Mesa Legend - Features - Year of the Pig

Year of the Pig

Chinese New Year falls on Feb. 18 this year. This year marks the Year of the Pig, also known as the Year of the Boar, in the Lunar New Year.

Those born in 1923, 1935, 1947, 1959, 1971, 1983 and 1995 were born in the year of the pig. In Chinese tradition, the pig is associated with honesty, straightforwardness and patience.

Chinese New Year starts with the New Moon on the first day of the new year and ends on the full moon 15 days later. The fifteenth day of the new year is called the Lantern Festival, which is celebrated at night with lantern displays.

Festivities are usually celebrated with the color red, which represents good luck, good health and prosperity. Red envelopes with money are given as a gift for good fortune.

Throughout the month of February, local Chinese-American residents of the Valley stocked up on traditional Chinese goodies at local Asian markets to celebrate the new year with specialty foods such as moon cakes and bamboo shoots. Fruit trees are brought out to celebrate “new life.”