Eileen Zheng

After Christmas, what comes next? Of course: New Years! But what’s normally thought of as blowing party horns and kissing at midnight on January 1, that’s not how it is for those of Chinese heritage.

Chinese New Year, celebrated on January 25, is a bit different than the New Year’s celebration people are used to. “[Chinese New Year] is a day where you get family together and you just celebrate each other’s presence,” says West senior Eileen Zheng. “We have the color red a lot because it means good luck for the new year. We get red envelopes filled with money and it represents good fortune.”

Though the Zheng family celebrates this holiday, it isn’t a replacement for Christmas.”We’ve never had a tree in our house. We’ve never had the big family dinner, and we’ve never had the whole setup,” Zheng explains. “We got a lot of business at our family-ran restaurant Great China that day, so we basically work the entire day of Christmas and it’s not different from any other regular day.”

The practices of Chinese New Year are also different than the traditional new year. One tradition is burning fake money and watch the ashes float away as symbolism of good omen from their ancestors.

Chinese New Year is more than giant dragons and the different zodiac signs. It’s a family-oriented holiday based on good fortune and celebrating ancestry.