Tet in Hoi An – Year of the Fire Horse
We move from the beach over to the heart of Hoi An, Vietnam just in time for “Tet” - the lunar new year we narrowly call “Chinese New Year” in Vancouver. While the calendar new year in Montreal was met with kombucha, half-hearted resolutions and Emily in Paris, Tet in Hoi An is a full-throated full-on week of fun, food, family and formality.
Preparations for Tet in Hoi An
To please the kitchen gods (and the goddess mamas in the kitchen), Vietnamese prepare for the Year of the Fire Horse with a deep spring cleaning. Thankfully, water is plentiful in this floodplain town, because it’s gushing out into every street as people scrub their floors, walls, motorbikes, driveways, curtains, everything. Gates are repaired and repainted. Our whole neighbourhood comes out to help hang lanterns and string red flags across the road.
Like most of Hoi An, our tight residential area is dotted with garden plots and tree nurseries, now busily harvesting flowers and the potted kumquat trees that each family will rent to put in front of their home. The more bountiful orange fruit on their tree, the more wealth and luck will flow to that family over the coming year. Somewhat cynically I note that, as usual, families with more accumulated wealth will be able to afford larger trees and continue to widen the wealth gap for another year.
Tet Rituals in Hoi An
As we reach the big day, two sacred Hoi An Tet rituals I don’t get to enjoy are the long lines to make offerings at numerous neighbourhood temples, and the longer lines at the hairdresser to enter the new year looking one’s best. But there’s no missing the fireworks - right outside our window, and next door, and the door after that. I join the children and families in the street as we rush back and forth to each new burst of colour and celebration, clapping and dancing in delight, then hastily retreating from the billowing cloud of smoke.
Children are given money in red “bao lì xì” envelopes. Begging and handouts bring bad luck, but gifts in red envelopes are lucky, and children accept them as eagerly as my boys used to scoop up dimes and candies from the Chinese New Year’s parade floats. And just like my boys have grown into the role of Santa’s helper at Christmas, these children will eventually - presumably with mixed feelings - mark their maturity by becoming givers rather than receivers of lucky red envelopes.
When the ear-splitting pyrotechnic cacophony finally subsides about 1am, our host starts to break down the door-front ancestral offerings table. The pile of American dollars and other symbols of prosperity and respect are quietly burned in the streetside half-barrel. Final drinks are poured into shot glasses then tossed onto the ground. We share in the special cakes and fruit dishes that the ancestors didn’t eat, then go to sleep assured that we’ll be fortunate and cared for for another year.
Post-Tet Peace
The morning after this Tet craze, our host texts without warning at 10am to come right now for a Lunar New Year breakfast. Over a table bulging with home-cooked delicacies, we talk in broken Vietnamese, English and google-translate about family and traditions. Throughout the town, families are gathered in their open-air living spaces enjoying similar food and togetherness. We are so grateful to be included in this homestay family’s tradition, not just today but also a few days later at some other significant moon phase meal. Of course, the benefit is mutual - who you have as your first visitors in the new year determines the amount of luck you will have, so hopefully foreign guests are high on the Bring Us Prosperity scale.
In the aftermath of Hoi An’s Tet celebrations, streets are eerily quiet. Not because of hangovers and football games, but because Tet is the longest holiday of the year in Vietnam and everyone is expected back in their home village. We cycle freely on streets usually crawling with an intricate dance of scooters, bikes, cars and busses. Wait much longer and pay much more for Grab (Uber) cars (or motorbikes). The few restaurants that are open have signs apologizing for the increased prices, longer waits and fewer menu options as they work with limited staff earning higher wages in exchange for not being with their families.
Unrivaled by fireworks and scooter horns, the plaintiff calls of karaoke crooners carry the day. I walk past a woman sitting alone on her coffee table, earnestly and unabashedly wailing into her fully-pumped-up-volume system, splaying her, um, music across the empty streets and rice fields. Friends gather in living rooms across the town singing duets. Neighbours compete to drown each other out. What they all have in common is being off-key, distortingly loud, and impressively unrestrained. I’ve learned (decided?) to love this free-range unpretentious expressionism, but also sing my own bountiful praises to the government that recently banned karaoke after 10pm.
More rituals in the Weeks after Tet
Hoi An slowly comes back to life when people come back from their home villages, but the celebrations and rituals are not over. Six days after Tet we attend a Fortune Telling event, learning about the fascinating mix of religion and philosophy that guides life in Hoi An and Vietnam - a unique and practical blend of Buddhism, Tao, Confucianism, Sea Goddess, even a bit of Hindu. We select a printed red leaf from the tree to learn which of the 10 pirams will be our area of growth and challenge in the coming year (“diligence” for me, “patience” for my wife). Temples offer bigger promises of wealth and health, but these pirams are more oriented toward personal development and responsibility.
On the 11th day after Tet we cycle 11km outside of Hoi An to the Kim Bong Woodworking Village Festival. The rains arrive just in time to cancel/postpone the intended traditional boat race and opening ceremonies, but the food and woodwork displays are spectacular. As is the long ride home - happily and not-coldly drenched, we worm through the tour groups in their matching plastic ponchos miserably shrinking from the wet splendour we are embracing.
At the first new moon after Tet, Hoi An’s old town dims all the street lights and amps up the candle-lanterns and lantern boat rides along the river. It’s a crazy scene every night, with the live music bars across the river competing with enthusiastic covers of Adele, Bon Jovi and John Denver, but a little more reverent on this special night. On this day, people have also been renewing their offerings to the ancestors - while picking up protein powder at the pharmacy we see the grandpa refilling the shot glasses. A reminder that what is to me a fun cultural spectacle is in fact a very real and meaningful ritual for the people of Hoi An.
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Currently in...
Hoi An, Vietnam for Feb-March
Heading to...
North Vietnam, Bali (April), Philadelphia (May). Please share any sites, people or ideas by email.
Rick , wow the beautiful carving amazing thank you , well needed break from our news
I never thought I wanted to go to Vietnam, but the photos you share, and the lovely stories makes me want to go there for sure. Thank you for being my guide. 🙂