung upside-down because the word for upside-down (dao) sounds like the word for arrive (dao). So an inverted fu symbolizes that fortune has arrived.

Which sticky rice cake eaten at Chinese New Year stands for rising higher each year?

Nian gao, a sticky glutinous-rice cake, sounds like 'higher year' (nian gao), so eating it is meant to bring promotions and better fortune year after year.

Which fruit is a Chinese New Year favourite partly because one way of writing its name contains the character for luck?

Tangerines are often written with a character, ju, that contains ji, 'luck'; their round shape and golden colour add a wish for fullness and wealth, so they are displayed and eaten through the festival.

Which instrument sets the beat for a Chinese lion dance, backed by cymbals and gongs?

A big drum leads: the lion's steps and pounces follow its beat while cymbals and gongs crash in, and many of the moves themselves come from Chinese martial arts.

If a floor must be swept during Chinese New Year, which way is the dirt supposed to go?

From the outside in: sweeping outwards is thought to send the family's luck and savings out with the dust, and for the same reason the rubbish is not carried out on New Year's Day either.

In 1928 China's Kuomintang decreed Chinese New Year be celebrated on which date instead?

1 January was the Nationalists' choice: in 1928 they ordered the festival moved to the Gregorian New Year and tried to stamp out the lunar one, but people kept celebrating and the policy was dropped.

In one telling of the zodiac race, which animal did the Rat push into the water, costing it a place?

The Cat, in this telling, was shoved into the river and missed the cut, which is said to be why cats have chased rats ever since.

In legend, how did the Rat win the zodiac race?

It rode on the Ox and jumped off at the last second, the legend says, leaving the animal that did all the swimming to settle for second place.

What is the traditional greeting 'Gong Xi Fa Cai' wishing someone?

Gong xi fa cai wishes someone 'be prosperous': gong xi is congratulations and fa cai is to get rich, so the greeting never mentions the new year, though many say it in place of 'Happy New Year'.

Families offer sticky sweets to which deity before burning his paper image, hoping for a kind report to heaven?

The Kitchen God (Zao Jun) leaves each home before New Year to report on the family to heaven; the sweets are meant to sweeten his words or, some say, to stick his lips together.

The Chinese word for fish, yu, a must at New Year's Eve dinner, sounds like the word for what?

Surplus: the fish is deliberately left unfinished at the New Year's Eve dinner, so the wish 'may there be surpluses every year' is acted out on the table.

What are the red-paper strips of calligraphy hung either side of a door at Chinese New Year called?

Spring couplets (chunlian) carry two matching lines of good wishes, one on each side of the door; they replaced the wooden charms once hung there against evil spirits.

Which country calls its Lunar New Year celebration 'Tet'?

Vietnam's Tet is short for Tet Nguyen Dan; the 1968 Tet Offensive took its name from the holiday, launched during the truce called so that both sides could celebrate it.

What is the Korean name for the Lunar New Year celebration?

Seollal is the Korean Lunar New Year: children bow deeply to their elders (sebae) and are rewarded with pocket money, and the day's main dish is tteokguk, a rice-cake soup.

What food is traditionally eaten on the 15th and final day of the Chinese New Year period?

Tangyuan, sweet glutinous rice balls served in broth, are eaten on the fifteenth night that closes the period; the name echoes tuanyuan, a family coming together, so they also appear at weddings and the winter solstice.

Which two colours do many people avoid wearing during Chinese New Year?

Black and white are the colours of mourning in Chinese tradition, so they are thought to invite bad luck at the turn of the year; festival clothes are bought in bright shades instead.

Which animal is last in the Chinese zodiac cycle?

The Pig is the final animal of the cycle: in the race legend it stopped to eat and rest along the way, and trotted over the finish line after everyone else.

Fai chun, the red Chinese New Year doorway papers, descend from ancient charms made of which wood?

Peach-wood charms hung by doorways to keep out ghosts; over time people simply wrote the guardian gods' names on them, then auspicious phrases.

In Chinese tradition, the dragon is especially associated with power over what?

Chinese dragons are benevolent rulers of water and weather, commanding rain, rivers and seas, which is why farmers prayed to dragon kings for rainfall; the dragon was also the emperor's symbol.

Chunyun, the season around Chinese New Year, is often called the world's largest annual what?

Human migration is the usual label for chunyun, 'spring transport': students and workers living far from home all head back for New Year's Eve at once.

Which flowers are a taboo gift at Chinese New Year because they are linked with funerals?

Chrysanthemums are funeral and grave-offering flowers in Chinese custom, so bringing them on a New Year visit is taboo; white blooms of any kind carry the same message.

The third day of Chinese New Year, known as 'Red Mouth', is traditionally a day to avoid what?

