Chinese New Year Red Envelopes: How to Give and Receive “hóngbāo” Like a Local

Chinese New Year Red Envelopes: How to Give and Receive “hóngbāo” Like a Local

Delicious dinners and family reunions. Homemade dumplings, fish and glutinous rice balls. These are just some of the traditions of the Chinese New Year for millions of people around the world. There is much to celebrate as we ring in the Year of the Dog this January 16th, but one New Year’s tradition remains a favorite for a lot of people, young and old: Red Envelopes or hóngbāo|红包. These lucky red packets stuffed with cash are just as fun to give as they are to receive. But for Mandarin learners, this custom may leave you feeling nervous. Perhaps you wish to partake in the fun, but are wondering who exactly should you give them to? You could go broke trying to give a red packet of cash to everyone you know! And what is the proper way to receive a red packet? Have no fear! This Chinese New Year, learn how to give and receive hóngbāo like a true local. Below are the three things you need to know about this fun yet important Chinese New Year tradition that has stood the test of time.

  1. Who gives and who receives?

Children are the largest receivers of hóngbāo, called Yāsuìqián| 压岁钱. Any adult can give children red envelopes, but if you are married, there is a certain expectation for you to give to the younger generation (wǎnbèi|晚辈), as your married status signifies you have started your own family. However, children are not the only receivers of lucky money. Working professionals, regardless of age, often give hóngbāo to elders (parents or grandparents), as a sign of respect known as xiàojìng | 孝敬, an important concept in Chinese culture.

Generally, it is acceptable for anyone to give a hóngbāo, except to people of similar age. That will only lead to an awkward situation that is best avoided.

  1. How to properly receive lucky red envelopes.

Before receiving a hóngbāo, one should have a few traditional New Year’s well wishes (zhùfú huà｜祝福话) ready to recite, such as “Zhù nǐ xīnnián kuàilè, shēntǐ jiànkāng|祝你新年快乐，身体健康”, a common wish for a happy new year and good health. Often, the children will try to come up with the wittiest phrases to recite before bravely asking for their hóngbāo. When receiving a red envelope, just remember: never open your red packet in front of the giver.

  1. How much money should you give?

You can give as much as you wish and can afford to give. There is no standard amount, as it depends entirely on your economic situation, and your relationship with the receiver. A close relative would typically expect to receive more than a distant family friend. Just remember: crisp, new bills should be given to signify luck, and coins should be avoided.

Since 2014, red packets have also entered the digital age, as with most other things in China’s booming economy. Wechat Red Envelopes can now be sent electronically, of course, reserved for those who are more technologically inclined.

Yet, there is still something beautiful about keeping to tradition. By following the above customs of giving and receiving hóngbāo this Chinese New Year, you will be sure to gain appreciation and respect of those around you who are celebrating the Chinese culture’s most important holiday of the year.

Learn more about the intricacies of giving and receiving hóngbāo in Chinesepod’s entertaining lesson.

Happy Chinese New Year!

Xīnnián kuàilè! 新年快乐

Dàjí dàlì 大吉大利！

If you found this blog post interesting, you will love our special Chinese New Year’s playlist. With over fifteen lessons, you have the option to learn about many different facets of the Chinese Spring Festival. Subscribe today to get access!


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6 Simple Ways Anyone Can Celebrate Chinese New Year

6 Simple Ways Anyone Can Celebrate Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is widely considered to be the most important holiday in China. Known in Mandarin as Chūnjié｜春节 or Guònián｜过年, it is a period symbolized by family reunion (tuánjù|团聚), and represented by various customs that Chinese people across the world take part in over a span of several weeks leading up to and following the start of the new year. This month, as we get ready to say goodbye to the Monkey and welcome in the Fire Rooster, remember, just as so many people around the world celebrate Christmas regardless of culture and ethnicity, you don’t have to be Chinese or living in China to celebrate Chinese New Year. This special holiday is really about family, a fresh start, and good wishes for you and your loved ones. True to the essence of Chinese New Year, here are 6 simple things you can do this year to join in on the festivities and bring happiness to those around you, wherever you may be in the world.

Read More

New Year and New Language with ChinesePod Stories

New Year and New Language with ChinesePod Stories

Story-based series are my favorite feature on ChinesePod. Regardless of the topic, they sustain an element of curiosity from lesson to lesson. Watching my kids grow and learn, I’ve seen that one of the most important ways for them to absorb language is listening to stories. They love it. They soak up every word. Even if the lines aren’t exactly Shakespeare, they’re still curious to know what happens next. Drama and suspense make things memorable.

