Do you want to enjoy a Chinese festival while visiting Phuket?
The Chinese New Year is the vibrant festival that promises to be an auspicious and amusing event for the millions of people who witness and celebrate it. It is also one of the most popular Chinese festivals celebrated with great pomp and fanfare in Phuket.
When & Where?
Chinese New Year’s Day (Trut Chin in Thai) is the first day of the first month in the Chinese lunar calendar but it is different each year on the Gregorian (internationally used) calendar. It ranges between January 21 st and February 20 th of the Gregorian calendar. Every year during this time, the Chinese New Year is celebrated magnificently in Phuket, like other cities and towns in the world.
The Chinese New Year Festival generally takes place in the Sino-Portuguese quarters of Old Phuket Town with many exciting shows including the lion dance, the dragon dance and Phuket traditional dances. During this 2-day festival, four famous streets named Thalang Road, Krabi Road, Dibuk Road and Phang Nga Road remain closed to motorized traffic.
How it is celebrated?
Regular fireworks displays, colourful processions and street parades take place throughout the New Year day and evening to celebrate the Chinese New Year. Chinese houses and living rooms are decorated with vases of flowers, platters of oranges & ; tangerines and a tray full of 8 varieties of dried sweet fruits. The entrances of numerous houses and shops are also festooned with red banners and decorations to encourage prosperity and happiness during the coming year. Traditional music and dance performances, taking fun food and ethnic dishes, as well as martial arts displays add a new edge to this festival.
Chinese people bid the old year farewell and welcome the New Year through ear-splitting firecrackers. The firecrackers are part and parcel of the celebration that happen every day throughout the festival. Popular traditions dictate that on the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve, every door and even windows of a house have to be opened to allow the old year to depart.
What to Consume?
The Chinese New Year festival offers a great opportunity to consume special & tasty dishes.Various items of food are eaten during this New Year celebration than any other time of the year. Lots of traditional dishes with specific ingredients are prepared for family members,friends and the spirits of ancestors. Consuming such types of dishes at this time is considered lucky.
On the Eve of the Chinese New Year, Chinese families dedicate special dinner items to the spirits of the ancestors for their nice past contributions to the family prosperities. The communal feast of ‘weilu’ (meaning ‘surrounding the stove’) is arranged around the family dining table and is a perfect way to join the spirits of the past with the family of the present. This joining symbolises family unity.
Dresses & Gifts
On the occasion of the New Year, Phuket Chinese people wear red nice dresses for a happy and glorious future. They believe that appearance & attitude in the New Year creates the tone for the rest of the year, so kids and unmarried friends as well as close relatives are presented with ‘lai see’ (little red envelopes with money inside) for good luck. Oranges and tangerines symbolise abundant happiness, so if you visit a Chinese family during the celebration you must take these fruits as a gift to ensure a long relation with the persons you are meeting.
Shopping
Chinese New Year in Phuket is the good time when people get a nice chance to buy famous Thai items and international brands. Departmental stores and locals shops, like Central Festival Phuket and Phuket Weekend Market offer amazing discounts and deals on clothing, groceries, sporting gears, electronics, jewellery items for buyers in the hope of starting the new year in an auspicious and successful way. It is also a perfect time for visitors to shop in Old Phuket Town markets.
The Chinese New Year is the most famous and most important festival in Phuket. During this festival, tourists from many countries of the world including Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong flock to Phuket to enjoy these celebrations. You can also plan to take part in the celebrations of this glorious festival. Start your amazing holiday with PhuketNow.
