With fireworks, lion dancing, temple visits and even robots, more than a billion people across Asia and in diaspora communities welcomed the Year of the Horse on Tuesday.
The Lunar New Year marks the arrival of spring and the first new moon of the lunisolar calendar. It is the most important holiday in many Asian countries and is known as Spring Festival in China, Seollal in South Korea, and Tet in Vietnam.
Traditions vary across and within countries, but common threads run throughout: family gatherings with marathon feasts, and rituals to honor ancestors and seek prosperity. Many people flock to temples to make offerings of traditional food, and light incense at altars for ancestors and elders.
In South Korea, families ate rice cake soup and wore traditional hanboks. In Vietnam, people bought potted kumquat trees, symbols of luck and good fortune. Across Southeast Asia, dragon dances, believed to bring prosperity and rain, filled the streets.
In China, the festival prompted the world’s largest annual migration, with hundreds of millions traveling from major cities to hometowns for reunions.
This year’s celebrations also featured an unusual sight: humanoid robots, which appeared at temples and performed martial arts at the Spring Festival Gala, one of the world’s most-watched programs.
Here is a look at how people welcomed the Year of the Horse:
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