Chinese New Year Cards
A Post-Holiday Excuse to Give & Give Again

Chinese New Year Cards

As a former expatriate resident of China, I've been absolutely nuts about keeping up on Chinese culture. A few days back I returned from a trip to central China and brought a few goodies for Chinese New Year 2008 - coming up this February 7. Namely, I got some Chinese New Year cards.

If you didn't get enough holiday at year's end, what's cool about Chinese New Year is that it's another great excuse to get together with friends to have some great food, great talk, and to mail some Chinese New Year cards or even give away some hong bao (which we'll get to later).

Where To Get Em? In China?

I bought a few Hallmark brand Chinese New Year cards and a pack of hong bao for about five RMB each ("renminbi" or "the People's currency", also written as 5), equivalent to about 67 in US cash. I bought them at a place called "E-Mart", a Korean-Chinese joint venture department store located just south of the intersection of Xizang Road and Fuxing Road (Chinese code: ) in Shanghai, People's Republic of China. For those of you living in Shanghai, this is just south of the new Lao Xi Men (Chinese code: ) underground metro station.

What About America?

Some of you may shout "No fair!" that I cheated because I bought my Chinese New Year cards directly in China. Well, okay. I happened to be at the right place at the right time.

For those of us who cannot just hop on the plane and go to China, there is ample respite if you live in a somewhat larger city elsewhere. Really large cities such as Los Angeles, Chicago, Paris, Amsterdam and Berlin all have their own versions of "Chinatown".

Even if you live in a somewhat smaller city, you most likely know some Chinese folks at a local Chinese restaurant who may have some connections to a Chinese grocery store or two in town. Or you can check your yellow pages under the Markets section that specialize in "Chinese" and/or "Asian".

Go Green & Send An E-Card Instead

Let's say you don't have any Asian stores in town? No problem! Or, if you want to "go green" and send your Chinese New Year card greeting electronically, there are loads of options available. Some user-friendly English-language sites include:

123Greetings.com
BlueMountain.com

Not Just Cards: Also Try Giving Hong-Bao / Lee-See

While Chinese New Year cards are fun to send, if you want to give that little bit more, or are into handing gifts out in person, also try buying a packet of hong bao (also called lai-see, lee-see, or li shi). These "red enclosures" are actually small envelopes into which you can tuck some dollar bills. Great for aunts, uncles, and grandfolks who prefer giving that green gift we all love!

And so Gong Hey Fat Choy (in Cantonese) or Gong Xi Fa Tsai (in Mandarin).

Happy Chinese New Year!

- John

Learn more about this author, John Melendez.
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