#Travel
Each time spring comes, we are happy to celebrate 🎉 Tet holiday, normally it happens in the end of January or February according to the lunar calendar.
Although this year is a special case cause Corona virus, we still try to prepare some unique things in our holiday as flowers, sticky rice cake, fried spring rolls, and also buy something news to replace old ones. Tet holiday is also the occasion to express the respect and gratitude to our parents, our grandparents.
The traditional Tet festival lasts for three days. It is considered a time to begin new stuff, to discard the problems of the past year and start all over. People buy new clothes and often change jobs or switch careers. During the last week of the old year, they sweep away all the bad things that have accumulated in the previous 12 months with a thorough cleaning of their homes and gardens, especially including altars that honor gods and ancestors.
This festival is our biggest vacation yearly, we have 5-7 days to celebrate it with all members in our family and including our relatives, our friends, certainly all companies and restaurants, coffee shops close to allow their staffs go back their hometown.
Though we buy many flowers but we’ve never forgotten preparing peach blossoms (in North) or Mai flowers (in South) which are signal beauties of each family in Tet holiday.
In this occasion, all members make sticky rice cake (Chung cake) together which is made from sticky rice, bean, meat and some spices and put in to 4 “dong” leaves. After that, they are boiled for 6 hours to mix the tasting of all ingredients together. Besides it, there are a lot of traditional foods which people cook in this festival.
Normally we cook a meal which is called “goodbye old year and say hell new year” one to invite the old ancient go back and celebrate Tet with us in the afternoon at the end of year.
Tet is our relaxing time, people meet together and tell about all things in the last year. And elder and kids are received lucky money (we call “li xi”) to hope a wealthy, happy, healthy year.
There are some of the greetings you may hear during Tet:
An khang thịnh vượng: Wishing you safety, health and prosperity.
Vạn sự như ý: May all your wishes come true.
Of course, Chúc mừng năm mới. Happy new year.
On the other hands, there are a lot of public events to celebrate for the whole country. However, due to Covid 19, we stopped almost events as we only did fireworks one place in Hanoi, or Hochiminh stopped fireworks to avoid people centralize too crowded. And at the beginning days of year, many temples and pagodas postponed New year events for buddies. Therefore, we only go to pagodas and pray for new year and still keep the allowing distance, hoping Covid-19 will be ended soon to back as our normal life.
Wish you could come to our country next Tet Festival and celebrate with us.
All best wishes to you in New Year.
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2021
Donna Nguyen 