New Years Traditions and Superstitions

What do you plan on doing this year on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day? You may spend the evening before the first day of 2015 partying the night away and sipping champagne at midnight, or it may be more important to get in a kiss at that first moment of the New Year. Even if you’re planning on spending a quiet evening at home, you’ll probably watch the ball drop on TV or step outside to see a local fireworks show. For a lot of people New Year’s Day is often spent taking down Christmas decorations, visiting with family, or even cooking certain foods meant to bring luck in the New Year. But if you travel to another area of the globe for New Year’s, you may find yourself watching or partaking in some very different traditions.

Here are some fun and interesting New Years traditions and superstitions that many believe will get 2015 off to a good start!

New Year Lucky Foods – so many New Year’s traditions and superstitions involve food – eating 12 grapes, black eye peas, pork, collard greens – there are so many New Year’s Lucky foods, we gave it it’s own blog post! Here are a few of the lucky foods and traditions from around the world.  You may also want to read our lucky food menu ideas from appetizers to desserts.

• In Greece many people smash a pomegranate right after midnight outside their front door.  Why make this mess? Well they believe that the seeds will bring prosperity and good fortune. They also put a coin in a cake such as Vasilopita. The cake is cut at midnight and whoever gets the coin is said to have good luck in the New Year. The Greek often adorn tables with symbols of happiness and wealth including nuts, honey, fresh fruit and olive branches. Dating back to the 6th century BC, some hang a squill (or regular) onion on their front door to ward off bad spirits.
• In Italy many eat sausage, polenta and lentils.  The New Year toast is usually with Prosecco or Spumante.  Grapes, raisins and dried fruit decorate the table.  They often give one another sweet gifts such as figs and dates in honey.  Some Italians break plates or glasses in their driveway to get rid of any negative vibes around the home. Not practiced as often anymore, some Italians throw old items out the window to represent letting go of the past.
• In France, friends and loved ones exchange New Year’s resolutions, wishes and kisses. Foie gras, oysters, escargot and champagne are often served. Heart or log filled cakes are decorated with symbols that represent winter or good luck charms such as chocolate coins or bells. King’s cake (similar to the Vassilopita in Greece,) with a hidden coin or small ceramic figurine are served with a paper crown on top – the person who gets the filling gets to wear the crown for the day.
• In Ireland, families would place buttered bread outside the door to show that there was no hunger in the house and would ensure food for the year to come.  This dates back to many years ago when there was a food shortage, so now the tradition has changed to eating bread and butter with the New Year’s meal.
• In Germany it is said to bring good luck and health if you touch a chimney sweep or have him rub ashes on your forehead. Marzipan pig, sausages, sauerkraut, jam filled donuts called Berliner and Speckdicken (a pancake with sausage or bacon and syrup,) are usually on the menu.
• In Latin countries such as Spain, Costa Rica and Chile, they eat 12 grapes at the stroke of midnight and make a wish for each.
• In Denmark cured pork, boiled cod and stewed kale are served as well as Kransekage or wreath cake, a special dessert that consist of rings of cake piled on top of one another, each getting smaller until they form a cone or x-mas tree shape. The cake is made with egg whites, almonds and sugar.

Other popular New Years traditions and superstitions:

