Chinese New Year is the longest and most important celebration in the Chinese calendar. The Chinese year 4712 begins on Jan. 31, 2014.  People dress in red and children receive gifts of “lucky money” contained in red envelopes. The colour red symbolizes fire to drive away bad luck.  Traditionally households thoroughly cleanse the house to sweep away ill fortune and make way for good luck, decorate windows and doors with red paper-cuts and light firecrackers.   Festivities often continue until the Lantern Festival, held on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. The highlight of this festival is often considered to be the dragon dance. Traditionally the dragon is held aloft by young men who dance as they guide the colorful beast through the streets.

This is the Year of the Horse and those born in this year are believed to be cheerful, skillful with money, perceptive and witty.