Gong Chi Fa Cai

Last week I had a chance to witness the famous lion dance in relation to the Chinese New Year Celebrations -The Year of Rooster.It was quite an new experience for me ..

In China, besides dragon dance, the lion dance is another popular recreation for the Chinese during their new year season. The 'Lion' which popularly exists in the Chinese culture and custom, is seemingly incredible because China does not have lions and the description of lions by the Chinese nobles derived from their imaginations. Chinese temples all over China and overseas had these imaginative lion sculptures placed in the frontages. These lions were far from the true likeness of a real lion because the real ones have no horns. These people were called 'lion-men' and they danced in tempo to the musical pieces called 'Tai-pin' melody.There are many different sayings about the origin of the lion dance but none with any real historical records. One saying quoted that 'Many years ago there was a lion which appeared in a small village and it caused harm to the people and domestic animals. There was a Kung-Fu expert who learnt of this and went into the forested mountain to figh t with the lion. He fought with the lion on three occasions but was unable to capture it. So he called up some of the villagers and trained them in Kung-Fu with the intention to kill the lion. A few months later, they went up to the mountain again and finally they killed the lion. The villagers, in order to celebrate this occasion, followed the steps of those who fought with the lion and thus the 'lion dance' was composed. Another saying was that 'the emperor of China of the Ching of the Ching Dynasty had seen a lion dance in one of his dreams and he ordered the guards of the palace to dance in accordance with what he had seen after he woke up. Of course the above two sayings were just legends.

Another aspect of the new year is the tossing of the raw fish salad - “Lo Hei”! Essentially you have a plate of ingredients, each specially chosen for its auspicious sound and meaning in Chinese. For example, the key ingredient is raw fish slices. In Chinese, this reads as “Yu Sheng” which sounds like “surplus and vitality”. Everyone is invited to take part in the “toss-up” to mix the ingredients.I did manage to toss using the chop sticks only to know this later.. The higher you toss, the better your prospects and fortune in the year ahead. It is actually a rare opportunity to mess up the table in the name of overflowing abundance!