The Chinese New Year, also known as the Lunar New Year, is a significant cultural event celebrated by Chinese communities worldwide. This 15-day celebration begins with the new moon and is characterized by fireworks; traditional cuisine; the wearing of red clothing; the giving of gifts to children, and the decorating of homes and streets with festive decorations. The New Year is an opportunity for families to come together, reunite, and honor their ancestors.
The Chinese President traditionally extends his greetings and best wishes to the Chinese people for a prosperous and successful year ahead. This year, the Chinese people will welcome the Year of the Rabbit, symbolizing agility and energy, as they participate in the various customs and traditions that make the Chinese New Year such a vibrant and meaningful occasion.
The international community also joins China in its New Year celebrations as the Secretary General of the UN, Antonio Guterres, extended his felicitations to Chinese people wishing energy and agility with reference to rabbits. He relates these much-needed traits for human personality to grow with Chinese efforts to become a normal country after Covid, where agility and energy become helpful in achieving arduous tasks. Other felicitations include the best wishes from heads of UNESCO, the International Olympic Committee, and the International Monetary Fund. The Prime Minister of Pakistan and various heads of numerous other states remember the Chinese people with their best wishes.
The unique element of New Year felicitations is the association of charm, luck, wholeness, and intra-relationship with traditional cuisine.
Chinese Lunar Year of Rabbit began with festivities believed to offer success, longevity, and prosperity. The lunar year marks the fortnight celebrations and one-week public holiday across China. The festivities begin with cleansing the houses with a belief of expelling bad omens and luck away and end with the lantern festivals, hanging them in temples, and carrying them in night parades. Dragon is yet another feature of Chinese celebrations which people carry along for good fortune in the streets.
Chinese New Year gets global attention because millions of people, including Chinese ex-pats, return to their parents and families in China from all around the world. Chinese people with cultural consciousness coincide their visits to China with New Year celebrations, where a long week of public holidays adds value.
Moreover, around two billion travelers are expected inside China for the family reunion burdening the transport, health, and municipal infrastructure. Amid mass mobilization, President Xi expressed his concerns over the welfare of millions of people, especially the elders. He fears the fate of the elderly population, who may get exposed to the virus during family holidays and mass greetings.
President Xi Jinping’s father-like concerns over the health of the elderly and farmers in rural areas are more critical because of relatively weak health facilities as he expects their extra care. President Xi interacted with representatives of the Chinese community from all walks of life and spoke his heart about Chinese culture, health, economy, and society who participated in the realization of the China Dream. He virtually addressed Chinese people working in health, home welfare, oil field workers, railway officials, travelers, vendors, and customers of the wholesale markets and ethnic minority groups in China at the Great Hall. It reflects the conscious effort of Chinese leadership to directly engage with the public to wish for the New Year and make them proud of being part of Chinese culture.
Chinese New Year is unique in several ways to any major culture around the world. The foremost is the one-fifth global representation where Chinese people collectively celebrate the lunar year in all corners of the world. The other distinct feature is the representation of the New Year with zodiac signs such as the Year of Tiger i.e., 2022 is ending, and the Year of Rabbit is set to commence, where each animal exhibits a different understanding among Chinese people. The unique element of New Year felicitations is the association of charm, luck, wholeness, and intra-relationship with traditional cuisine. This includes whole steam fish as a sign of surplus, entire chicken as a sign of togetherness, dumplings reflecting more wealth, and Nian Gao reflecting a higher year.
The Rabbit year is the first full-swing celebration year after the global pandemic coronavirus and Chinese people could not be more excited. But being responsible citizens, they are expected to take due self-care by not exposing the elders to a larger audience, monitoring the health of all family members, and immediately reporting to a relative health center in case of a health emergency. To this end, Chinese health officials relaunched a campaign to vaccinate people in rural areas as a preemptive measure. Although China is performing well in pandemic management, Chinese society and health infrastructure remain stressed.
The writer is Founder (Friends of BRI Forum).