7 Quick Takes: Chinese New Year (of the Pig)

1/ Turnip cake, red packets, flower markets, spring cleaning, red clothing, family, holidays and who even knew? I spent the whole of my Cape Town life clueless that so much festivity took place across the waters during this time of year: Chinese New Year. Its the biggest holiday time of year here and includes three consecutive days of public holidays. They don't mess around! Its the only time of the year that the majority of the city goes into shutdown mode, especially on day one. There is a whole lot of meaning and 'good luck' beliefs behind much of what happens, but we are quickly learning to enjoy the break it brings and some of the fun elements. We are far from celebrating it in any appropriately traditional way, but for those who have no idea what this time of year looks like, this is a bit of a snapshot of our last few days.

2/ The first two days of Chinese New Year are spent visiting family. Traditionally, the first day is for visiting paternal relatives and the second day is for visiting relatives on the mothers side.  Families decorate their homes with flowers, tangerines and candy platters, ready for the visitors.  This family reunion time is an important part of the holiday time, I guess similar to what we do around Christmas time with family, in the west.

3/ Just like any other holiday time, Hong Kong does not hold back on the decorations for Chinese New Year.  The city is adorned with reds and gold. There are also a myriad of events and celebrations held around the city at this time year, including lion dances, fireworks displays, lantern carnivals and night parades. We took our girls to see some of the decorations in the area, earlier in the week.

4/ Chinese New year is, of course, also all about the food. Its pretty much three days of feasting on traditional foods. One of the traditional or typical chinese new year dishes is called turnip cake. Last year we were given one and my girls were super excited. We followed instructions and served it up, much to their disappointment! Don't be fooled by the word 'cake', because there is nothing sweet about it. The main ingredients are turnip, rice flour and dried chinese mushroom and shrimp. Its all savoury and nothing cakey about it. Once I got my head around that, I actually quite liked it.

5/ Flowers are everywhere and make this time of year especially beautiful. Homes, offices, apartment blocks, and the streets are blooming! Apparently different flowers or plants have different meanings and so will be chosen and bought according to that. Flower markets are also a big attraction leading up to the CNY holidays. The biggest flower market at this time of year stays open to midnight, the few days leading up to CNY. On New Years Eve it stays open from mid night to 6am! We haven't ventured to one of these markets yet, apparently wisely so, as they get packed with crowds.

6/ Lai See, also known as 'red packets' is a big part of Chinese New Year. These 'red packets' are filled with money and are seen as a kind of blessing, passed on from employer to employee, married to unmarried and old (in age) to young. This also includes the security and cleaners in your block. The amount of money inside depends on the relationship with the receiver, so usually the closer, the more. Lets just say that we are going into our second Chinese New Year a little better prepared, having set some guidelines for our girls around how they will steward what they are given.

7/ Now it is Thursday evening and the end of day three of this CNY. In theory, it's back to school/work tomorrow, but good news is this whole week is school holidays (yes, again!) and Kev is off tomorrow, so its not over for us just yet. We may not have participated in much of the CNY traditions, but despite us not having family to visit, we have still had such lovely time with people. We have visited friends for meals and playdates and walked up the peak with our girls. They made it to the top, for the first time. Whoop! Whoop! Helps that they had buddies alongside them, keeping them distracted and motivated. We watched the CNY fireworks last night from our amazing dinner venue. I have always had a real love for fireworks and the girls have always wanted to see them, but the midnight game is not one I have been willing to try out with them. Amazingly, the CNY fireworks happen at 8pm! Amazing! And to top it all off, today we had our first braai (now referred to as barbeque) since arriving in Hong Kong. I would say that's a perfect way to end our second Chinese New Year.

Oh yes, and 'Sun Nin Fai Lok!'