New Year

Festival Location: , Worldwide

Festival Type: New Year Celebrations

Gearing up for the Next New Year

by © Joshua Hartshorne 2008

New Years was great. Friends, food, fun - it had it all. Too bad it only comes once a year. Or does it? With some travel and a hefty supply of good cheer, you can celebrate the New Year all year long.

Your first opportunity came January 2nd, in Cape Town, South Africa. Tweede Nuewe Jaar (literally, "Second New Year") may have begun as a celebration for slaves too busy attending their masters the previous day. Just one day of "Coon Festival," which gets going in December and lasts until even the most die-hard revelers must rest (some time in January), the centerpiece is processions of flamboyantly-dressed and brightly-painted minstrels parading through the city.

You may have to skip out early to reach Russia in time for Orthodox New Year (January 15), where some of the more serious Russians will still be celebrating the conventional new year. As with all Russian parties, expect vodka.

Try to recover in time to reach East Asia for the Lunar New Year (February 8-9). Often called "Chinese New Year," this colorful festival is also celebrated in Vietnam, Korea and Japan. According to ancient tradition, ghosts wander the earth during the New Year, so the Chinese set off deafening peals of firecrackers. Should they run out of firecrackers, they shout and beat drums. Between scaring off ghosts, lighting thousands of lanterns and attending dragon parades, the revelers throw Thanksgiving-sized family banquets.

Moving quickly, you can reach Tibet in time for Losar, which starts February 9th and lasts up to 15 days. Celebrants eat dough balls stuffed with fillings as various as chilies, salt, wool and coal; the ingredients you find are supposed to describe your character (coal is a bad sign). The Namgyal Monastery in India, home of the Dailai Lama, is the heart of the celebrations.

According to About.com, "Muslims do not traditionally 'celebrate' the beginning of a new year," but that shouldn't stop you from heading to Saudi Arabia (which observes the Islamic calendar) in time for the Islamic New Year (February 10, though apparently this varies "according to the visibility of the lunar crescent").

By February 12, it's time to head to the other side of the world for the Mayan New Year (Wajxaqib' B'atz'). Traditional fire ceremonies are still held in some traditional parts of Guatemala. This year Wajxaqib' B'atz' comes just after Carnival, and it is rumored that parts of Mexico will roll the two celebrations together.

After a hectic February, you can mosey back to the Middle East in time for No Ruz (Iranian New Year; March 20-21). Of Zoroastrian origin, this 13-day festival may have been celebrated by the Sumarians, 5000 years ago. Celebrations last 13 days, and festivities primarily involve visiting friends and relatives and exchanging fruit, pasteries and nuts. If that is insufficiently wild, the travel advisory for Iran may liven it up.

From Iran, you need to rush to Armenia to celebrate Amanor (March 21st), the ancient traditional New Year. Though if you are late, no one is likely to notice as Amanor hasn't been celebrated for thousands of years (see below).

Asia is difficult to navigate, so it's a good thing that you have until April 9th to get there for the next holiday. Once there, though, mid-April is so packed with new years you can't possibly get to them all.

The first (Gudhi Padwa) is in Maharashtra, the third-largest state of India. For this holiday, families erect gudhi, bamboo staffs decorated with colored silk and garlands.

The next stop is Bangkok. The holiday is Songkran (April 12-15). Sometimes called the "Buddhist New Year," Songkran traditionally involved pious activities such as giving alms to monks and washing Buddha images. Today, it is as much about the water fights - melees, really. According to travel-writer Donald Gilliland, "The water warriors use squirt guns, super soakers, hoses, buckets, garbage cans and anything else they can get their hands on." There are also parades, beauty pageants, singing and dancing in the streets, but the focus is definitely the water.

You may want to skip out early in order to reach Bangladesh for Poila Baisakh (April 14). Houses are decorated with beautiful powdered designs, and participants celebrate with songs, dances, kite flying, ox-fighting (!) and poetry recitation. You can also celebrate the holiday in London, home to 70,000 Bengalis.

