At these days, driving in the streets, you can feel Tet is coming. The
streets become more crowded and decorated with coloured lights and red
banners. People are more hurriedly, busy buying gifts, cleaning and
decorating their houses. Shops and offices are ...
At these days, driving in the streets, you can feel Tet is
coming. The streets become more crowded and decorated with coloured
lights and red banners. People are more hurriedly, busy buying gifts,
cleaning and decorating their houses. Shops and offices are redecorated,
look brighter. Some streets which are used to selling flowers become
more colourful with many kinds of flowers...
Combining
with the merry atmosphere, peach blossom, apricot blossom and kumquat
trees are showing off their beauty with striking colour for traditional
Tet. Vietnamese people decorate their houses and offices with these
ornamental plants during Tet as symbols of warmth, wealth and good luck
for the country’s biggest holiday. Peach blossom is traditional at Tet
in the North while apricot blossom is traditional in the South. The
kumquat tree with its ripe deep orange fruits is popular throughout the
country.
A kumquat tree with many fruits
makes a house brighter and warmer, especially in the cold weather in the
northland. The tree is a popular decoration for the living room during
Tet. Its many fruits symbolize the fertility and fruitfulness that the
family hopes will come in the coming year. The more fruit on the tree,
the luckier your family. Greeting cards and good luck symbols are hung
from the Tet tree.
Therefore, kumquat trees of about two or three
feet tall are carefully selected and prominently displayed during Tet.
The bushes of the tree have been precisely pruned to display ripe deep
orange fruits with smooth clear thin skin shining like little suns or
gold coins on the first day of the lunar new year. Other fruits must
still be green to ripen later. This represents the wish that wealth will
come to you now and in the future. The leaves must be thick and dark
green with some light green sprouts. The fruits represent the
grandparents, the flowers represent parents, the buds represent children
and the light green leaves represent grandchildren. The tree thus
symbolizes many generations. Guests will caress the light green leaves
about to sprout and compliment the discerning host who chose so
carefully.
Talking about ornamental plants for Tet, you cannot forget
peach blossom and apricot blossom,
considered as traditional Tet’s flowers. Apricot blossom is present at
most families in southland and peach blossom is more popular in the
northland. They mark the end of winter and the beginning of spring. They
bring good luck to your houses in the new year, their colour is the
symbol of happiness. They are absolutely beautiful when they are full
bloom but they also really impress when they are tumbling down in the
drizzling, cover the ground by pink petals.
Peach blossom is an enduring symbol of the Lunar New Year. You can visit Nhat Tan (
Hanoi)
where the delicate art of growing the trees is passed from generation
to generation. According to Vietnamese legend, once upon a time, in the
East of the Soc Son Mountain, North Vietnam, existed a gigantic peach
tree. The tree was so huge that its shadow extended through out a large
area of land. Up on the tree, lived two powerful deities, Tra and Uat
Luy. They protected the people of the land in the surrounding areas from
the devils. The devils were so afraid of these two deities that even
the sight of the peach tree haunted them. However, at the end of every
lunar year, these two deities had to fly
back
to heaven for an annual meeting with the Jade Emperor. During this
time, the devils took advantage of this opportunity to harass the
peaceful inhabitants. To fight the battle against these devils, people
came up with the ideas of display a branch of the peach tree in the
house to scare away the devils. Since then, it becomes a custom of the
North Vietnamese to have a branch of a peach tree during Tet season to
protect themselves against the Satan soldiers. Those who do not have
peach tree can draw the figures of the two deities, Tra and Uat Luy, on
red paper, and display them in front of the house.
People say that if you have not had any
apricot blossom
in your house, that means you have not prepared for Tet. It is compared
as the symbol of the spring in Southern Vietnam and it has the similar
important role like the Christmas tree on the Christmas holiday. At the
moment of the previous years, if you go around a city, specially to the
flower-show, you can see the yellow or the white everywhere, that is the
color of apricot blossom. Although apricot blossom are planted mostly
in the southland, now you can easily buy one in Hanoi.
Apricot blossom
is more commonly used for this ceremony in the South because of the
warm weather. Apricot is a small, yellow or white flowering plant that
is used for decoration during Tet with the meanings of prosperity and
well-being for the family. The value of these flowers is determined by
the number of petals - the more petals, the more expensive the flower.
Lunar
New Year or Tet is a fete of the family, and the time for family
members to gather at home to enjoy warm atmosphere. Every Vietnamese
family has their own way celebrating the New Year, but they share the
same symbol of Tet in their mind, which distinct Vietnamese cultural
characteristics. The symbol is an indispensable part of Vietnamese
traditional Tet, and brings the Tet flavour to every family when the day
is coming.
In addition to such national dishes and products as "Fat pork, salted onions, parallel sentences written on red paper. Long bamboo poles planted upright, strings of fireworks, and square glutinous rice cakes", it is indispensable for each Vietnamese family to mark their Tet by
colorful golden kumquat trees, peach blossom as well as yellow apricot
flowers as the symbol of good fortune for the coming year.