Far and away the most important holiday in China is Spring Festival, also known as the Chinese New Year. To the Chinese people it is as important as Christmas to people in the West.
The dates for this annual celebration are determined by the lunar calendar rather than the Gregorian calendar, so the timing of the holiday varies from late January to early February.
To the ordinary Chinese, the festival actually begins on the eve of the lunar New Year's Day and ends on the fifth day of the first month of the lunar calendar. But the 15th of the first month, which normally is called the Lantern Festival, means the official end of the Spring Festival in many parts of the country.
"Guo Nian," meaning "passing the year," is the common term among the Chinese people for celebrating the Spring Festival. It actually means greeting the New Year.
At midnight at the turn of the old and New Year, people used to let off fire-crackers which serve to drive away the evil spirits and to greet the arrival of the New Year. In an instant the whole city would be engulfed in the deafening noise of the firecrackers.
Chinese Spring Festival celebrating the end of winter and the warmth of spring. It began in the last day of the lunar year end in the 15th day of lunar New Year, also is the Lanter Festival.
During the Spring Festival, people use red lantern and Spring Festival couplets to decorate their house,put on all kinds of colored clothes. They often visit their friends and relatives or together eat dumplings, fish, meat and other yummy food.
The children are looking forward to receiving red envelope money. And together they set off fireworks,with joy and excitement. There will be dragon and lion dance and some other carnival activities on the street.
CCTV will held the grand Spring Festival gala and everyone will sit in front of the TV to watch it.
Spring Festival is a traditional festival in China and some Asian nations. Because legend has it that the beast is afraid of red, afraid of fire and afraid of sound, so people will have couplets, firecrackers,gongs and drums and other customs.
Different periods, different regions, different ethnic customs are not the same.