This weekend saw the celebration of the Chinese New Year both across the world and locally, including a traditional celebration hosted by the Dartmouth Asian Organization for local children who participate in DAO's pals program, a recently-founded mentoring service.
Each of the 12 years in the Chinese calendar is named after an animal. 2003 is the Year of the Sheep.
The DAO celebration, held in Brace Commons Saturday morning, featured the making of traditional wall hangings, red packets and an explanationn of why sticky foods are made during the New Year.
On the 24th day of the last lunar month, the Kitchen God returns to heaven to give a report to the Jade Emperor, the ruler of heaven according to Chinese tradition, about the family's activities over the past year. At that time, some families traditionally offer the Kitchen God sweets to encourage him to give a favorable report or burn money to offset the costs of his journey to heaven.
Wendy Wong '03, chair of DAO's pals program, described one variation of this widespread tradition. One year, though, the Kitchen God simply became lazy: he slept all day and failed to pay attention to anything the people did.
When it came time for him to report to the Jade Emperor, he didn't know what to say, so he lied and said that the people had been unappreciative.
Shocked at how the people appeared to be wasting food, an angry Jade Emperor instituted a punitive wave of floods and famines.
The following year, the families thought up a plan. They starved the Kitchen God and then prepared especially sticky foods for him.
The Kitchen God thus greedily stuffed his mouth full of sticky foods, but when he turned to open his mouth, he discovered he could not after having eaten so much sticky food. The Jade Emperor, unsure of what to do, concluded from the Kitchen God's fat appearance that the families had treated him well, and the Jade Emperor rewarded the families accordingly.
Thus, Wong said, Chinese families still continue to prepare sticky foods during the New Year in honor of this story.
Traditional red packets are usually given from members of the older generations to members of younger generations, Wong said.
The red packets made by DAO and the youths involved in the pals program included "lucky candy," a type of candy which can be bought at Chinese grocery stores.
While the red packets typically contain money, DAO included chocolate coins instead, Wong said.
Chinese children traditionally put the packets under their pillows before going to sleep for good luck, said DAO mentoring program co-chair Bryant Ho '05.
The 24 inch wall hangings, highly similar to those on display at the Asian Studies Center, feature Chinese characters spelling out traditional expressions like, "Wherever you go, peace and tranquility."
The characters are often written upside down on such hangings to keep the good luck from falling out, Ho said.
There are few formal festivities held for Dartmouth students alone over the Chinese New Year, Ho said. He himself has generally celebrated by "eating some lucky foods" and cleaning his room in accordance with tradition the day before the New Year's festival.
32 children, ranging in age from two to twelve years, participate in DAO's pals program, Wong said.
Wong and Jennifer Sy '04 founded the program Spring term, with the help of Advisor to Asian and Asian-American Students Nora Yasumura, in order to supply Chinese children adopted by local non-Asian families with Asian role models.
