How Hongkongers celebrate Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is a time to unite with your family and eat auspicious foods, play mahjong and (for some) pray for luck in the next year. Being such a long held tradition, there are a few important rituals that have developed, including rules about cleaning your house, haircuts and the colour of your underpants. The rules are far from universal, and really depend on how lucky or faithful a person feels.

Calligraphy

See Derek Chan work outside Man Mo Temple

As many Hongkongers attempt to decorate their homes and other places they spend time regularly – from businesses to school desks – they like to put up sayings such as those that encourage wealth creation, prosperity and success at studying called fai chun.

Fai chun are sometimes ready-made or printed out but it’s still possible to get them hand-made. Calligraphy writers tend to write on red paper, use gold or black ink and must practise for years to make their characters perfect. The crowds surrounding calligraphers can be crushing, so prepare.

There is humour in some signs, as calligrapher (and high-flying lawyer) Audrey Eu Yuet-mee SC says. She has been busy writing in markets and outside MTR stations all over Hong Kong for the past 10 years and learnt so that she could do the service for the Civic Party, of which she is the chairwoman. “It’s almost practically non-stop,” she said of the demand for her work over CNY.

Another calligrapher who sets up behind the Man Mo temple on Ladder Street, Derek Chan, said he learned the art when he was in grade three, and has written fai chun for CNY since 2008 at the site. “When I first saw this old man in the street doing Chinese calligraphy, his hands shaking, I learned from him,” the man, born in the year of the horse, said. “Maybe this is my fortune.”.