Hello! I hope you are all having a great holiday season so far! I know you could celebrate many different things this time of year. So Happy Holidays to everyone, and Happy New Year!
Here in Taiwan, we don't really celebrate many of these December holidays. There are a lot of Christmas decorations all over the city of Taipei right now. Many people still might celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, or other holidays this time of year. But we are all still in school! We even have school next week on Christmas day, which is a very weird feeling for me. Our winter break starts next month, on January 20th. Here, we celebrate Chinese New Year, which always happens around the end of January or the beginning of February. Let me tell you a little bit about that!
In ancient China, people used the moon and weather to help them plan their calendar, called the Lunar Calendar. They planned their New Year celebrations around a day called the winter solstice. This is the day every year when the Earth has the shortest day. According to the Lunar Calendar, the new year starts on the second new moon (when you can't see the moon in the sky) after the winter solstice. So this year, Chinese New Year is on February 10th, and that's when our winter break will take place!
