I really wanted to celebrate Seolnal, the Korean version of Lunar New Year so at the last minute I visited the market expecting to find "ready made" rice cake soup, Tteokguk. This soup is traditionally eaten eaten at Lunar New Year to bring good luck and an extra year of life in the New Year. Every person is considered one year older at the same time at Lunar New Year. You can learn a lot more about Tteok from Korean Dreamer.
The market had the ingredients to make tteokguk, but I was running out of time with Lunar New Year only hours away. I wanted to take something to share the occasion with my colleagues at work, so time was running out! I looked around, and found the Chinese candies that you see in the picture. Candies like these are given to children as part of the Chinese New Year's Celebration. I also bought some ginger candies as you can see on the right. These candies are quite gummy and sticky and have a sharp ginger taste. I like to suck on them until they disappear in my mouth. These would be perfect to share at work.Another Chinese tradition for Lunar New Year is to post "couplets" by your doorway. These are pairs of printed wishes for the new year. I put a couplet on each sides of my office doorway at work. My couplets are printed on red cardstock in beautiful Chinese characters. One says " May you be blessed with peace and safety in all seasons" which in Chinese would sound like "si ji ping an." The other one says "May you be blessed with peace and safety wherever you are" which in Chinese would sound like "chu ru ping an."
I shared the candies with my coworkers with hopes that they will have a safe, healthy, and profitable New Year. Guonian is a Chinese New Year expressions that means that we made it through the old year. Another Chinese New Year expression is Bainian which means congratulations for the New Year.
So to you I say Guonian and Bainian and hope that you have a healthy and prosperous New Year!
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