Paying visits is avoided on Chikou, 'red mouth' day: it belongs to the Red Dog, a god of anger, so anyone out calling on friends is thought likely to end up in a quarrel.

What sweet dried meat snack is popular in Singapore and Malaysia during Chinese New Year?

Bak kwa, Hokkien for 'dried meat', is grilled over charcoal in thin sweet sheets, and it is such a New Year must-have that sellers raise their prices in the run-up to the holiday.

The ceremony held before a new lion-dance costume first performs is named for dotting which part of it?

The eyes: in the 'dotting the eyes' ceremony a guest of honour marks them, which is said to give the lion life before it dances for the first time.

In the Chinese zodiac, which animal year follows the Year of the Dragon?

The Snake follows the Dragon; in one telling of the zodiac race it hid on the Horse's hoof at the river and slipped ahead just before the finish.

What is the round or octagonal tray of sweets served to Chinese New Year guests called?

The Chuen Hop, or Tray of Togetherness, is an octagonal or round tray with multiple compartments filled with symbolic treats: candied melon (growth), red melon seeds (happiness), lychee nuts (family bonds), kumquats (prosperity), and more.

The predecessor of the firecracker, bamboo heated until it burst, was used in China as early as when?

Heated bamboo that burst with a bang was used as early as 200 BCE, in the early Han era, long before gunpowder; later paper firecrackers copied the bamboo shape and kept the name.

Chuanghua, the red 'window flowers' pasted up for Chinese New Year, are made by which craft?

Paper cutting (jianzhi) uses scissors or a knife to turn red sheets into zodiac animals and lucky characters, which are then pasted on windows and doors to welcome the year.

In Chinese astrology, what are the five elements that modify the zodiac animals?

Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, Water each colour two years in a row, so a pairing such as the Fire Horse comes round only once every 60 years.

Which app launched digital red envelopes for the 2014 Chinese New Year holiday?

WeChat launched its digital red envelope for the 2014 holiday; one sent into a group chat is split at random among the first to tap, which sets off a race to grab a share.

Zaotang, the candy offered to the stove deity around the 23rd of the last lunar month, is made from what?

Zaotang is made from maltose, a sticky malt sugar boiled and pulled until it sets hard; depending on shape it is called Guandong tang or tanggua, 'sugar melon', and is meant to stick the deity's mouth sweet.

In legend, the beast that raided villages each New Year was said to fear which three things?

Red, loud noise, and fire were the beast's three fears, so villagers hung scarlet paper, made a din and set off firecrackers; these became the festival's fixtures.

China's televised New Year's Eve gala, on air since 1983, is billed as what?

Most watched TV program in the world, by the broadcaster's count: more than a billion viewers are claimed, and families leave it running through the evening meal.

What is the significance of eating uncut noodles during Chinese New Year?

They symbolize long life: the longer the noodle, the longer the life, so each strand is slurped whole instead of being cut or bitten through.

In the lion dance custom of cai qing, what vegetable does the lion "eat" and spit out?

The lion 'eats' lettuce because its Cantonese name sounds like 'growing wealth'; the lettuce is hung up with a red packet, which the troupe keeps as its fee, while the leaves are spat back out.

The God of Wealth honoured on the fifth day of Chinese New Year is identified in one tradition with which figure?

Guan Yu, the Three Kingdoms general later deified, is one of the martial Gods of Wealth alongside Zhao Gongming; on the fifth day households and shops set off firecrackers to catch the god's attention.

What is the Tibetan New Year celebration called?

Losar means 'new year' in Tibetan; because the Tibetan calendar keeps its own count, it can fall on the same day as Chinese New Year or weeks apart, and the celebrations run for about two weeks.

What is yusheng, eaten at Chinese New Year in Malaysia and Singapore?

Yusheng is a raw-fish salad tossed for prosperity: slices of raw fish with shredded vegetables, crackers and plum sauce that diners toss high (lo hei) while shouting lucky phrases; Malaysia and Singapore both claim the modern version.

What is the 'Renri' celebration on the 7th day of Chinese New Year?

Everyone's birthday: in Chinese myth the goddess Nuwa made a different animal on each of the first six days and humans on the seventh, so the day counts as a shared birthday for all.

How long is China's Spring Festival travel rush, with its special rail, bus and air arrangements?

The rush lasts about 40 days, starting fifteen days before New Year's Day and running twenty-five days after it; the trips taken in that window exceed China's entire population.

Portraits of two Tang dynasty generals, Qin Shubao and Yuchi Gong, became which New Year decoration?

Door gods: Qin Shubao and Yuchi Gong served Emperor Taizong, and their armoured portraits are pasted as a facing pair on the two leaves of a door to keep evil spirits out.