The first extended story I listened to was the 9-part Intermediate-level “Beauty Pageant for Bloggers” series. To say that this topic didn’t interest me would be a major understatement. However, the opportunity to participate in an unfolding plot line in Chinese for the first time was thrilling. I gained an appreciation for why kids want to watch the same simple shows over and over: Each time, they’re picking up something new.

The next series I heard was a real treat: The 17-episode Lili and Zhang Liang love story. When you put the dialogues into a playlist, they last for a whopping 26 minutes. And remember: This entire drama is appropriate for HSK 4 learners. I know of nothing else like it out there.

Lili and Zhang Liang Love Story

The Intermediate level gives us several more, including Lao Wang’s Office, a mixture of useful office language with the realistic and intense conflict between new and old management.

Jizhou

At the Upper Intermediate level, things get even better. The suspenseful Jizhou series is a strange story about a couple who travel to a remote mountain village. The man disappears after hearing a strange flute, and no one but the woman remembers that he existed. Creepy. I recently played the first dialogue for my 5-year-old, and he wouldn’t let me stop until he heard the whole story.

Perhaps the most popular story in ChinesePod history is the 11-part Detective Li crime series. Initially, it’s like a TV show where each installment stands alone, but the further it goes, the more entangled the episodes—and the mystery—become. The audio production values are on par with Hollywood, and the plot is so entertaining that I plan to re-study this whole series in the coming months. Warning: Some episodes are not for the squeamish!

Funny Business

In a similar genre, Funny Business is actually a continuation of Lao Wang’s Office, but now with a surprising turn to the underworld. Lao Wang’s failure in the office pushes him into new and “creative” ways of making money that cause his accountant to start asking potentially fatal questions.

There are too many Upper Intermediate series to name, but a couple more deserving mention are the Pregnancy Series and The Seven Year Itch, both dealing with the realities of family life.

On the Advanced level, we get a dramatic introduction to archaic language: 小太监进宫 tells us of a young eunuch dealing with catty intrigue in the Emperor’s palace, while 孙悟空三打白骨精 introduces us to a beloved character every Chinese child knows—the Monkey King.

扎着麻花辫的女孩

While shorter than most others at only 3 lessons, 扎着麻花辫的女孩 provides gripping audio and big twists with each episode.

If these are all out of your reach, don’t despair! There’s the hilarious junior high Yang Jie’s Diary for Elementary learners, detailing “the simpler days of ugly boys, teenage angst and unrequited crushes.”

Most of the above links will only take you to the first lesson. I’ve created a more complete list of links to these and other ChinesePod stories on my personal blog.

Even if you’re not interested in a particular topic, the opportunity to hear a developing story in level-appropriate Chinese is priceless. I’d recommend resisting the urge to listen ahead. Don’t spoil the story! Instead, study each lesson thoroughly before moving forward.

If you liked this blog post. Check out “Phrases which will Impress Your Chinese Friends” and “Back to School”

Popular Chinese Cuisine: Szechwan

Sichuan cuisine, is also known or spelled as Szechwan cuisine, or Szechuan cuisine (/ˈsɛʃwɒn/ or /ˈsɛtʃwɒn/) and it is a style of Chinese cuisine originating from Sichuan Province. We will use the contemporary spelling: Sichuan

If Cantonese style cooking is the most popular in the United States, Sichuan is the most popular in China. As noted it originated from the Southwestern region of China and is known for deep and rich flavors, especially the taste of Sichuan pepper. In other words: Spicy which is rare in China’s other regional cuisines.

But Sichuan cuisine is not only spicy, it tends to be hot.

Sichuan cuisine

Source: www.heatculinary.com

Perhaps one of the most remarkable things about the Sichuan philosophy in food is its wide diversity. If you named any number of traditional Sichuan dishes, most of them would be completely different from each other, both in taste and cooking method. There is a saying (whose cleverness unfortunately doesn’t translate all that well to English, although its meaning is felt) ‘One dish with one flavor, with one hundred dishes come hundred flavors.‘

As noted, Sichuan food is most well-known for its hot and spicy flavors, though it may sport sweet and sour flavors too.

And the Sichuan palate recognizes several important flavors which are referred to as  “The Five Fragrances”

These five are:

Fennel

Pepper

Anise Seed,

Cinnamon and clove

Chili and Sichuan pepper. Read here why Sichuan Peppers make your lips go numb.

Seasonings of Sichuan Cuisine

Source: www.confuciuswasafoodie.com/

Separately from the Five Fragrances, Sichuan cuisine simply cannot do without Sichuan pepper, black pepper, chili, broad bean chili paste, shallots, ginger, and garlic.

These are must-have seasonings that bring out the intense flavors the dishes are renowned for. Without them you simply have spicy food. They are like the Trinity in cajun cooking.

