According to the old rules in Beijing, the New Year (Spring Festival) of the lunar calendar is celebrated almost at the beginning of the waxing moon." It is the coldest time of the year, when the crows freeze to death. However, since spring comes soon after winter, people do not let the cold dampen their enthusiasm for celebrating the New Year and welcoming spring. On the 8th day of the 12th lunar month, people make congee at home and in temples. This special congee is a sacrifice to the gods, but when you think about it, it is an expression of pride in the agricultural society - this congee is made of all kinds of rice, all kinds of beans, and all kinds of dried fruits (almonds, walnuts, melon seeds, lychee meat, lotus seeds, peanut rice, raisins, lingzhi rice ......). This is not porridge, but a small agricultural fair. On the day of Laha, you also need to soak Laha garlic. The garlic cloves are put into high vinegar on this day and sealed up for eating dumplings in the New Year. By the end of the year, the garlic soaked as emerald color, and vinegar also has some spicy flavor, color and taste double beautiful, so that people want to eat a few more dumplings. In Beijing, every family eats dumplings on New Year's Day. From the eighth day of the Lunar New Year, the store has been stepped up on the New Year's goods, and the streets are filled with stalls selling spring couplets, New Year's paintings, honey offerings, and daffodils, etc., all of which are only available during this season. These New Year's stalls make children's hearts beat a little faster. In the hutongs, the sounds of yelling were more varied and sophisticated than usual, and among them were those that appeared only in the month of Lunar New Year, such as the sellers of gendarmes, pine branches, barley rice, rice cakes, and so on. When there was an emperor, schoolchildren stopped going to school on the 19th day of the Lunar New Year and took a New Year's vacation for one month. Almost the first thing the children did to prepare for the New Year was to buy miscellaneous food. This is a variety of dried fruits (peanuts, jujube, hazelnuts, chestnuts, etc.) mixed with candied fruit, ordinary with skin, high-level without skin - for example: ordinary with the skin of the hazelnut, high-level with the hazelnut flesh. The children were so fond of these bits and pieces that even if they did not have dumplings to eat, they had to buy the mixture. The second most important thing they buy is firecrackers, especially the boys. I'm afraid the third thing is to buy playthings - kites, firecrackers, harmoniums, etc. - and New Year's paintings. The children are busy and the adults are nervous. They had to prepare everything to eat and drink for the New Year. They also had to make new shoes and clothes for the children so that they would be ready for the New Year. The 23rd day of the Lunar New Year was almost a "dress rehearsal" for the New Year. In the old society, the night of this day, every family sacrifices Zao Wang, from a dark child firecrackers will sound, with the sound of firecrackers to Zao Wang's paper image incineration, the beautiful name called Zao Wang sent to heaven. In the first few days, the street has more or less how much to sell maltose and sugar, sugar or long square or the size of the melon shape. According to the old saying, if there is sugar to stick to Zao Wang's mouth, he will not report bad things in the family to the Jade Emperor when he gets to heaven. Nowadays, there are still candies for sale, but they are only for everyone to enjoy and no longer stick to Zao Wang's mouth. After the twenty-third, everyone gets even busier. The New Year will be here in the blink of an eye. Before New Year's Eve, families must put up the Spring Festival couplets and must clean the house once, called sweeping. Meat, chicken, fish, vegetables, rice cakes and other things must be prepared enough, at least enough to eat a week - according to the old custom, most of the store closed for five days, to the sixth day of the first month before opening. If you don't prepare food for the next few days, it's not easy to replenish it temporarily. Also, the old society, the old mother theory, preaching in the New Year's Eve to cut out everything that should be cut out, so as not to be in the first day of the first month of the first five and then move the knife, move the knife cut is unlucky. This contains superstitious meaning, but it also shows that we are indeed peace-loving people, in the first of the year even cut the knife are not willing to move a. New Year's Eve is really lively. Families cooked New Year's dishes, and the smell of meat and wine was everywhere. Young and old, men and women put on new clothes, red couplets were put up outside the door, colorful New Year's paintings were put up inside the house, and every house was illuminated all night long without interruption, and the sound of cannons was heard day and night. People who work outside, unless absolutely necessary, must rush home to eat a reunion dinner, ancestor worship. On this night, except for very young children, no one sleeps, but to keep the New Year's Eve. New Year's Day is very different from New Year's Eve: New Year's Eve, the streets are crowded with people; New Year's Day, the stores are on the board, the door is piled up in front of the firecrackers set off last night, the whole city is resting. Men in the afternoon before the move, to relatives, friends to pay New