Author, BoYang Gu is an Accounting and Finance student at the University of Liverpool.
Hey guys, the Spring Festival is coming! The Spring Festival is the biggest festival in China, and usually I spend it with my family, but this year I plan to spend this festival with my friends in Liverpool, which I’m sure will be a fantastic experience as well!
Here I’ll share with you some important Spring Festival activities and custom:
1. Make dumplings
One of the important customs during the Spring Festival is make dumplings, and this goes back around 1,800 years. Dumplings have a good meaning in China, they represent peace and happiness during the next year! This year, I have already made dumplings with my roommates Kevin and Nick. It is a memorable experience. After three failures we succeeded in making dumplings!
We made three different kinds – my favourite is chive and shrimp dumplings. You can enjoy the bounce of the shrimp and the special fragrance of the chive when you eat the dumpling. Very tasty!
2. Hang lanterns
It is also important to hang lanterns and paste couplets during the Spring Festival. I have already put up the red lanterns in my accommodation – I bought these in SIDA. Actually, there are more styles of lantern to buy on Amazon. If you want, you even can buy a cute pig style lantern.
For me though, I always prefer to use a classical style lantern. Red lanterns symbolize the life happiness in my hometown! So now, I also need one in Liverpool!
3. Hang couplets
These couplets written in Chinese, are expressions of good wishes for family for the coming year. I bought this couplet from Amazon, and it is traditional for most couplets to be written on red paper.
When I paste the couplets, I use a special glue which is made of glutinous rice. This glue is very sticky and eco-friendly! Here are the five steps to make this rice glue:
- Bring the rice and water to the boil in a pot
- Cook over low heat for 45 minutes
- Wait until the rice looks like porridge before adding it to the water
- Set aside to cool, then pour into a sieve and stir
- Keep in the refrigerator, and you can use it to stick things.
4. Set off firecrackers
Setting off firecrackers is also an important custom in Spring Festival. This year, I took part in a video chat with my family, and we virtually set off firecrackers together.
Setting off firecrackers during the Spring Festival has a history of more than two thousand years in China. It originates from a legend. Long ago, on the eve of the Lunar New Year, a monster named “Nian” would appear every year, in order to scare off the beast, people would burn bamboo sticks in front of their houses (or paste them with red objects outside their houses). The air inside the bamboo cavity would expand when heated, causing the bamboo cavity to burst and make a loud noise, thus driving away the Nian beast.
Although this year is different, I’ve had a fantastic experience for Spring Festival this year with my friends in Liverpool, and I hope all of you will also enjoy this year’s festival. Many thanks for reading, and I wish you good health and happy studies in the New Year!