China Country Manager Baoli Wang talks about the Chinese Spring Festival and all the preparations families have to do for this festivity.
Anticipation has been littering in the air for weeks as people frantically prepare for the Chinese Spring Festival. Now, the Festival is really around the corner!
However, many people are not done with the preparations yet. There is one Chinese folk song that says, “23rd day to farewell the God of Stove, 24th day to clean the house, 25th day to make tofu, 26th day to kill the pig, 27th day to kill the chicken, 28th day to make rice cake, 29th day to fry fat meat to preserve lard, 30th day to wait for the new year”. That explains how much preparation people do for the Festival. .
Traveling home for family reunion: Spring Festival is the most important festival for the Chinese. All family members must get together, no matter how far they live away. So, long-distance bus stations, train stations and airports are having their business time. With millions of people moving at the same time, for many people, standing for over 10 hours in the train to get home is normal.
Spring festival sign at a mall in China.
Cleaning up: This includes cleaning up the entire house and cleaning up oneself. Although the Little New Year is the day that people are supposed to do the house cleaning, it’s a lot of work and it takes a lot of your time if you do it all by yourself: dust off the walls and cabinets, washing up the bedsheets, curtains, carpets, windows, etc. It’s also an old tradition for people to take a bath before the New Year to wash off the disease and back luck.
Shopping like crazy: It’s a custom for people to wear new clothes for the New Year. So getting new clothes for all family members is a big task too! Then, lots of snacks and food to shop: candies, roasted sunflower or watermelon seeds, all kinds of nuts like peanuts, cashews, pine nuts, and cookies are popular snacks. Of course, getting special and enough food for the New Year’s Eve dinner and week-long holiday during which all or most stores will be closed. New Year Decorations are important too: a big new printed calendar painting, read couplets for the door, new paper gods, red lanterns, red wall hangings, paper cuts for the windows and some plants to fresh up your home.
All work must be done and everything must be ready before New Year’s Eve because people are supposed to relax, enjoy the family reunion and pay visits to relatives and friends during the Chinese Spring Festival.
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