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Tet Nguyen Dan is a time for families to gather and reunite after a year of hard work and diligent studying. It is the biggest celebration of the year for the Vietnamese people, filled with countless customs, traditions, and rich cultural heritage passed down through generations.
1. Paying respects to ancestors
When family members gather together, they visit the graves of their ancestors to clean and tidy the area. Here, they offer fruits and incense to honor and invite the spirits of their ancestors to join in the Lunar New Year festivities with their descendants. This tradition takes place at the end of the year, from the 23rd to the 30th day of the twelfth lunar month.
The Lunar New Year market showcases an array of exotic goods and specialty items essential for the festive season. Overflowing with vibrant flowers, the indispensable symbols in every household are the apricot blossom, cherry blossom, or kumquat trees.
The atmosphere of the Lunar New Year market is always lively and bustling, serving not only as a place for shopping in preparation for the Tet holiday but also as a venue for gathering with relatives and friends to enjoy the festivities with a mix of excitement and anticipation.
4. Decorating and tidying up homes
The end of the year is the time when every family cleans and tidies their homes, ensuring they are neat and organized, with streets and alleys looking spacious and spotless.
As Tet approaches, cherry blossoms, apricot blossoms, and kumquat trees are all meticulously placed in a prominent position adorned with twinkling colorful lights. Red couplets, inscribed with calligraphy, are hung to invoke blessings for a prosperous and fortunate new year.
During this auspicious period, the ancestral altar is adorned with a tray of five fruits, symbolizing wishes for a year filled with joy and fulfillment of desires.
5. Wrapping Chung cakes
Vietnam's traditional Tet celebration would not be complete without Chung cakes and Giay cakes. Families gather to wrap and boil these cakes together. In the cold winter weather, every member sits by the fireplace, eagerly awaiting the cakes to cook, offering ancestral incense, as well as sharing conversations about work, family, and achievements of the past year, creating an intimate and cozy atmosphere.
6. Fruit tray
As Tet approaches and spring arrives, every family's altar is adorned with a beautiful fruit tray to worship their ancestors. The fruit tray is also seen as a symbol of the achievements after a year of hard work by farmers. These products, crystallized from the sweat and efforts of the laborers, are carefully selected through the seasons. Until the warm sunshine of spring arrives, choosing an auspicious occasion to respectfully offer to the ancestors.
Selecting and arranging the fruits on the tray depends on each locality's climate, produce, and cultural beliefs. Hence, people choose fruits with spiritual significance to design the fruit tray.
7. Ancestral spirits procession ceremony
On the evening of December 30th, families will prepare feasts with various delicacies and fruits laid out on ancestral altars. Incense will be lit as everyone clasps their hands in reverence, bowing to ask for blessings from their ancestors for a prosperous and harmonious new year, with all wishes fulfilled.
At the stroke of midnight, the ritual of welcoming the new year commences.
An ancient belief holds that each year, celestial authorities rotate their governance over the mortal realm, with a supreme figurehead overseeing all. The moment of transition symbolizes the passing of authority from the outgoing to the incoming celestial officials, signifying the continuous cycle of cosmic governance.
During these pivotal moments, families offer chicken rice, pastries, and fresh fruits as offerings outdoors, bidding farewell to the departing guardians of the old year and welcoming the incoming custodians of the heavens for the upcoming year, in hopes of divine protection and blessings for the year ahead.
9. Traditional house cleansing ritual (also known as earth exorcism)
Vietnamese people have a fascinating tradition of cleansing their homes at the beginning of the year, which has been inherited and strongly upheld by people of all ages and genders. The belief in selecting a suitable person to cleanse the house at the beginning of the year is that it will bring prosperity, harmony, and happiness to the family throughout the year. Therefore, people always pay attention to the person performing the cleansing ritual. In many regions, women are discouraged from being the first to perform the house cleansing ritual because of the belief that it does not bring luck to the household.
10. Spring luck harvesting
After bidding farewell to the old year and welcoming the new year, people gather to visit temples and pagodas to light incense and harvest spring luck. Upon returning home, they harvest a young tree branch symbolizing the arrival of luck into the house. However, in recent years, the practice of harvesting luck by breaking branches has not been well-received by everyone.
11. Traditions of Lunar New Year
On New Year's Eve, family members gather to exchange warm wishes. It's a time for children to show respect to their grandparents and parents.
It's a beautiful cultural tradition in Vietnam for friends and neighbors to visit each other's homes, fostering closer bonds and harmony.
12. Lucky Money (Celebrating Age)
In Chinese characters, 'lì xì' originally means 'fortunate money' or 'prosperity'. Hence, during the first days of the lunar new year, children celebrate their grandparents' and parents' birthdays and offer them lucky money along with heartfelt wishes.
During festive occasions like Tet, children eagerly anticipate receiving 'lì xì' envelopes, so parents and elders in the family prepare red envelopes containing a little money to celebrate their children's birthdays. Along with the money, they include wishes for diligence, academic excellence, and healthy growth.
13. Tet Gifts and Celebrations
On every Tet holiday, families traditionally prepare gift baskets to visit relatives and friends, expressing gratitude, respect, and deep affection.
However, one should not excessively indulge in Tet gifts as it may lose its inherent meaning. Affection should stem from the heart. During Tet, all that is needed is heartfelt wishes, gathering around the dinner table, a glass of fragrant wine, warm embraces, and firm handshakes that convey warmth. All these elements vividly demonstrate the beauty of Vietnamese cultural customs during Tet.
14. Commencing Trades
During the New Year, those with official positions commence their duties, students inaugurate their studies, farmers commence farming, artisans commence their crafts, and traders open their shops on auspicious days. After the first day of the lunar new year, everyone chooses a propitious day to commence their trades. If the first day is favorable, then the afternoon of the first day is auspicious for commencing trades. As for commencing studies, it is done after the New Year's Eve, preferably at an auspicious hour.
15. Observing Taboos and Not Littering on Tet
Hope you'll discover more about Vietnamese customs during the traditional Lunar New Year, according to the Vietnamese lunar calendar.