The number four is avoided in New Year red-envelope sums because it sounds like which word?

Death (si) is a near-twin of four (si) in Mandarin, so sums such as 40 or 400 are out, while amounts ending in eight are favoured.

On which day of Chinese New Year do married daughters traditionally visit their birth parents?

The 2nd day, kainian, is when married daughters visit their birth parents: a wife traditionally spent New Year's Day itself with her husband's family, so going home any sooner hinted at trouble.

Which household gift is taboo at Chinese New Year because its name sounds like a funeral ritual?

A clock is doubly unwelcome: its name echoes a phrase for seeing off the dead, and any timepiece hints that the receiver's time is running out.

Laba garlic, pickled in vinegar ahead of Chinese New Year, famously turns which colour in the jar?

Green is the sign it is ready: the vinegar's acid lets sulfur compounds in the garlic react with its own amino acids, a change that takes about twenty days in a sealed jar.

Hokkien families offer which crop at Chinese New Year, recalling ancestors who hid in it?

Sugarcane is the must-have offering because legend says Hokkien villagers escaped a pirate massacre in a cane field. Its Hokkien name also sounds like 'thank you'.

Which Chinese New Year mishap prompts the saying 'sui sui ping an', a wish for yearly peace?

Breaking a bowl is bad luck at New Year, so people cancel it with a pun: sui, meaning 'year' or 'age' in the phrase, sounds just like the word for 'shatter'.

Which East Asian country dropped the lunar new year in 1873 by adopting the Gregorian calendar?

Japan made the switch five years after the Meiji Restoration, though Okinawa and the Amami Islands long kept celebrating by the old lunar date.

Which is the only African country to list the Chinese Spring Festival as a statutory public holiday?

Mauritius gives the whole island the day off even though Sino-Mauritians are only about 3% of its people, and Port Louis's Chinatown fills with firecrackers.

Which U.S. city's Chinese New Year parade, dating from the 19th century, is billed as the oldest outside Asia?

San Francisco's Chinatown began parading in the 1860s to share its culture with wary neighbours. Marchers carried flags, banners and drums down what is now Grant Avenue.

The Chinese New Year song 'Gongxi Gongxi' was actually written in Shanghai to celebrate what?

Victory in World War II inspired Chen Gexin's 1945 tune. Its title doubles as a seasonal greeting and it hails the coming of spring, so it soon became a New Year fixture.

What does the Chinese New Year's Eve custom of shousui, or 'guarding the year', ask families to do?

Stay up all night: the vigil dates back to the Jin dynasty, and keeping it is still believed to add years to one's parents.

Which tile game is a favourite pastime with family and friends once work stops for Chinese New Year?

Mahjong feels ancient but is young: the 144-tile game only took shape in the 19th century. It comes out when most workplaces close for the holiday.

Which shared centrepiece of many Chinese New Year's Eve feasts signifies the family coming together?

Hot pot puts one simmering pot in the middle of the table for everyone to cook in. Southern tables add cured duck and Chinese sausage saved for the occasion.

By tradition, what should Chinese businesses clear before New Year's Eve so the year starts clean?

Their debts, and that includes debts of gratitude, which is why firms send gifts and rice to close associates and relatives before the holiday.

What do some cooks hide inside a single Chinese New Year jiaozi for one lucky diner to find?

A coin, scrubbed clean, promises whoever bites it a fortunate year. A Ming-era account already describes silver slipped into the New Year's Day batch.

The Chinese New Year lion dance takes many of its basic movements from which other discipline?

Martial arts schools still field many troupes: in the Foshan style, kung fu stances drive the lion and only the most advanced students may perform.

Philippine Chinese New Year centres on Binondo, called the world's oldest Chinatown, in which city?

Manila's Binondo was founded by the Spanish in 1594 as a settlement for Chinese converts, placed across the Pasig River where the colonial government could keep an eye on it.

Chinese New Year usually falls on the second new moon after which annual astronomical event?

Winter solstice anchors the count: its lunar cycle is always numbered the eleventh, so the new year normally lands two new moons later, and only rarely three.

Before Chinese New Year, the stove deity reports each family's conduct to which heavenly ruler?

Jade Emperor is the ruler who hears the yearly report and rewards or punishes each family for it. The ninth day of the New Year is kept as his birthday.

The Chinese New Year film, a feel-good holiday comedy, emerged as a genre in which city?

Hong Kong studios created the genre: the Hui Brothers' 1981 comedy Security Unlimited is counted as the first modern one, and mainland directors took it up in the late 1990s.

Families throw out the rubbish piled up over Chinese New Year to drive off which spirit?

The Ghost of Poverty goes out with the rubbish on the sixth day, also called Horse's Day, as a send-off for the old year's hardships.

