With Chinese New Year speedily arriving, and well on its way to taking place, we’re all eagerly awaiting the festivities to truly begin. But even while celebrating, it’s important to remember our manners, making sure that we stay respectful while having fun.
With that said, Chinese culture comes with many different beliefs and traditions to follow – and you might unintentionally disrespect someone if you make the wrong move. So here’s a few etiquette tips to keep in mind when you celebrate!
1. Give gifts in the right colours
Chinese New Year is a time of celebration and giving. More likely than not, you’ll be giving out some gifts here and there. But even with gifts, there’s some etiquette you need to take note of, especially during the Lunar New Year. Always keep in mind that colour has large significance in the Chinese culture.
Keep your gifts and packaging to red, yellow or gold colours. These colours symbolise wealth and prosperity to the recipient, helping to convey your well wishes to them. Remember to stay away from colours like white, black and blue. These are all associated with funerals and death, a topic that should be kept away from during times of celebration.
2. Receive with both hands
Another extremely important habit in Chinese culture is to remain polite and respectful. Always show your appreciation to others, especially your elders. During Chinese New Year, you’ll probably be receiving gifts and angpaos from other people.
When you do receive something, make sure to take it with both hands. Don’t just casually take it with one hand, or it’ll come off as a disrespectful gesture, and it makes you look very offensive. Demonstrate your gratefulness for the gift by receiving it properly – with two hands.
3. Don’t open gifts in front of the giver
On the topic of receiving gifts, getting something is always an exciting occasion. We’re all curious about the new addition, and want to open it immediately to check out what we’ve gotten. However, keep in mind that you shouldn’t open it in front of the giver.
This kind of behaviour is frowned upon, and it makes you seem rude. So, don’t just tear open your new gift or even ang paus! Have some restraint and wait until you’re in the privacy of your own home, then you can go wild and open it.
4. Clean the house
Now with all the visitation that’ll happen during the new year, it’s important to have a clean house. That’s a great way to impress guests, while also having a nice living environment. However, cleaning the house before Chinese New Year is important for another reason —- getting rid of bad luck.
Make sure to do a full sweep, and clear out all the unfortunate things that have happened in the past year, leaving your house open to good fortune once the celebrations begin. Do make sure not to clean after Chinese New Year begins, or you’ll only be sweeping out all the good things then. But no worries because you can clean after the celebration period ends.
5. Don’t cut hair
Now we all know the phrase “new year, new me”. However, Chinese New Year isn’t the time to be applying that. If you’re considering a haircut for the celebration, how about saving it until after it’s over? Why so? Well, the Chinese word for “hair”, fā (发), is also the first character in the word “prosper” ,fācái (发财).
By cutting your hair, it can symbolise cutting off your prosperity. In normal cases, that’s already a pretty bad situation. Right before Chinese New Year though? It’s not a sign that bodes well for the rest of your year, so let’s stay away from those hair salons during this time.
6. No negative emotions
Now, it’s already solid advice for us to keep negative emotions out the door. After all, anger and sadness generally hurt others around, and overall, it’s not a great experience for anyone involved. Around Chinese New Year though? It’s even more important to keep your positivity in check, and keep the happy levels up.
It’s believed that the way you enter a new year will be what dictates the rest of said year. So if you enter feeling annoyed or distressed, you might end up spending an entire year in that state! So think happy thoughts and enjoy the celebrations happening all around you instead of wallowing in sorrow.
7. Wear red
Lastly, we all want to look our very best for the festivities that take place, showing off our beautiful and stunning outfits to everyone. But to truly match the spirit of Chinese New Year, we should wear a lot of red during this period because it’s the colour of good fortune! Invite wealth, prosperity and so many more good things while still looking absolutely stunning.
Janae Lee contributed to this article.