Balancing the Five Fragrances with the traditional seasonings (especially the lip numbing Sichuan Pepper) is pretty much the heart and soul of Sichuan Cuisine, and as noted helps produce a prodigious variety of flavors and dishes.

Cooking Methods

Source: www.chinadiscovery.com

Sichuan cuisine favors a fast and furious approach to the actual cooking. It is not a tradition that features much fermentation, chemical methods of cooking like Ceviche, or multistep processes like cheese making or the like.  Instead, Sichuan chef’s prefer fast cooking methods like stir-frying, steaming, braising, baking.

The most common is fast-frying.

Finally, the Sichuan chef is often measured against their preparations of the most famous traditional Sichuan dishes.

Here is a great list of some of the fiery traditional fare.

 

Source: www.chinasichuanfood.com

  1. ‘Pockmarked Granny’ Bean Curd (Mapo Tofu)

Mapo (/maa-por/) tofu is bean curd served in a chili-and-bean-based sauce — usually a thin, oily, and bright red suspension — and often topped with minced meat; It is often seasoned with water chestnuts, onions, other vegetables, or wood ear fungus.

The taste of mapo tofu is charitably described as ‘numbing,’  Its super hot by tradition, fresh, tender and soft, aromatic and flaky.

Mapo tofu is not exclusive to Sichuan but this dish is. It is also one of the most exported dishes of the Chinese diaspora.

Source: kirbiecravings.com/kung-pao-chicken/

  1. Spicy Diced Chicken (Kung Pao Chicken)

Kung Pao Chicken is  actually its Cantonese name, and read as Gongbao Jiding (宫保鸡丁 /gong-baow jee-ding/ ‘Palace-Protected Chicken Cubes’) in Mandarin. But it is Sichuan in origin.

The dish is prepared by frying diced chicken and dry red pepper with golden peanuts. Spicy diced chicken is more popular among Westerners than its counterpart mapo tofu.

Like Cajun or Thai spice afficianados, the Sichuan chefs brag that it is the more popular of the two because it is usually less spicy, or not at all, when served abroad and outside Sichuan province—because Fiery, lip numbing spice and all.

Source: www.thedrinksbusiness.com

  1. Fuqi Fei Pian (‘Husband and Wife Lung Slices’)

Fuqi Fei Pian, the brainchild of Guo Zhaohua, is made of thinly sliced beef (or bovine lung or tongue) seasoned with chili oil.

Like the name suggests, there is a story behind this famous Sichuan dish—one far less grisly than it would suggest.

Zhaohua and his wife sold their vinegar-ized beef slices for a living from a street cart. As their beef slices were aromatic and delicious, They became one of the most popular food items in the city. In honor of the couple, patrons coined the name — Husband and Wife Lung Slices.

Source: www.thefooddictator.com

  1. Sichuan Hot Pot

Sichuan hotpot, like most of the cuisine in this humid and populous province, is numbingly spicy. The broth is flavored with chili peppers and other strong-tasting herbs and spices.

The main ingredients include hot pepper, Chinese crystal sugar, and wine. Slices of kidney, chicken breast, beef tripe, goose intestines, spring onion, soy bean sprouts, mushrooms, duck, and sea cucumber are the usual meats used in the dish.

Source: rasamalaysia.com

  1. Dandan Mian (Dandan Noodles)

Dandan noodles is yet another quintessential Sichuan dish that has received international attention and hence may come in different versions.

Unlike the usually watered down ones outside Sichuan, dandan noodles in Sichuan province embody a combustion of flavors — savoury, nutty, spicy, and smoky. The noodles are drenched in chili oil with vegetables, Sichuan pepper, and minced pork served on top.

  1. Ganbian Sijidou (Dry Stir Fried Green Beans)

There has been a misconception about this dish being oily and heavy. However, when done right in Sichuan province, the stir-fried green beans are supposed to be light and crunchy. Also known as snap beans or string beans, the beans are prepared with the cooking technique “dry-frying” where lesser oil is needed and a longer frying time required. This dehydrates the beans, creating a crispy outer layer.

The beans are subsequently tossed sufficiently in chili-flavored oil, Sichuan pepper, scallions, garlic, and ginger.

Sichuan Cuisine is fairly easy to understand and recognize. Strong flavors, generally very fiery. Part of the dining experience is the aromas (or the five fragrances) and the use of a pepper that literally makes your lips and mouth go numb.

In our next installment we will be discussing what is seen as the most refined and artistic of the Great Cuisines of China. Jiangsu Cuisine

Chinese: 苏菜 Sūcài

  • Fresh, moderately salty and sweet, precise cooking techniques, favoring seafood, soups and artistic, colorful presentation

Jiangsu Province and China’s biggest city, Shanghai, have a very refined gourmet cuisine that is often served at government banquets.

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