LaBa congee ~~~~ amount, New Year's Eve 12 o'clock to eat dumplings.

"The years on earth change, and heaven and earth return to spring." The Spring Festival is a traditional festival most valued by our Chinese sons and daughters, and for thousands of years, the ways and customs of celebrating the Spring Festival in folklore have been the richest, grandest, most lively and festive.

The Chinese New Year is the first of a hundred festivals

Often we call the Spring Festival the New Year, and the folk proverb says, "The year is the first of a hundred festivals," so what is the relationship between this "year" and the "Spring Festival? What is the relationship between this "year" and the "Spring Festival"?

: In fact, the year is the Spring Festival, the Spring Festival is the year, but the origin and meaning of the two are slightly different, "year" is more folk meaning. In the Shuowen - Wo Department, it says: "Nian, the grain is also ripe." In ancient folklore, the year is a kind of monster that will bring people bad luck, "year" comes, the trees wither, no grass, the year will also eat people; the year is over, everything grows, flowers bloom everywhere. Therefore, when the year comes, people should hide in their houses and go out to celebrate when the year is over. How to get rid of the "year"? People in the old and new, the "New Year" at the juncture of the firecrackers, in order to "New Year" to drive away.

After the Laha is the year

Entering the month of Laha, the atmosphere of the year will be more and more intense, and there will be a lot of activities about the year, from the folklore, the Spring Festival is not a period of time? From which day should this year start to which day should it end?

From the eighth day of the Lunar New Year, when the "Laha congee" is drunk, the various activities of the Spring Festival enter the "program". There is a nursery rhyme that says: "Don't be greedy, children, children, after the eighth day of the month is the year. Don't be greedy, it's the New Year after the 8th day of the 12th lunar month. On the twenty-third day, sugar melons stick; on the twenty-fourth day, we sweep the house; on the twenty-fifth day, we make tofu; on the twenty-sixth day, we deep-fry the mutton; on the twenty-seventh day, we kill the rooster; on the twenty-eighth day, we send out the noodles; on the twenty-ninth day, we steam the steamed buns; on the thirtieth day, we play for the night, and on the first day of the new year, we sweep. There is also a children's song this sort of Spring Festival program list: "the first morning, the second coquettish, the third no pass coquettish, the fourth tonton full, the first five apart, the first six scoop fat, the first seven seven yuan, the first eight completely, the first nine days of the public birth, the first ten have to eat, eleven general, twelve leak repeatedly, thirteen eat slop rice boy with mustard, fourteen knot lamp shed, fifteen on the Yuan day medieval." Visible, until the first month of the fifteenth, the Spring Festival this lively drama before the end. In fact, after the Lantern Festival, there is a residual charm, until February 2, "dragon head", the Spring Festival drama is considered to be all curtains, people have to start busy with the new farm work.

Customs of the Spring Festival know a lot

The Spring Festival is so long and rich in customs, so which customs are still relatively fashionable?

The customs of the Spring Festival can be categorized into religious rituals, ritual taboos, food culture, entertainment and other aspects. At present, in most parts of China are still circulating customs simply put, there are the following:

La Bao Festival: originated from the founder of Buddhism, Sakyamuni's day of initiation. The custom of drinking congee originated from the story of Buddha who fainted when he was tired and hungry during his practice and was saved by a bowl of porridge from a shepherdess. Authentic Laba congee should be made with eight ingredients such as jujube, lingzhi, chestnut, glutinous rice, japonica, corn, broomcorn millet, red beans, etc. The congee is served to honor the gods and ancestors, as a gift to relatives and friends, and as a meal for the whole family.

Small New Year: Lunar New Year 23 or 24 is the small New Year, also known as the Festival of Stove, Stove King Festival, Stove God Festival. This custom is no longer fashionable in the city.

"Playing Dust": Because "dust" and "Chen" are homophonic, dust sweeping in the New Year has the meaning of "getting rid of Chen Bu Xin". "The intention is to sweep out all the poor luck and bad luck.

Posting Spring Festival couplets and sticking the word "Fu": Posting Spring Festival couplets is unique to our country. This custom began in the Song Dynasty, the rise of the Ming Dynasty, flourished in the Qing Dynasty, is still very popular today. At the same time, some people have to be in the house door, wall, lintel on the large and small "Fu" character.

Posting New Year's Paintings: New Year's Paintings originated from the "Door God", and with the rise of woodblock printing, the contents of New Year's Paintings are not limited to this, and have become colorful. In the early years of the Republic of China, Shanghai Zheng Mantuo will be a combination of lunar calendar and New Year's paintings, and later developed into a wall calendar, once became a contemporary fashion.

