CHINESE NEW YEAR
Celebrating the Chinese New Year will make it easy to set some new year’s goals in case you didn’t start doing that since January 2019. The reason why the Chinese people and the Asian countries, which are influenced by Chinese culture, welcome the new year at this time is the start of a new moon, marking the lunar new year. So, while most European countries use the Gregorian calendar, which always starts on January 1st, the date of the Chinese New Year changes every year due to the moon phase. What is also interesting in Chinese tradition is that each year is dedicated to one of twelve animals: 2019 is actually the year of the Pig. This should explain your confusion as some designers like GUCCI bring out special collections featuring pig-themed motifs.
Since the oldest Chinatown in North America and the largest Chinese enclave outside Asia is located in San Francisco, you can take a trip to this place, when you want to take China for a “test drive experience”. Be assured: this is a very original and not at all idealized experience (as you might suspect in the USA). Only half the population in SF Chinatown actually speaks English – hence most signs are just written in Chinese. The Cuisine? Very genuine Chinese. Which can be a good thing if you’re already oversaturated with burgers. But if you’re not a huge fan of difficult-to-identify food do keep in mind, that SF has a geological joker to play: it’s so far in the north that there’s a huge supply of fresh Lobsters all year long.
