New year, old traditions
Vietnamese Buddhist temple marks Tet
Vien-Giac Buddhist Temple in northeast OKC recently celebrated the 2017 Vietnamese New Year.
Tony Tieu, of Oklahoma City, showed up dressed in a dapper black suit, holding several bright red envelopes in his hands.He fit right in at Vien-Giac Buddhist Temple, where almost everyone was dressed in their finest attire to celebrate Tet, the Vietnamese New Year. “Everyone is here — it’s a reunion,” said Tieu, an Oklahoma City University business school graduate.
More than 500 people marked the beginning of the Year of the Rooster during the Jan. 29 celebration at the temple, 5101 NE 36. The Tet celebration is a tradition in Vietnam. Other Asian cultures that observe the lunar calendar also have festivals and activities marking the Lunar New Year.
Those who didn’t come to Vien-Giac with red envelopes like Tieu expected to leave with at least one of the colored paper pouches. As part of the Vietnamese New Year tradition, the red envelopes are filled with money and given to people for good luck in the New Year. The distribution of the envelopes was one of the highlights of a service that lasted about 1 ½ hours.
People formed two lines inside the temple to receive red envelopes with “lucky money.” The temple’s monk, the Rev. Thich Nguyen Nguyen, stood at the head of one line, smiling at each temple member and guest as they accepted their New Year’s gift. At the head of the second line, some temple members simply handed out crisp $1 bills to crowd members, foregoing the envelopes. When the monk bent down to hand one of the envelopes to a young boy, his mother and onlookers giggled when he opened it, took a dollar bill out and promptly tried to stuff the money in his mouth.
One of the temple leaders, Thien Chon, of Oklahoma City, said about 99 percent of the people
who attend the Vien-Giac temple are Vietnamese and the Vietnamese New Year celebrations typically draw about 600 people to the temple in northeast Oklahoma City.
Meanwhile, beforethe red envelope distribution, people carried flowers to the altar where they placed them in pitchers of water. Participants of this ritual included everyone from the tiniest children to elderly adults.
Dragon Dance
Tet is a time marked by reunions among family members and friends. They gather together to wish each other good luck in the new year and to pay homage to their ancestors.
Soon, music filled the air of the temple for one of the celebration’s most anticipated activities: the Dragon Dance. Performed by members of the temple’s youth group, the dance is a popular tradition at spring festivals and parades associated with the Lunar New Year.It is believed that the dragon drives out evil and brings good luck. The colorful dragons danced before crowd members which showed their appreciation by throwing dollar bills at the dragons’ feet. At one point, the dragons appeared to gobble the money piled on the floor.
An individual dressed as a Buddha in a red robe visited with children in the crowd as the dragon dance took center stage. Confetti rained down on the dragon as the performance ended in cheers from the crowd.
People made their way outside the temple then, and the sound and smell of firecrackers filled the air. Popping firecrackers during Tet is seen as a way to drive out evil and bring good luck for the new year.