Happy Chinese New Year - 2007!

[Mave]

Gong Xi Fa Cai! Kong Hei Fatt Choy! Wishing you a Prosperous New Year!

This is the year of the Pig aka Kisa's year (for you Furuba fans out there). CNY eve falls on the 17th of February and extends over 3 -15 days depending on your culture. XDD

Out of pure curiosity:

1) Who in CAA is Chinese? Or has some Chinese roots?
2) Are you from mainland China, Southeast Asia or migrated to another country (e.g. ABC - American born Chinese)?
3) If so, do you speak Chinese or any form of its dialects?
4) How traditional is your family in celebrating this CNY?
5) Is it a good or bad year Pigs (i.e. ppl born in the year of the Pig)?

1) I am Chinese but have some Thai blood in me.
2) I think my family is from the Fujian province but I'm probably the 3rd generation living in Southeast Asia.
3) Which leads me to say that my family speaks Hokkien but I'm familiar with Guangdong/Cantonese and of course, Mandarin
4) Not too traditional. We still observe some practices:

- buying new clothes for the first 3 days
- absolutely no sweeping of the house for the first 3 days
- eating yee sang (lo hei) and tossing it as high as possible
- cutting my hair before CNY and general spring cleaning
- having CNY decoration including a big of long red cloth at the entrance of my house, having orange/kumquat trees, ***** willows and some typical ang pows deco hanging around the house
- buying lotsa goodies such as nuts, cookies, grilled meat/sausages ('long yok'/'bak kuah')
- meeting up with family and friends, hopefully I can get lotsa nice 'ang pows ' (red packet) filled with $$$

5) Just curious: Some say it's supposed to be among your most lucky years but I've also heard otherwise. I'm born in the year of the monkey so I'm not too worried LOL. Gonna have to wait for the 12 year cycle again. XD

As a Christian, my family doesn't acknowledge the god of fortune and whatever gods are out there in (that I don't know of). We may visit ancestor's graves but we don't worship them. As much as we go along with the celebration for prosperity (i.e. health, $$$), we pretty much leave a lot of things to our Almighty God.

**************

It's not my style to create threads without responding to them but I'll be travelling back to my hometown the next few days so until then, pls accept my greetings and behave in this thread!

EDIT: ROTFL!!! I totally forgot that some words are censored in CAA but ppl, folks, the plant is really called just that. Trust me, no swearing was intended. XD

[Tenshi no Ai]

1) Who in CAA is Chinese? Or has some Chinese roots?

Well, my step-family are all mostly/half/partly Chinese

2) Are you from mainland China, Southeast Asia or migrated to another country (e.g. ABC - American born Chinese)?

I believe it was my step-dad's parents who came over to Canada from China (not sure the exact year) some many years ago.

3) If so, do you speak Chinese or any form of its dialects?

I myself only know a couple words of what my step-dad taught me. He said his siblings and him used to be fluent when younger, but not anymore. Kinda funny... he used to say for the longest that from the little he knew, it was Madarin... Then like, last year I think it was he talked to someone and they said it was Cantonese.

4) How traditional is your family in celebrating this CNY?

My step-dad's half bro was one of the head of the Chinese Society in town, so every year we'd go there to celebrate as we have a good feast, and watch the little kids dance around in the dragon suit. Now due to controversy and the fact that his bro isn't a member or whatever anymore, I doubt we'll be going v_v

5) Is it a good or bad year Pigs (i.e. ppl born in the year of the Pig)?

*shrugs* I'm a bunny/cat

[Tommy]

I have no Asian decent whatsoever but...

Happy Chinese New Year Anyway!

[Bap]

Isn't the Pig Kagura? @o@a

1. I am~!

2. Durh. Well, my parents are from Hong Kong, but I was born in America. xD

3. I can speak a real tiny bit of Cantonese, and it's not that great... xD; I can listen a bit better than I can speak.

4. Haha, I have no idea. @o@ xDD We buy like, candies and snacks and stuff, and of course we have the whole red envelope thing, but I don't think we're that traditional at all... xD

5. No say! xD I'm a sheep.

[Mr. SmartyPants]

I'm not Chinese... I'm Korean!

But uh... at one point we were all one big Asian race... so yeah! ANCESTRY!

And I'm a snake.

"Snnaaakkke! It's a snnaaakkeee!"

[Sammy Boy]

Mr Smartypants, how do you say Happy New Year in Korean, mate?

To answer Mave's questions:

1) Who in CAA is Chinese? Or has some Chinese roots?

My ancestors were from northern China. Here's more information:
http://www.yutopian.com/names/17/17han25.html

2) Are you from mainland China, Southeast Asia or migrated to another country (e.g. ABC - American born Chinese)?

I was born in Hong Kong. Both my parents are from northern China (Shandong province).

3) If so, do you speak Chinese or any form of its dialects?

I speak Mandarin and Cantonese. I would say I can converse fairly fluently in them (i.e. okay with most everyday topics)... but for theology and philosophy topics, I need to switch to English.

4) How traditional is your family in celebrating this CNY?

We are not very traditional at all. I am a third generation Christian (hence we are not a Chinese-tradition rich family), so we really don't celebrate many festivals (but this is more due to the fact that we're low-key people).

But, it's CNY's eve here for us now, so we had dinner with some relatives at a local restaurant. That's our way of celebrating.

5) Is it a good or bad year Pigs (i.e. ppl born in the year of the Pig)?

I am a ram / goat. Can't help you there. LOL.

Happy Chinese New Year everyone!!

