The annual Chinese New Year Celebrations officially began this week on Tuesday and will last until February 19. According to the Chinese zodiac, each year is represented by a different animal and 2019 marks the beginning of the year of the pig. As one of the Chinese community’s most important holidays, this week sees a variety of events celebrating the Chinese New Year in several cities across the country.

The Buddhist Fo Guang Shan He Hua temple, at the heart of Amsterdam’s Chinatown around Nieuwmarkt, is a focal point for the Chinese Buddhist community. The temple is offering a Chinese New Year blessing ceremony this Sunday (February 10th) from 11:00 am to 12:30 pm, as well as a light offering ceremony on February 17th from 10:30 am to 12:30 pm.  While the services are exclusively held in Mandarin, the temple warmly welcomes everyone who is interested in attending. In fact, it is not only Buddhists from China who practice their faith in this temple, but also those from other Asian countries such as Thailand.

“The Chinese like to use the time period of the Chinese New Year to prepare for a good and auspicious year”, says Ivan Lim, a volunteer at the temple and an active member of the Netherlands’ Chinese community. In order to do that, the Chinese celebrate the New Year as largely as possible. Lim wanted me to note that he didn’t want to speak to me on behalf of the temple but rather from a personal point of view.  “People buy new clothes, clean the house. It is good to start the new year clean”. When visiting the temple, he continues, it is popular to light incense and give food offerings, specifically in the form of mandarin oranges, as they symbolize luck and auspiciousness. The Cantonese word for mandarins, ‘kam’, is the same as the word for ‘gold’.