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The Lunar New Year is the most significant festival for ethnic Chinese around the world, wherever they come from. It is a very jubilant occasion mainly because it is the time when people take a break from work to get together with family and friends.

The origin of the Lunar New Year Festival can be traced back thousands of years, involving a series of colorful legends and traditions. One of the most famous legends is Nian ¦~, an extremely cruel and ferocious beast that the ancients believed would devour people on New Year's Eve. To keep Nian away, red-paper couplets are pasted on doors, torches are lit, and firecrackers are set off throughout the night, because Nian is said to fear the color red, the light of fire, and loud noises. Early the next morning, as feelings of triumph and renewal fill the air at successfully keeping Nian away for another year, the most popular greeting heard is gong hei fat choy or "congratulations."

Even though Lunar New Year celebrations generally last for only several days, starting on New Year's Eve, the festival itself is actually about three weeks long. It begins on the twenty-fourth day of the twelfth lunar month, the day, it is believed, when various gods ascend to heaven to pay their respects and report on household affairs to the Jade Emperor, the supreme Taoist deity. According to tradition, households busily honor these gods by burning ritualistic paper money to provide for their traveling expenses. Another ritual is to smear malt sugar on the lips of the Kitchen God, one of the traveling deities, to ensure that he either submits a favorable report to the Jade Emperor or keeps silent.

Next, "spring couplets" are hung up around the house. Spring couplets are paper scrolls and squares inscribed with blessings and auspicious words, such as "good fortune," "wealth," "longevity," and "springtime." The paper squares are usually pasted upside down, because the Mandarin word for "upside down," dao, is a homonym of the word "arrival." Thus, the paper squares represent the "arrival" of spring and the "coming" of prosperous times.

On Lunar New Year's Eve, family members who are no longer living at home make a special effort to return home for reunion and share in a sumptuous meal. At that time, family members hand out hong bao, or "lucky money" in red envelopes, to elders and children. They also try to stay up all night to welcome the New Year, as it was long believed that by doing so on New Year's Eve, their parents would live a longer life. Thus, lights are kept on the entire night--not just to drive away Nian, as in ancient times, but also as an excuse to make the most of the family get-together. In addition, some families even hold religious ceremonies after midnight to welcome the God of the New Year into their homes, a ritual that is often concluded with a huge barrage of firecrackers.

Chinese New Year, also known as the Lunar New Year or the Spring Festival is the most important of the traditional Chinese holidays. It consists of a period of celebrations, starting on New Year's Day, celebrated on the first day of the first month of the Chinese calendar. This is the day of the second new moon after the winter solstice, unless there is an intercalary eleventh or twelfth month in the lead-up to the New Year. In such a case, the New Year falls on the day of the third new moon after the solstice. (The next time this occurs is in 2033.) The Chinese New Year period ends with the Lantern Festival, on the fifteenth day of the festival.

According to legend, the beginning of the year began with month 1 during the Xia Dynasty, month 12 during the Shang Dynasty, and month 11 during the Zhou Dynasty, but intercalary months were added after month 12 during both the Shang Dynasty according to surviving oracle bones and the Zhou Dynasty according to Sima Qian. The first Emperor of China Qin Shi Huang changed the beginning of the year to month 10 in 221 BC. Whether the New Year was celebrated at the beginning of these months or at the beginning of month 1 or both is unknown. In 104 BC, Emperor Wu established month 1 as the beginning of the year where it remains.

According to legend, in ancient China, Nian ("年獸 Nyan"), a man-eating predatory beast from the mountains, could infiltrate houses silently. The Chinese were always very scared of this monster. The Chinese later learned that Nian was sensitive to loud noises and the color red, and so they scared it away with explosions, fireworks and the liberal use of the color red. So "GuoNian" actually means "Passover the Nian". These customs led to the first New Year celebrations.

Another popular legend is about Chinese New Year Eve, which is called "ChuXi" or 除夕 in Mandarin Chinese. "Chu" means "get rid of" and "Xi" is the name of a legendary man-eating beast that preys once a year on New Year Eve. When Xi arrived, people use firecrackers to scare Xi away. Once Xi ran away, people joined together to celebrate for another year of safe life.

Celebrated internationally in areas with large populations of ethnic Chinese, Chinese New Year is considered to be a major holiday for the Chinese as well as ethnic groups such as the Mongolians, Koreans, the Miao (Chinese Hmong), the Vietnamese (see Tết), Tibetans, the Nepalese and the Bhutanese (see Losar) who were strongly influenced by Chinese culture in terms of philosophical and religious worldview, language and culture in general. Chinese New Year is also the time when the largest human migration takes place when overseas Chinese all around the world return home on the eve of Chinese New Year to have reunion dinners with their families.