• Toast the new year with a glass of champagne. This is done in several countries around the world including the U.S., France, Germany, Belgium, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.  Put gold jewelry such as a ring into your champagne glass and drink up for wealth in the New Year (careful not to choke on your ring!) In some places they hop 3 times without spilling any champagne, and then pour it over their shoulder to let go of the past year and begin the new one.
• A midnight kiss…the New Year’s Eve kiss is a symbol that your affection and closeness will last all year.
• Nothing taken out of the house the first day of the year – not even garbage, or it is said that you will be “losing” things all year.
• Make a lot of noise right after midnight (like banging together pots and pans) is said to help ward off evil spirits. This is how fireworks became popular for New Years!
• Wearing yellow underwear attracts positive energy and a year of prosperity for the new year, while red underwear will bring a year of romance and passion. Blue underwear is said to bring a year of good health, green, a year of better luck than the previous year, white for a year of peace, joy and happiness, and pink for luck in love.  In Italy they believe red underwear will bring you luck as well as make you fertile.  (In Italy they throw away the underwear on January 2nd.)  If you happen to have polka dots or circles on your underwear, even better as the round shape symbolizes coins/money. Oh yes, one more important fact that should go without saying – they need to be clean underwear.
• Write wishes on paper and burn them so they are fulfilled.
• Have cash in your wallet to bring more money in the new year – an empty wallet means cash flow problems all year.  While on the subject of money, don’t loan any money out on New Year’s Day or it is believed you will be loaning things out all year.
• Sweeping the house just before midnight to get out all of the “negativity from the previous year.”  In Japan after cleaning out their homes they hang bamboo sticks on the front door for prosperity.  It’s also good luck to put clean sheets on the bed for New Year’s Eve.  While we are on the subject of cleaning, No cleaning on New Year’s Day or you can clean out good luck. Don’t even take out the trash or do dishes, so make sure and stock up on paper plates!
• Open your window and doors for a few minutes shortly after midnight to let out the old year and allow the new one in.
• Don’t cut things!  Chinese believe that using knives, scissors or anything sharp on New Year’s Day is bad luck as you will “cut off” the New Year’s fortune.
• Anos Viejos. In Ecuador, people make effigies of straw, newspaper, old clothes and paper mache. These are called Anos Viejos, or Old Years, and are meant to represent people or events from the past year. In some cases, these effigies are stuffed with firecrackers. The tradition is to light the effigies on fire at midnight, as a way of shedding the old year and welcoming in the new.
• Throw Furniture. Planning on visiting Johannesburg, South Africa this New Year’s? If so, you may want to refrain from walking down the streets until the morning of January 1. That’s because you’re likely to be injured by falling furniture or appliances if you’re walking under windows on a residential street on New Year’s Eve. In an attempt to clean out their homes for the New Year, furniture and appliances are thrown out the window and on to the street. It’s common for guns and fireworks to be shot out of windows as well.
• Go in Circles. For a considerably safer New Year’s tradition, travel to the Philippines and celebrate the circle of life in the New Year. In the Philippines, literal circles and round objects are used to celebrate the occasion. Locals dress in polka-dotted clothing and fill their tables with round food and fruit. Borrowing a tradition from Spain, grapes are a commonly used round fruit, and the object is to eat twelve of them starting when the clock starts chiming at midnight, and finishing before the clock stops.
• Paint Your Door Red. In China residents paint every door of their house red. This is meant to symbolize good fortune and happiness. They also hide everything that’s sharp, including all of the knives, so that no one accidentally cuts themselves and brings about bad luck to the household for the coming year.
• Burn Christmas Trees. In the Netherlands everyone gathers in the streets and has a big bonfire with their Christmas trees. This is a way to get rid of the old and welcome the new that comes with the New Year.
• In Mexico they decorate their homes in different colors with a particular goal in mind – yellow is for blessings of improvement employment, white for better health, red for an overall improvement in lifestyle and love, or green for better financial circumstances in the coming year.
• Find a Husband. It’s in no way uncommon for people to deliberate their relationships and life situations at the start of a new year. What’s interesting about Belarus is that the women there do more than just think about their romantic future; they’ve come up with ways to predict it. Common games include one in which a group of women each has a small pile of corn, which they take turns throwing at a rooster. The first women whose corn is eaten by the rooster will be the first to get married. Another game is for a married women to hide a variety of ordinary items around the house, and have her single friends look for them. The different gifts have different meanings. If you find a ring, your future husband will be handsome, and if it’s bread that you locate, your husband will be rich.
• Guests:  Some cultures believe the first person to step into your house on New Years can make or break your luck.  It should be a loved one with good intentions – a child is a good option as they are pure of heart.  Oh yes – and the first step into the home should be with the right foot.
• Avoid crying: Unless they are tears of joy, avoid crying as it is thought that is could cause unhappiness all year.
• Work:  Write a short blog or to-do list for your job.  Don’t work for hour, just something quick – it is said that will lead to success in your job in the near year.
• Pay off your debts:  If you can start the new year with little to no debt, then you can start the year with a clean slate.  That’s tough around the holidays, so if you can’t pay your bills, then come up with budget that you can stick to as part of your new years resolution, so that you pay those bills off as soon as you can. Making minor changes like bringing your lunch to work instead of eating out can help you save money quickly.
• Flipping open a new calendar with it’s 12 unmarked months, is perhaps one of the most universally hopeful acts…representing a clean slate, or new start.

The list goes on and on, with the same hopes of “out with the old and in with the new.”  The traditions may be different, but the celebration and excitement of the new year is the same in many places around the world. Every group has special traditions that bring meaning to their new year celebrations. Do you have any special New Years Eve traditions and superstitions that you’ll be including in your celebration this year?

Want to travel in 2015?

I found two things you may want to try – one was to put your luggage outside your front door on New Years Eve and leave it there overnight.

The other was to walk with a packed suitcase or back pack around the block – both are said to ensure travel in the new year.

We wish you all a healthy, happy and prosperous 2015!

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