Tết Celebrations

New Year has finally come and rather gone in truth. It is slowly getting back to normal here in Vietnam. 

The more I learnt about tet through experience, through the girls sending me photos and messages the more I realised that this three day celebration is like the wedding at Cana. 

The Vietnamese New Year, taking on the Lunar calandar, is a three day celebration that is the most imporatant celebration in Vietnamese culture. Tết means ‘Feast of the First Morning of the First Day’. This day is calculated by both the motions of the Earth around the Sun and of the Moon around the Earth. 

Emily Family, traditional meal shared.

Its all about relationships with your family, friends, neighbours and those you wish happiness to. Its about meeting people who you might not have time to catch up with during the year, share a meal and give thanks. While I’m sure a lot of wine is consumed, there is only one type that is changing from water to wine, that is the way the celebrations happens. Its about an offering of the living water that we are gifted and passing this onto those we meet over the next three days. 

Some families spend about a month planning and preparing for this celebration, a lot of money, effort and importance is placed on the festive celebrations. 

The family firstly make Tết cake. Now, don’t get excited my friends, the word cake is extremely misleading in this context. This is a special cake that is only made at this time and comes with its only legion. Firstly the cake is made with sticky rice and filled with pork fat and beans seasoned with black pepper and shallots. It is wrapped in banana leaves, leaving the colour of pale green on the rice and a slightly leafy taste. However, due to the demand and use of banana leafs over the years it is now only those families that have banana trees in their garden that still use this leaf. Other people used another type of green leaf. (anything big enough to wrap) 

Hanh and her twin sister at home making tet cake

During the nations hard times, this cake was prepared only for new year, with many people enjoying as they often lived on rice, water and what they could find in mother nature. So the cake was a welcome blessings. Now there is plenty of food and a lot of people don’t like the cake at all, yet its still a tradition that is passed on from one generation to another to make this cake on new years eve and give to loved ones who visit or you visit. Plus alway have on the table during the three days of Tết celebrations. 

Legend tells us that when the 6th Hung King organised an ancestral worship 4,000 years ago, he assigned his princes to prepare offerings. He said he would cede the throne to whoever brought the best offering. The princes travelled through forests and dived in to the ocean to find precious products. Lang Lieu, the 18th prince, was the poorest son. He could not get precious and rare items for the ceremony. With available agricultural products such as glutinous rice, green beans, and pork, he made a Chung square cake, which symbolises the earth, and Giay round glutinous rice cake, which symbolises the sky.

Lang Lieu’s offering met Hung King’s desire, so he succeeded to the throne. Chung cake have since become a must have item in ancestral worship, which illustrates the spirit of “remembering the source of the water we drink.”

Round from South Vietnam and Square from North Vietnam

The other important part of Tết is the cleaning of the house. I guess its like when we say ‘spring clean’ so the same applies here. The house is dusted, wiped, washed down, including the motorbikes. Some houses down our lane has taken this a step further with taking the opportunity to repaint their house, which I think is just as they have four days off work so able to do this opposed to a tradition at Tết time. 

First day got, just before tet 

Another custom is to have a Tết tree, which you hang red envelopes on with money inside - called lucky money, plus signs sending greeting for new year. These are special types of trees, which only blossom during the three/four days or so of Tết. They have a beautiful delicate yellow flower that will fall with the wind, or if touched. 

The church hired one, as after Tết celebration they will return, as it is an older tree which likely costs millions to own - so the girls say. We purchased a small tree, with hope that with some tender love and care it will be present next year blooming in full glory. 

As Tết runs for three days, it is divided up, so the first day is celebration of new. Its like the whole country enters into a pilgrimage to return to family, or their home towns. Often its where the parents or grandparents are based. There is a sense of forgetting about the troubles of the past year and hope for a better year to come. 

Second day is for visiting your ancestors and giving thanks to the elderly. It is a day where a lot of people return to the graves of their family as a sign of respect. They clean them up, ofter prayers and sometimes share a meal at the grave. 

The last day of Tết is for the workers, to take time to give thanks for having employment and well wishes for the coming year that it bring much work. 

Every region of the country celebrate Tết differently in some ways. There are similarities to our new year, the fireworks, the staying up to welcome in the new year with a toast, the singing, dancing and unions between neighbours, family and friends. 

For our Tết it has been a quiet affair, while in truth I have not been attending 4.30 mass, I have missed out on a few of the invitations for Tết celebrations which is no bother. We celebrated with a meal together as community, prepared a meal for the parish priest, fathers and a few brothers. We went to the Tết garden in the centre of the city, along with the Sr visiting the parish priest family. (I’m too young for this invitation) Plus we have rested!!! 

Overall its been an interesting time to witness the happening and get a sense of what its all about. Im left with feeling the really this is a great Christian celebration, there are so many things that Jesus teaches - welcome the stranger, share a meal, give even if have nothing, shelter, love your neighbour, wipe the dust off your feet… etc. There are so many lessons we are taught that are wrapped up into this celebration that has a calling to the people to reunite in peace, joy, love with each other. It has a calling of union between earth, moon, sky, water, land and the people. It has a calling of spending the first three days of the year so deeply rooted in living as we are called - love one another just as I have loved you - giving thanks for all that has been and all to come. I can understand why the most religious, even all our men are sent home for this time, and wonder if we have done a little injustice to the girls to keep them out of this celebration, limiting their experience of living out in their culture, in their traditional way, in their very real way of witnessing and extending the Christ message to all.