Caishen, the God of Wealth welcomed at Chinese New Year, is often depicted riding which animal?

A tiger carries Caishen in many portraits while he holds a golden rod. Beggars once carried his picture from door to door, shouting that he had come, to earn lucky money.

Emperor Taizong of Tang is said to have begun which New Year custom using gold leaf?

Sending greeting cards is said to date from his gold-leaf notes reading 'the whole nation celebrates together'. Ordinary people copied the gesture on Xuan paper.

Which Mandarin New Year greeting is a direct, modern translation of the Western 'Happy New Year'?

Xin nian kuai le is new enough that many northerners still prefer 'guo nian hao', which sets the Spring Festival apart from the international new year.

Fat choy, a delicacy saved for Chinese New Year dishes, is a dried bacterium that looks like what?

Black hair is what the dried strands resemble, and the Chinese name means 'hair vegetable'. It grows on the ground in the Gobi Desert, and its price makes it a luxury.

Which meat-free dish, also called luohan zhai, is a first-day tradition at Chinese New Year?

Buddha's delight honours an old Buddhist rule of keeping to vegetables for the first five days of the year as a form of self-purification.

In legend, the physician Zhang Zhongjing first made jiaozi to treat villagers suffering from what?

Frostbitten ears, the legend goes, gave jiaozi an early name, 'tender ears': he stewed lamb with pepper and warming herbs, wrapped it in dough and served it with the broth.

Nianhua, the bright pictures hung for Chinese New Year, are traditionally made by which technique?

Woodblock printing let workshops turn out the pictures in bulk. The genre is thought to have begun with Tang dynasty prints of door gods.

Which Southeast Asian country confined Chinese New Year to private homes from 1967 to 1998?

Indonesia imposed the rule under Suharto. A 2000 decree by President Abdurrahman Wahid annulled it, and in 2002 the festival, called Imlek there, was declared a national holiday.

What do Filipinos call the sweet sticky rice cake that is popular at Chinese New Year?

Tikoy takes its name from the Hokkien word for the cake. Filipinos often dip slices in beaten egg and pan-fry them until crisp outside but still chewy inside.

Singapore launched which street parade in 1973, a year after banning Chinese New Year firecrackers?

Chingay was first staged in early 1973 with floats, acrobats and stilt walkers. Its roots go back to a 1905 float-decorating contest in Penang.

What is the Mongolian lunar new year called, a name that translates as 'White Moon'?

Tsagaan Sar fills the first three days of the lunar year. Mongols greet their elders with the zolgokh, grasping them by the elbows to show support.

Which Republic of China president made 'Spring Festival' the official name of the lunar new year?

Yuan Shikai's government adopted the name in 1914, tying the holiday to lichun, the solar term that opens spring. Beijing kept it; Taipei later chose 'Traditional Chinese New Year'.

Which dish, offered first to the ancestors, marks the Laba Festival ahead of Chinese New Year?

Porridge is cooked by the women of the house at first light. After the ancestors and household gods, every member of the family is served.

To keep pace with the seasons, the traditional Chinese calendar sometimes adds an extra what?

Month is the unit added: ordinary years have twelve, each starting on the day of a new moon, and many years gain a thirteenth.

Which broadcaster launched the Spring Festival Gala, China's New Year's Eve variety show, in 1983?

CCTV director Huang Yihe proposed a televised party in the early 1980s. The first edition was such a hit that it became a yearly fixture, known in Chinese as Chunwan.

Families visit temples before midnight on Chinese New Year's Eve to light the year's first what?

Incense lit first in the new year carries prayers for success. Back home, doors are sealed until dawn, when 'opening the door of fortune' greets the year.

Bangkok's Chinese New Year celebrations close which street, the main artery of the city's Chinatown?

Yaowarat Road becomes a pedestrian street for the festival, opened each year by a member of the royal family. Its many gold shops earned it the nickname 'Golden Road'.

Which animal comes immediately before the Dog in the order of the Chinese zodiac?

Rooster comes tenth and the Dog eleventh. In the Great Race story the bird found a raft and made the crossing with the Goat and the Monkey.

In the Chinese zodiac's Great Race legend, why did the Dog finish only eleventh?

It lingered in the river: though it should have been the best swimmer, the Dog played in the water and pleaded that it had needed a good bath after the journey.

In traditional Chinese timekeeping, which two-hour period of the day is the Hour of the Dog?

7 to 9 p.m. is the Dog's slot, the time when dogs were said to take up their duty of guarding the house.

Chinese folklore blamed which sky event on the Tiangou, a heavenly dog with an appetite?

An eclipse meant the Tiangou was swallowing the sun or moon. In one legend the hound chased the goddess Chang'e into the sky and gulped down the moon with her.