[Debitt]

1) Who in CAA is Chinese? Or has some Chinese roots?
Half Chinese. :3

2) Are you from mainland China, Southeast Asia or migrated to another country (e.g. ABC - American born Chinese)?
My mom's side of the family came from Shanghai, went to Malaysia, and then my mother came here. So I'm american born, the rest of my family is mainly born in Malaysia. X3

3) If so, do you speak Chinese or any form of its dialects?
one day I hope to learn, but not right now.

4) How traditional is your family in celebrating this CNY?
Not very. We usually go out for a nice dinner on that day and sometimes I get red packets from my mom's friends, but that's about it. ....*pets red packets* >->

5) Is it a good or bad year Pigs (i.e. ppl born in the year of the Pig)?
XD Dragon~ <3

[mitsuki lover]

I am your average Northwest European American.So unless one of my ancestors came over with Attila The Hun I have to say as far as I know I have zilch Asian
ancestry.

[Mr. SmartyPants]

Mr Smartypants, how do you say Happy New Year in Korean, mate?

XDDD Not a stinkin' clue.

[mitsuki lover]

How to celebrate the Year of the Pig:
1.Have bacon for breakfast
2.Have ham for dinner
3.Have piggies in a blanket for breakfast
4.Watch Disney's Three Little Pigs
5.Have pork for dinner
6.See Charlotte's Web
7.Read Charlotte's Web
8.Name your first born Wilbur
9.Name your first born Arnold
10.Watche every episode of Green Acres that focuses on Arnold Zieffel
11.Buy or rent every DVD of Green Acres that focuses on Arnold Zieffel
12.Eat ham hocks for lunch
13.Read the Pigman
14.do the This Little Piggie nursery rhyme on your toes when no-one's looking

[Yahshua]

Eh Happy Chinese New Year 2007.

[Alice]

1) Who in CAA is Chinese? Or has some Chinese roots?
2) Are you from mainland China, Southeast Asia or migrated to another country (e.g. ABC - American born Chinese)?
3) If so, do you speak Chinese or any form of its dialects?
4) How traditional is your family in celebrating this CNY?
5) Is it a good or bad year Pigs (i.e. ppl born in the year of the Pig)?

1. Not a bit. : (
2. -
3. I learned a few words a year or so ago, and I even bought myself a dual language Chinese/American New Testament, but I've forgotten the things I learned.
4. My family has never celebrated it. But sometimes we read and discuss the different animals/years on the mats at the Chinese restaurant.
5. -

[Sammy Boy]

I think only married couples give out red packets, so you won't be getting any from me.

But here ...
* hands out candy * Hahah

[mitsuki lover]

In Bible School most of the Chinese I knew were from Hong Kong and so they all spoke Cantonese.However there was this one girl who was from Taiwan and spoke
Mandarin.

[blkmage]

My family's from Hong Kong, but I am born here in Canadia. I speak really cruddy Cantonese and our Chinese New Year festivities include eating tasty things and giving kids monies. Oh, and I am dragon, graar.

[JayF]

I'm Chinese, and I speak Mandarin and Hokkien. My mom's especially picky about the New Year celebration being a rather traditional Chinese. (No knives on the first day, etc)

[mitsuki lover]

Is Hokkien from Mainland China or Taiwan?

[Sammy Boy]

I believe Hokkien is the language of Fujian province, located in southeastern China (my geography is shocking, so if I am wrong, please correct me JayF). It is quite close to Taiwan in terms of distance, and many people in Taiwan also speak Hokkien (which I think is called Minanese in Taiwan).

JayF - just curious, does your mum allow people to sweep the floor on the first day of CNY?

[JayF]

I believe Hokkien is the language of Fujian province, located in southeastern China (my geography is shocking, so if I am wrong, please correct me JayF). It is quite close to Taiwan in terms of distance, and many people in Taiwan also speak Hokkien (which I think is called Minanese in Taiwan).

JayF - just curious, does your mum allow people to sweep the floor on the first day of CNY?

Technically, Hokkien, or Minan or Taiwanese is really a dialect, since they don't have a written script and words that describe terms unique to Hokkien are written with their Chinese equalvilent. (Don't tell the pro-independence Taiwanese this though.) Also, your geography is actually quite correct, Taiwan is Souteast of the Chinese mainland, just south of Fujian.

Also, my mum allows sweeping on the first day, but only INWARDS. All debris are also kept until the end of the first day. Vaccuming is aokay too, since nothing gets swept out.

She's not too traditional, wearing black on the first day is fine, but wearing plain white (mourning colors) however is still a taboo, which it should be as it is just plain rude especially if the person doing so was raised Chinese.

Incidentally, I belong to the Hakka minority, but do not speak the dialect because my father never spoke it to me, and my paternal uncles don't speak it much even among themselves

[Sammy Boy]

That's cool, thanks for sharing. My mum's Hakka too, because her ancestors were escaping a big war up northern China a couple of thousands of years ago, so I'm told.

Hakka sounds a bit like Cantonese. If you can understand Cantonese, you can kinda understand Hakka.

My family is very non-traditional, so anything I know about Chinese traditions are either from friends or reading. Could you tell me what the reason(s) for wearing white not being a good thing on CNY is/are? Is it a play on the sounding of the word for "white" or something like that (just guessing)?

Lastly, have you checked out: http://www.yutopian/names/ before? You can find out where your family name came from. It's interesting stuff.

[JayF]

Put simply, white is a mourning color. Traditionally, only widows, those in mourning and condemmed prisoners wore all white. So yeah, wearing an all white ensemble is generally considered plain inappropiate for the first day.

Note that wearing a plain white shirt with a patch of cloth pinned to the sleeve is a sign a person is in mourning, so this explains why white is simply not done.

[Sammy Boy]

Cool, thanks for the info.