Chaul Chnam Thmey (April 14-16) in nearby Cambodia is another watery new year. Revelers and monks splash each other in perfumed holy water for good luck. Those who prefer to stay dry can throw talcum powder. Additional entertainment includes tug-of-war and similar games at monasteries. Rewards for winning appear to include rapping the knees of the losers. The most pomp and ceremony is probably in Phnom Penh, where the last day of the festival sees a royal procession, boxing, and elephant races.

Simultaneously, the Burmese are celebrating their New Year (April 13-16, variable). Revelers welcome the monsoon season by dousing each other with colored water - which does double duty as it purifies your soul as well.

On July 20, the Mandaeans in southern Iraq and elsewhere ring in their new year (Kansia Uzahila). Mandaeans, who consider Jesus, Mohammad and Moses to be false prophets, revere John the Baptist instead. New Years celebrations include baptisms for all, after which the next 36 hours are spent indoors and wide awake. This is a dangerous time, as guardian spirits are off visiting Mara Rba Kabrina, the Lord of Greatness.

Next, it's back to Armenia for Navasard (August 11), which replaced Amanor (see above) several thousand years ago (and is now being replaced itself). It celebrates a legendary victory of a tyrant, which is said to have occurred in 2492 B.C. In this wholesome holiday, children serenade villagers and alcohol consumption is frowned upon.

On September 11, the Coptic (Egyptian Orthodox) Christians celebrate one of the more religious new years. Based on the position of the star Sirius, this holiday once predicted the yearly flood of the Nile. These days, according to the Coptic priest Father Antonious Tanious, the celebration "is basically a celebration of the martyrs...celebrating and glorifying what they have suffered for the sake of keeping the faith strong, preserving it for us. It is a beautiful service ... a night spent in glorification of the mother of God and all the martyrs and the saints."

Before Peter the Great, Russians celebrated the New Year on September 14, and though nobody appears to celebrate it now, that shouldn't stop you from another trip to Russia - which, after all, makes up over 1/7 of the world's land.

On October 3 (Rosh Hashanah), blasts from ram's horns around the world signal the beginning of year 5766 in the Jewish calendar. Possibly the best place to celebrate is in Old Jerusalem, though it may not be the safest (though Southern Jews who spent Rosh Hashanah 2004 waiting out Hurricane Ivan may disagree).

Wherever you celebrate Halloween, you are also ringing in the Irish (Celtic) New Year (Samhain), which Halloween long ago replaced. Celtic priests gathered bunches of mistletoe to protect from sprits of the dead. They also built bonfires to drive said spirits away. Girls slept on sprigs of mistletoe or holly and ivy and chanted, "Oh, ivy green and holy red/Tell me, tell me whom I shall wed!" It is not clear whether this works for boys, too.

The very next day is Diwali, the Hindu New Year. Lamps light the night during this five-day "festival of lights," one of the most colorful in a country of colorful festivals. Hours of firecracker-fun have become integral, which is now something of a contentious issue between those who prefer to sleep and those who do not. The Supreme Court of India has restricted the practice, but this is unlikely to resolve the issue.

Next (probably) comes the Hmong New Year, which celebrates the end of the rice-farming season in parts of China, Laos and Vietnam. As such, the actual date varies from year to year, but in the US Hmong immigrants often celebrate it over Thanksgiving (larger communities are found in Wisconsin and Minnesota). A holiday for flirting, girls toss balls at boys. If the boy in question drops the ball - not always accidentally - he must forfeit something of value, which he can later ransom back by serenading the girl with love songs.

The last stop takes us back to Africa, where we began. Some time in December or January (depending on astronomical observations and only set a few weeks in advance), the people of Swaziland celebrate Incwala. The Swaziland king plays an integral role in this heavily-ceremonial festival, as does gathering the foam of the waves off the Indian Ocean (how exactly they get to the Indian Ocean and back is not entirely clear).

Then it will finally be time for the Western New Year, and the cycle begins again.

note: the dates given are for 2005 and may be different in other years. The same holiday may be celebrated by different people differently. The author welcomes corrections, comments and additions at (Joshuahartshorne@netscape.net).

by Joshua Hartshorne