Lunar New Year launches in Singapore

Dragon looking over Chinatown in Singapore

Wow!  have we ever learned a lot about this celebration!  Gong Xi Fa Cai!  A Happy and Prosperous Year of the Water Dragon!  The dragon is the only animal of the twelve animal signs in Chinese culture that is mythical.  Add to this that Chinese New Year, known in Asia as Lunar New Year or the two week long Spring Festival, also marks the event causing the largest human migration on earth , and you’ve picked up just a few things we’ve learned about Chinese New Year! 

Flowers, Laterns and Food!

What We’ve Learned: First, this is a special time for families of Chinese origin.  This is a time when they all work hard to get home to be with their families.  From all over Asia and the world – they go home to their town of origins and celebrate with their families.  The airlines even raise prices!   New clothes to signify the new year, red colors for luck, all manner of special foods and food that are auspicious for the year ahead.  The cities clear out, stores close because the workers go to their families and families are together for a great dinner and celebration.  The youngest in the family is meant to travel to the oldest, all across the fourteen days of the Spring Festival beginning with the new moon on January 23 and running to the full moon on February 8!  After the dinners, the celebrations!

Head of a Massive Lighted Dragon on New Bridge Road



The Dragon is one of twelve symbols, each symbol has five elements: wood, fire, metal, earth, and water.  And each year the symbol is either a Yin year or a Yang year. This year is a Yang Water Dragon. Water erodes stability so many are predicting that this will be a year of floods, earthquakes and turmoil.  But water brings life too and many others are predicting growth, and life!



...and the rest of her.  With Ricky and Christy



 The last time there was a Yan Water Dragon was 1952 – sixty years ago. The Japanese have a term for this, Kanreki, and when someone returns to the symbol of their birth after sixty years – they return to their birth itself and have a new beginning.  The Dragon is one of the strongest signs – all the signs are  good – and the dragon is one that is desired because of mythical leadership, intellect, and intelligence.  In Western cultures, dragons are feared – in Eastern cultures, they are good and revered.  Many births are even planned for dragon years – and planned for conception and birth in the dragon year (the head and the tail)!

Laterns Lighted