Year's visit. The women received guests at home. At the same time, inside and outside the city, there are many temples open for people to visit, vendors set up stalls outside the temple, selling tea, food and a variety of toys. The Dazhong Temple outside the north city, the Baiyunguan Temple outside the west city, and the Fire God Temple (Factory Deen) in the south city were the most famous. However, the first two or three days of the opening of the temple, and not very lively, because people are still busy with each other to celebrate the New Year, no time for this. To the first five or six, the temple began to wind up, the children are particularly enthusiastic to go to the stroll, in order to see the wild scenery outside the city, you can ride a donkey, but also to buy those New Year's unique toys. Baiyun Guan outside the square of the race car racing; in the elderly, it is said that there are camel races. These races do not strive to see who comes first and who comes second, but rather to show off the fine manners and skills of the mules and horses and their riders in front of an audience. Most of the stores open on the sixth day of the month, and firecrackers are again set off, and the whole town is filled with the sound of cannon from daybreak until early morning. Although the store is open, it is not very busy except for the stores selling food and other important daily necessities, and the workers in the store can take turns to visit temples, walk along the footbridge, and listen to the opera. The Lantern Festival (from the 13th to the 17th day of the first month) is the climax of the New Year when the Yuanxiao (soup dumplings) go on sale. New Year's Eve is lively, but there is no moonlight; the Lantern Festival, on the other hand, happens to have a bright moon in the sky. New Year's Day is decent, with bright red spring couplets pasted in front of every house and people wearing new clothes, but it's not beautiful enough. Lantern Festival, everywhere hanging lights and colorful, the whole street is like a happy event, fire and beautiful. Famous old store to hang out hundreds of lamps, some are all glass, some clear is a cow horn, some are yarn lamps; some of all shapes and colors, some through the colorful painting of all the "Dream of the Red Chamber" or "Water Margin" story. This, in those days, is also a kind of advertisement; once the lamps are hung up, anyone can enter the store to visit; in the evening the lamps are lighted with candles, and the number of viewers will be even greater. This advertisement was not vulgar. Dried fruit store in the festival of lights also do a batch of mixed business, so every unique, made all kinds of ice lanterns, or wheat seedlings made into one or two turquoise dragon, to attract customers. In addition to hanging lanterns, the square also put flowers. In the City God Temple and lit up the fire judge, the fire tongue by the judge's clay statue of the mouth, ears, nose, eyes out. In the park, sky lanterns are set off and fly into the sky like giant stars. Men and women came out to walk on the moon, watch lanterns and fireworks; the streets were crowded with people. In the old society, women didn't go out easily, so they could have some freedom in the lantern festival. Children buy all kinds of firecrackers and even if they don't go out to the streets to play, they can still have fun at home with sound and light. There are also lanterns at home: horse lanterns - the original movie - palace lanterns, paper lanterns of all shapes and colors, and gauze lanterns with small ling inside, which will tinkle when the time comes. Everyone must also eat soup dumplings ah. It was indeed a wonderful and happy day. In the blink of an eye, to the end of the temple, the students should go to school, adults go to do things as usual, the New Year in the first month of the nineteenth end. Lunar New Year and the first month, in the rural community is the most free time, and pigs, cows and sheep are also growing, so we have to kill pigs and slaughter sheep, to reward the hard work of the year. After the Lantern Festival, the weather turns warm and everyone goes back to work. Although Beijing is a city, it also celebrates the New Year together with the rural society, and it is very lively. In the old society, the New Year was inseparable from superstition. The congee of Laba, the sugar of Guandong, and the dumplings of New Year's Eve had to be offered to the Buddha first, and then people would enjoy them. New Year's Eve to receive the God; the second day of the New Year to sacrifice the God of Fortune, eat wonton soup (wonton), and some people have to go to the temple of the God of Fortune to borrow paper wonton, grab burn the first incense. On the eighth day of the first month, we should give the old people Shunxing and pray for longevity. Therefore, the biggest waste of money at that time was the money for buying incense, wax and paper horses. Nowadays, people are not superstitious, so they save this expense and use it for useful purposes. It is especially worth mentioning that children nowadays celebrate New Year's Eve happily without being tainted by superstition, and they are only happy without fear - fear of God and fear of ghosts. Perhaps, the New Year is not as lively as before, but how sober and healthy it is. In the past, people New Year's Eve is the blessing of the gods and ghosts, and now it is the end of the year of everyone's labor, we should also be happy New Year's Eve.