The Lunar New Year celebration is a festival unlike any other. Also known as the Chinese New Year and Spring Festival, this celebration does not hold a specific date, rather it is based on the lunar calendar. The 12th lunar month marks the end of the previous year, with the capstone Lantern Festival landing in late January to mid-February.

Like Christmas in the United States, part of the Chinese New Year celebration promotes retail consumption and mass domestic tourism. It is estimated that this vast festival brings in the equivalent of nearly 80 billion US dollars. The travel surrounding the holiday is the largest annual human migration in the whole world, with nearly 3 billion people traveling around the country, most returning to their hometowns.

The Lunar New Year celebrations happen in phases.

Little Year

The first phase, lasting for 8 days, is called the Little Year. This is the time of preparation – cleaning, sweeping, and an overall fresh start mentality. In traditional and contemporary Chinese culture, red represents happiness and prosperity. Red is a lucky color. The belief is that by surrounding yourself and your home with elaborate red decorations, good luck will follow you into the new year.

New Year’s Eve

Chinese New Year’s Eve is aligned with the new moon. Families come together for a reunion dinner, many traveling long distances to return home. This dinner consists of traditional symbolically lucky meals and of course Chinese dumplings. From 8:00 pm-12:30 am TV sets in family rooms will be set to CCTV’s New Year Gala for a 4.5-hour live presentation of games, songs, dances, martial art exhibitions, sketches, music, acrobatics, drama, and more.

Spring & Lantern Festival

Following the previous night’s Chinese New Year’s Eve celebrations, this marks the beginning of the Spring Festival. Fireworks are loud and often set off on the ground to fend off evil spirits. Respect is paid to ancestors in the form of shrines and offerings. Both kids and unmarried adults receive money in lavish red envelopes from parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. The first full moon marks the last day of the Spring Festival. That last day is traditionally China’s most important festival: the Lantern Festival. These celebrations welcome Spring and symbolize the reunification of the family bond. The daytime is filled with folk dancing in the streets, food vendors selling tangyuan (ball-shaped sticky rice dumplings), music, art exhibitions, riddles, and more. As evening falls onlookers enjoy watching extravagantly crafted lanterns float into the night sky under the first full moon of the year.

One of the most phenomenal things about this holiday is the vast number of people and cultures coming together in welcoming the new lunar year. It is estimated that 20% of the world’s population takes part in celebrating this Spring Festival. This group of people is far from only Chinese citizens, large populations in Singapore, Malaysia, Korea, Vietnam, and Tibet have also traditionally taken part in this holiday. There are many small variations of this celebration, however, the underlying traditions remain the same.  It’s easy to imagine that with modern technology, and the advent of social media, this colorful New Year’s celebration will be around for many thousands of years to come.

Traditional Chinese Medicine has so much to offer you AND your family. Give us a call today to schedule your appointment.

Chinese New Year is the most important holiday in China for good reason. Each new year brings new energies and opportunities. The celebration begins the day after the first new moon between January 21 and February 20 each year and lasts until the following full moon. These 2 weeks is a time of welcoming and aligning with the new energies. This year, the Chinese New Year falls on Feb 1st and festivities continue through Feb 15th, 2022. Each year has a corresponding element and animal of the Chinese zodiac. 2022 is a water-tiger year that holds a lot of promise for an exciting, productive year.

This water-tiger year is in gear to be a faster-paced, more passionate year after a slower year of the Ox (2021) and a very challenging year of the Rat (2020). The tiger has been sleeping, awaiting his time for action. 2022 has great potential to be a year of change because of the energy of the tiger: brave, self-assured, and ready to pounce. Individually we might be inspired to embark on new adventures, such as travel or moving, or starting a new business. Collectively, there may be an energetic shaking off of stagnation brought on by the past couple of years of the pandemic. It will be a year of exploring new ideas, and not shying away from challenges. If energy is not allowed to flow (individually and/or collectively) there may be some restlessness or unpredictable behaviors. It is also important to balance the aggressive energy of the tiger with times of rest. Even tigers take cat naps. This is a water year, so the yin energy of the water can help to balance the fierce fiery nature of the tiger.

Master Lu's Health Center, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Acupuncture, Cupping, Herbal Medicine, Moxibustion, Tai Chi, Kung Fu, Chinese New Year, Lunar New Year, Year of the Tiger, 2022

In terms of health for this year, keep that balance in mind. Get moving, embrace life, face challenges, and be brave but take time for relaxation, meditation, and proper sleep. The tiger is associated with the liver and gallbladder organs as well as the lung channel. We can give some extra support to these systems this year by:

For extra luck this year:

Chinese New Year food traditions are empowered with symbology. The idea is to signify prosperity and abundance with traditions such as cooking extra food to make sure there are leftovers and cooking coin-shaped cookies or dumplings representing pockets of money. Traditions can be considered ritualistic practices that help to infuse our lives with meaning and intention. And cooking is such a delicious opportunity to bring rituals into our celebrations.

Enjoy this dumpling recipe in celebration of the year of the Tiger. Just remember to fill them with not only the physical ingredients but your own intentions for a prosperous healthy new year!

Ingredients:

Dumpling wrappers (home-ade or store-bought)

Sesame oil

filling:

Cooked & chopped Chicken or Tofu (white color to support lungs)

Cooked & chopped dark leafy greens (support liver blood)

Pungent spices like fresh ginger and black pepper (open/move lung qi)

for dipping:

Soy sauce

Rice wine vinegar (helps to relieve liver stagnation)

Chopped green onions (benefit lung qi)

Happy New Year of the Water-Tiger!

Don’t forget to make acupuncture part of your new year’s celebration and get in for some treatments to fortify your own inner-tiger vitality and get the most out of 2022! Call today to schedule your Acupuncture appointment! Rawr!

Come and celebrate the year of the Pig with us and bring in the Chinese New Year! This will be a great activity for family and friends.

We would like to invite everyone to Master Lu’s Chinese New Year Celebration and Demonstration to bring in the Year of the Dog!

恭喜發財!

Master Lu offers Kung Fu Training!

The Chinese New Year celebration will be held at

Master Lu’s Health Center Saturday February 10th at 6:00 pm

Demonstrations will include

Everyone is invited so bring your family and friends.  The event is FREE!

It is a great time to come and learn more about Chinese martial arts, Chinese medicine, and Chinese culture.

Master Lu’s Health Center
3220 South State Street
Salt Lake City, UT 84115

 

 

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Master Lu has been practicing Acupuncture and Chinese martial arts for over 40 years. He was one of the first Licensed Acupuncturist in the state of Utah. He was trained in Taiwan in both Acupuncture and Chinese martial arts mainly Northern Shaolin Kung Fu and Old Yang Style Tai Chi. Master Lu was also twice national champion for full contact fighting in Taiwan.

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