Posts Tagged With: Chinese calendar

Why Does The Chinese New Year Date Change Every Year?

Posted on February 10, 2013 by ladyoftheabyss

Chinese New Year

By , About.com Guide

If you live in an area that has a Chinatown, chances are that at some point you’ve watched the Chinese New Year celebrations. However, Chinese New Year (also called the Spring Festival) doesn’t begin and end on a single weekend. Instead, the Spring Festival lasts a full fifteen days, with preparations beginning before the old year has come to a close. By the time the New Year arrives, families have already spent several days preparing for the big event; cleaning the house, buying gifts, and cooking festive foods.

People often wonder why the date for Chinese New Year changes each year. The Chinese calendar  is a combination solar/lunar calendar, based on a number of rather complex astronomical calculations, including the longitude of the sun. Chinese New Year falls on the second new moon after the winter solstice (all months begin with a new moon). In 2013, Chinese New Year Day falls on February 10th.

How did Chinese New Year come to be celebrated? According to an ancient legend, people were once tormented by a beast called a Nian – a ferocious creature with an extremely large mouth, capable of swallowing several people in a single bite. Relief from the Nian came only when an old man tricked the beast into disappearing. In reality, New Years festivities probably evolved from a desire to celebrate the end of winter and the fertility and rebirth that come with the spring, much like the ancient Roman festival of Lupercalia. Today, New Years is about family reunions and wishing everyone good fortune in the coming year.

The Spring Festival is China’s major traditional holiday, and is also celebrated in other parts of Southeast Asia, including Vietnam (where New Year’s Day is called “Tet”), Malaysia, Taiwan, and of course, Hong Kong. However, in my research I couldn’t find any mention of Chinese New Year’s celebrations in Japan. Lisa Heupel, an expert on Japanese Culture, came up with a possible reason – apparently the Japanese followed the lunar calendar until the middle of the nineteenth century. However, after the Meiji Restoration in 1868, they adopted the Gregorian calendar. Since that time New Years is celebrated on January 1st. While there are other popular festivals celebrating the arrival of spring, such as Hanami or the cherry blossom viewing festival, for the most part Chinese New Year goes unnoticed in Japan, except for a few small celebrations by the Chinese who live there.

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Today’s I Ching Hexagram for August 29 is 56: The Wanderer

Posted on August 29, 2012 by ladyoftheabyss

56: The Wanderer

Hexagram 56

General Meaning:  A seasoned traveler knows that a special kind of decorum is called for when one ventures far from home. He or she must develop a yielding nature outwardly, so that the ‘local contact’ or host can open doors and prevent unseemly errors. But inwardly, the wanderer knows that it is sometimes impossible to discern the true intentions of strangers — are they hostile, friendly or merely opportunistic?

The twin houses of mystery and discovery rule any journey. Each new day is launched on a fresh landscape, one that reaches out to grab our full attention. Though new adventures are a great teacher — and often a great equalizer — there is an art to living lightly in a strange land. Mindfulness and discernment become the keys not only to success, but also to survival.

If you are entering a new environment of any sort attempt to be sincere, flexible and undemanding, rather than obstinate. Let go of old attitudes and habits that could encumber you, or make you overly conspicuous. The onset of a great journey is not a favorable time to enter into binding agreements, or to start new enterprises.

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Today’s I Ching Hexagram for August 27 is 53: A Steady Pace

Posted on August 27, 2012 by ladyoftheabyss

53: A Steady Pace

Hexagram 53

General Meaning:  Like an ancient old-growth forest — where the subtle play of light, texture and shadows is the product of a process measured in centuries and inches — most things of lasting value develop gradually, at their own pace. The ability to learn from experience — one of humanity’s greatest capacities — implies constant yet gradual progress. The combination of stillness within and determination without are the essence of this dynamic. Good things sometimes sprout quickly; the truly delightful take much longer.

The principle of gradual development applies also to human relationships. For love and marriage or any important partnership to endure, progress must be slow but steady: slow enough to allow for the bonds to knit properly; steady enough to keep moving in the right direction.

You can’t expect to have everything all at once. Development must be allowed to take its proper course and allotted time; events must neither be rushed nor manipulated, but allowed to unfold naturally. In this way, you will come to enjoy long-lasting relationships and achieve success.

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Today’s I Ching Hexagram for August 23 is 12: Standstill

Posted on August 23, 2012 by ladyoftheabyss

12: Standstill

Hexagram 12

General Meaning:  A state of standstill is a state of decline. Confusion and disorder prevail. Inferior elements are on the rise, while the powers of clarity and creativity are waning. In such times, the wise take shelter in their own integrity and quietly remain faithful to their highest selves. Retreat from public activities and common exchanges until the time once again favors assertive action.

During periods of stagnation, inferior elements can rise to power. When the inmates are overrunning the asylum, summon up your fortitude, hide your worth and withdraw. Concentrate on your personal affairs with a quiet dignity, even if that means giving up short-term rewards.

Desiring to change a situation too quickly often creates extra conflict. By accepting hardship, while striving to maintain integrity, you are preparing for future growth. A seed of prosperity is often hidden inside the husk of misfortune.

