Happy Lantern Festival!

Lantern Festival, also known as Shangyuan Festival, Xiaozheng Yue, Yuan Xi or Lantern Festival, is the last important festival in the Chinese New Year. Lantern Festival is one of the traditional festivals of Chinese and Chinese cultural circles and overseas Chinese. January is the first month of the lunar calendar, The ancients called “night” as “宵(xiao)”,so the year the first full moon night of the fifteenth day is called Lantern Festival.

Since the ancient times, the custom of the Lantern Festival has been dominated by the warm and festive lighting customs. On this day, we will eat Tangyuan (rice dumplings), guess riddles, dragons, and lions, adding a lot of festive atmosphere to the Lantern Festival. Traditional customs go out to enjoy the moon, light the flames, hi-light riddles, eat a lot of lanterns, pull rabbit lights and so on. In addition, many local Lantern Festivals have also added traditional folk performances such as dragon lanterns, lions, stilts, dry boats, yangkoo, and Taiping drums.

The Chinese word “Tuanyuan” is similar to the “reunion”, which symbolizes the whole family’s roundness and happiness. The dragon dance lamp is a traditional festival that has been followed for many years in the history of the country. The dragon is a legendary auspicious mythical animal and a national totem.

When the Lunar New Year is on the 15th, the Spring Festival has just passed, and the traditional Chinese festival, the Lantern Festival, is ushered in. This is the first full moon night of the year, and it is also the time when the new year begins to rejuvenate.