][1]That’s Happy New Year if you spent last night celebrating the beginning of the year of the rabbit.
Yup, a new year in the Chinese calendar started at midnight last night and most of China’s 1.3 billion people plus significant numbers in assorted other Asian countries are getting ready to whoop it up for the next few days.
I spoke to Jian Wang of the Chop Chop restaurants a few weeks back. She told me that, as was the custom, her family in China always got together and made dumplings in the run-up to New Year.
Having spent the evening in the shared task of assembling the dumplings, they would then sit down to eat them on the stroke of twelve.
Despite stretching for thousands of miles, all of China is on one timeline which means that a good proportion of those 1.3 billion people were all chowing down on dumplings at pretty much the same time last night.
Over a billion people sitting down to eat at the same time. It’s enough to give the staunchest of chefs nightmares.
Many, but not all, Chinese restaurants will be taking a break for the next few days. You can use 5pm to check out not only the Chinese restaurants in your area but also other restaurants and bars that offer Far Eastern, Japanese or Thai food.