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Today’s I Ching Hexagram for August 12 is 34: Great Vigor

Posted on August 12, 2012 by ladyoftheabyss

34: Great Vigor

Hexagram 34

General Meaning:  Congratulations! There is strength and vigor in this situation — like a ram who has knocked down a fence to free himself from captivity. This points to a time when a powerful force comes into its own and achieves influence.

When a leader finally comes into power, his or her personal strength usually has peaked. Great strength is required in climbing to the mountaintop, but once at the summit, the support of others is needed to maintain that lofty position. A shift in attitude becomes necessary. Raw strength must be tempered by wisdom; to maintain power, a strong leader must learn to give it away, to share it with others. Only then will his or her position be secure, for she will not only be the possessor of power, but the source of it as well.

If you find yourself in a high or strong position, it is especially important to act responsibly and react with care. Your personal power must not be allowed to degenerate into raw force that rides roughshod over everything in its path. A strong sense of responsibility to the collective good of all is the key to the successful exercise of strength. By following what we intuitively know to be for the greater good, we avoid reckless abuses of power that in the end undermine the source of our strength. Arrogance always contains the seeds of its own undoing.

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The Chinese New Year Festival

Posted on January 23, 2012 by ladyoftheabyss

The Chinese New Year is now popularly known as the Spring Festival because it starts from the Beginning of Spring (the first of the twenty-four terms in coordination with the changes of Nature). Its origin is too old to be traced. Several explanations are hanging around. All agree, however, that the word Nian, which in modern Chinese solely means “year”, was originally the name of a monster beast that started to prey on people the night before the beginning of a new year (Do not lose track here: we are talking about the new year in terms of the Chinese calendar).
One legend goes that the beast Nian had a very big mouth that would swallow a great many people with one bite. People were very scared. One day, an old man came to their rescue, offering to subdue Nian. To Nian he said, “I hear say that you are very capable, but can you swallow the other beasts of prey on earth instead of people who are by no means of your worthy opponents?” So, swallow it did many of the beasts of prey on earth that also harassed people and their domestic animals from time to time.

After that, the old man disappeared riding the beast Nian. He turned out to be an immortal god. Now that Nian is gone and other beasts of prey are also scared into forests, people begin to enjoy their peaceful life. Before the old man left, he had told people to put up red paper decorations on their windows and doors at each year’s end to scare away Nian in case it sneaked back again, because red is the color the beast feared the most.

From then on, the tradition of observing the conquest of Nian is carried on from generation to generation. The term “Guo Nian”, which may mean “Survive the Nian” becomes today “Celebrate the (New) Year” as the word “guo” in Chinese having both the meaning of “pass-over” and “observe”. The custom of putting up red paper and firing fire-crackers to scare away Nian should it have a chance to run loose is still around. However, people today have long forgotten why they are doing all this, except that they feel the color and the sound add to the excitement of the celebration.

The Holiday Spot

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Ancient Customs on this Day

Posted on January 7, 2012 by ladyoftheabyss

 

Ancient Customs on this Day

 

Jan 7 Nanakusa (Seven Grasses)


The Japanese eat a stew of rice gruel and seven fresh herbs to ward off disease during the upcoming year. In the Chinese calendar, which is still lunar, a similar holiday is celebrated on the 7th day of the 12th moon (see Jan 20).

Funk and Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend, Maria Leach, ed., Harper 1984

 

Jan 7 Grandmothers Day


In Bulgaria, boys duck the girls in the icy waters of rivers and lakes, an ancient custom which is said to bring them good health in the coming year. Like the customs described above on Epiphany, it seems to promise a fresh new beginning.

Source:Spicer, Dorothy Gladys, The Book of Festivals, The Womans Press 1937

 

Jan 7 Fire-Saving Day (Eldbjorgdagen)


In Norway, eldbjorgdagen means fire-saving day but a Saint Eldberga was later invented to explain the holiday. A report from Seljord in 1786, tells that the mistress of the house celebrates the return of the sun by drinking a draught of ale before the hearth, throws something into the fire and then says: “So high be my fire that hell is no higher or hotter.” Then the rest of the household sat around the hearth, with their hands behind their back, and drank ale from bowls which were drained then tossed behind them with a toss of the head. If a bowl landed face down, the drinker would die within the next year. Another custom was to toast the members of the house and the king. In Skedsmo, this was said to be the day the hibernating bear turns over in his sleep.

Source:Blackburn, Bonnie and Holford-Strevens, Leofranc, The Oxford Companion to the Year, Oxford University Press 1999

 

Jan 7 Distaff Day
Partly work and partly play
Ye must on St Distaff’s day
From the plough soon free the team
Then come home and fodder them
If the Maids a-spinning go
Burn the flax and fire the tow
Bring in pails of water then
Let the Maids bewash the men
Give Saint Distaff all the right
Then bid Christmas sport goodnight
And next morrow, every one
To his own vocation.

 

Source: Herrick, Hesperides 1648

 

Sometimes said to honor a mythical St Distaff, this is the day when housewives could begin spinning again, after the break from the usual routine represented by the midwinter holidays. In 1745, a woman at East Dereham, in Norfolk, England spun from one pound of wool, 84,000 yards of thread, earning a mention in the Proceedings of the Royal Society.

 

GrannyMoon’s Morning Feast Source: Wilson’s Almanack and School of The Seasons

 

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