Tết!

So in case you didn't know, Tết, otherwise know as the Chinese New Year (for me anyway) is on February 3rd, 2011. This is exciting for it is the year of the cat for Tết and the rabbit for Chinese New Year! To bad no one in my family is a Cat. I myself am a Horse, my younger brother and my mother are both Sheeps, and my dad and my older brother are both snakes. How nice that everyone except me has a pair in the family, but all is well. For Tết as well as Chinese New Year we like to wish everyone a happy and joyous holiday. In Vietnamese this is done by saying Chúc mọi ngườ, and in Chinese we say xin nian kuai le (新年快樂). But in addition to wishing everyone a happy new year you also wish them luck and other things such as good health and prosperity. 
One of my favorite things to do with my mom before the new years is preparing all the food that we are going to offer to the gods. We get a lot of food cooked and ready and make sure that it looks nice when we present it but it is also all vegetarian. In addition I like helping my mom around this time because even when she's stressed she is so nice to me (hehe) this is usually not the case. Something I don't like doing for the new years is cleaning the house and making sure that it is spotless and presentable just like our food. My grandma explained to me that it was to make sure the good fortunes stuck when we got them? I'm not sure if that's the exact meaning but it worked for me when I was a kid :). Also my mom likes to pay her respects to those who have past away like her grandparents and other that she knew. I

During this time we also get lots of red envelopes that are suppose to ward off bad spirits and thoughts, but they are also filled with money! However we only get them if we wish the giver good luck first. The envelopes aren't the only things that are red. We are expected to wear red during the new year because it also scares away evil spirits. They are afraid of the color in general which is why during the new years we put red lanterns and paper things with lucky characters on them. 


In China, as well as Vietnam there are celebrations all over, however in China the celebrations go on for 15 days! In this time there is no work for anyone! You also get to witness dragon dances and other cool things http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM3yeYztTl4.