Tet or ‘Vietnamese Lunar New Year” is the most important and poplular holiday and festival in Vietnam. It is the Vietnamese New Year marking the arrival of spring based on the Chinese calendar, a lunisolar calendar.
Tet is celebrated on the same day as Chinese New Year though exceptions arise due to the one-hour time difference between Hanoi and Beijing resulting in the alternate calculation of the new moon.
In the period leading up to Tet, the country is abuzz with preparations. Guys on motorbikes rush around delivering potted tangerine trees and flowering bushes, the tradiontional household decorations. People get a little bit stressed out and the elbows get sharper, especially in big cities, where the usual hectic level of traffic becomes almost homicidal. Then a few days before Tet the pace begins to slow down, as thousands of city residents depart for their ancestral hometowns in the provinces. Finally on the first day of the new year an abrupt transformation occurs: the streets become quiet, almost deserted. Nearly all shops and restaurants close for three days.
In the major cities, streets are decorated with lights and public festivities are organized which attract thousands of residents. But for Vietnamese, Tet is mostly a private, family celebration, on the eve of new year, families gather together and exchange good wishes and gifts of “lucky money”. In the first three days of the year, the day time hours are devoted to visiting – houses of relatives on the first day, closest friends and important colleagues on the second day, and everyone else on the third day. Many people also visit pagodas. The evening hours are spent drinking and gambling or chatting, playing, singing karaoke, and enjoying traditional snacks and candy.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBm7EQ0iD7k
Vocabulary:
Lunar New Year (n): Tết Nguyên đán
Lunisolar calendar (n): lịch âm
New Year’s Eve (n): đêm giao thừa
Lucky money (n): tiền lì xì
Potted tangerine trees (n):cây quất trồng trong chậu
(to) base on (v): dựa trên
- This movie is based on a true story.
(to) celebrate (v): chúc mừng, ăn mừng / celebration (n)
- How do people celebrate New Year in your country?
- We will held a party for our parents in celebration of their 50th wedding anniversary.
(to) result in (v): gây ra, dẫn đến = lead to (v)
- The earthquake has resulted in thousans of deaths.
(to) decorate (v): trang trí / decoration (n) / decorative (adj)
- She decorated her room with a lot of fairy lights and paintings.
- The decoration of this cake is more beautiful than that chocolate one.
(to) slow down (v): chậm lại / slow-down (n)
- You speak too fast, you need to slow down so everybody can follow your talk.
Hometown (n): quê nhà
Deserted (adj): hoang vắng, hiu quạnh
- This village becomes deserted after the disaster because everybody moved to a safer place.
Festivity (n): các hoạt động được tổ chức trong những dịp đặc biệt
(to) attract (n): thu hút / attractive (adi) / attraction (n)
- The warm damp air attracts a lot of mosquitoes.
Private (adj): riêng tư, kín đáo, bí mật, tư nhân / privacy (n)
- He is a private person, he doesn’t want to share his family life to other people.
Relative (n): người thân, họ hàng
Colleague (n): đồng nghiệp
- We are colleagues, we have worked together in this department for 5 years.
Pagoda (n): chùa
Gambling (n): chơi cờ bạc (đánh bài, đua ngựa…)
