Why Chinese New Year is already getting my Goat

TODAY marks the start of the Chinese New Year, the Year of the Tiger.

There are two Chinese takeaways in my village, but there are unlikely to be any public celebrations. The one round the corner of our street still has an “Only One Person In The Shop” sign in the window.

How very different to Chinatown in London, or Singapore, where we lived for a year. They certainly know how to party.

And it’s very noisy. Firecrackers, drums, exhibition snakes with people in them. All to scare away evil spirits. There are plenty of those in modern China, but they’re not supernatural. They’re the organs of the state and you’d better behave.

Festivities for the New Year traditionally go on for three days, like Christmas.

Staying up and saying good words like “Happy New Year” after the clock strikes twelve will bring good luck.

Tigers are reputed to be brave, competitive, unpredictable and confident – very charming, but sometimes likely to be impetuous, irritable and overindulgent. That’s you, Leonardo Di Caprio and Tom Cruise.

2022 is said to be a good year for Tigers to get married, though famous tigers of the past, such as Marilyn Monroe, don’t exactly support this notion. I am a Goat in the Chinese zodiac system, meaning I have a calm, gentle and sympathetic personality. Er, perhaps.

My lucky colours are brown, red and purple and my lucky flowers are carnations and primroses. True, I like both.

Soothsayers disagree whether Goats are compatible with Tigers, though I would hate to be tethered to a post while one stalks by. All very fanciful. I don’t know why the Chinese go in for this superstitious stuff, but many of them do.