Window Decorations: Window Decorations is a very popular folk art, with a unique way to express auspicious events, good wishes, festivals will be decorated with red hot and rich.

Watch the New Year's Eve: Watching the New Year's Eve is one of the most interesting New Year's activities. New Year's Eve, the family reunion, eat New Year's Eve dinner, light up candles or oil lamps, symbolizing all the evil plague and disease Zhao run away, sitting around all night, chatting vigil, waiting for the old and welcome the new moment. Elderly people to observe the year for the "resignation of the old year", there is the meaning of the precious time; young people to observe the year, is to extend the life of parents.

Eating Dumplings and Rice Cake: New Year's Eve dinner is the most important meal of the year. People who are away from home have to rush home from thousands of miles away, as the saying goes, "If you don't rush home, you'll have to rush home on the 30th night of the year". In this sumptuous meal, there are two essential foods: one is dumplings, because the dumpling skin is the noodle, and the word "and" means "together"; dumplings "dumplings" and the The word "gyoza" is also a homonym of "交", and "合" and "交" have the meanings of "合" and "交", which symbolize the reunion of the family, and the meaning of "交子"; gyoza is also shaped like a Yuanbao (元宝), which is a kind of "treasure". The dumplings are shaped like Yuanbao, which also carries the meaning of "inviting wealth and prosperity". The second is to eat rice cakes, take "cake" harmonic "high", meaning step by step high, life high, high year after year.

Firecrackers: Chinese folk "open door firecrackers" said. At the dawn of a new year, the first thing that every family does is to set off firecrackers to get rid of the old and welcome the new with the beeping sound of firecrackers.

Welcome to the New Year: the first day of the New Year, people are up early, dressed in "holiday dress" to visit friends and relatives, and pay tribute to each other, wishing the New Year great luck. In the past, some of the scholarly men used to use the congratulatory stickers to throw congratulations to each other, which developed into the "New Year's card", and now develops the form of phone calls, sending messages.

New Year's Eve money: the Spring Festival to pay tribute to the New Year, the younger generation to wish the elders long life and well-being, the elders will be the New Year's Eve money to the younger generation. Ancient people believed that money can communicate with the gods, which in turn can serve ghosts and suppress evil. Especially children's blood is weak, money can suppress evil and turn good luck. Because of the "age" and "evil spirits" consonant, the younger generation to get the new year's money can be safe and sound through the year.

New Year's Eve: the first month of the 15th is the grand finale of the Spring Festival, this day is the first full moon of the New Year, the lamp symbolizes the light, therefore, all over the lights, bringing people into a colorful, bright and bright new realm. This day also want to eat "Lantern Festival", the South called "dumplings", folklore "happy to eat Lantern Festival pills, family reunion," said the daughter-in-law ate can give birth to a child, the child ate can be in the first, people give eating Lantern Festival a lot of good luck. People have given a lot of auspicious meaning to eat the Lantern Festival.

Spiritual and cultural promotion

Over the past hundred years, due to various reasons, many people gradually lost interest in our own folklore and attention, and some young people to the "foreign festivals" as a passionate pursuit of fashion. So how can the Spring Festival reproduce the splendor of Chinese cultural traditions in the present day?

Over the centuries, no matter what evolution of the Spring Festival customs, as the soul of the Spring Festival of the national spirit and traditional culture remains unchanged. The emotional cohesion of that heavy tradition calls out to every Chinese person to "go home for the New Year with or without money".

The Spring Festival is our cultural birthmark. However, it goes without saying that this birthmark seems to be getting blurred. This is not only due to factors such as the impact of Western culture and changes in the concepts and lifestyles of contemporary people, but also due to the fact that many customs have been withdrawn from the year's activities. Therefore, the inheritance and revitalization of Chinese New Year festivals and customs has become our top priority, especially those customs associated with our national emotions. Because it is the spring couplets, New Year's paintings, firecrackers, dragon lanterns, lion dances, temple fairs, social fires, reunion dinners, the New Year's Eve, paying homage to the New Year, and other customs with cultural connotations, aesthetic concepts, and the interest of life that create the atmosphere of the Spring Festival.

At present, what we lack is a new way to celebrate the New Year and a new carrier. How to make the Spring Festival really carry the deep meaning of traditional culture and civilization, so that the Spring Festival customs into the values of modern people, how to make the Spring Festival taste of the year, how to make people's days better, has become our most urgent task.