Not too much goes on around Chinese New Year. Restaurants and shops close down so people can spend time with their families. Red envelopes filled with money are given as gifts, and fireworks go off like crazy. Seriously, they were going off when we went to bed around 2am, yet managed to wake us up sometime around 7am. I think legend has it that long ago, a monster lived in the forest. Every year, he would come into the town and eat people. One day, when the monster was on one of his pillaging rampages, a little boy wearing red scared him away. That’s when people realized the color red was lucky and powerful. That’s also why today you see red lanterns, red envelopes, etc. The fireworks? Well, they scare the monster away of course, provided that people stay up all night. That may not be completely accurate, but I think it’s pretty close.
