Tet Holiday

The Miracle of Tet Holiday

“No matter where you are, remember to come back home on Tet holiday” Tet holiday, is also known as “Lunar New Year”, and it usually comes one month later than Western New Year as it is based on Lunar calendar. To me, it’s not just simply a holiday. It’s a miracle holiday. It’s a holiday when there is just only laughter and joy. It’s when you can see the family gather together to the fullest. Moreover, people forget everything that has happened in the last year to start a fresh new year. What can I say? It’s surely the biggest holiday in Vietnam. Therefore, even though I’ve been living in the U.S for almost a year now, spending the first Tet holiday in a different country has given me the worst nostalgia for Vietnam.

Basically, Tet is my favorite holiday of the year. My homesickness grows stronger when it comes to this period of time. When Tet comes, it also means there will be no work or school for ten days, for it is the most important celebration of the year. To be more specific, there are three parts of Tet holiday: before the New Year, New Year’s Eve and the New Year. My family and I always agree that the perfect time to feel the “Tet spirit” is before New Year’s Eve. This period begins one or two weeks before the actual celebration. Vietnamese people will be preparing for Tet at this time. We go shopping, cook the traditional Tet food, redecorate and clean up the house. Most importantly, we all do this with family, which makes Tet more special. However, I can’t do it here, in the U.S. On New Year, there will be many activities going on. People visit their loved ones, from family to neighborhood. They share gifts, best wishes and, of course, show their love to each others. For the children, the holiday means “the red envelopes”, which contain money as a good luck from older people. Furthermore, what I like most about the holiday is that it’s a good opportunity for people to replace all the bad things that had happened last year with the good things in the New Year. It’s like a miracle that makes you become a brand new person with so many hopes to start a bright future. Once again, I feel sad that I can’t be able to do that in the U.S, since they don’t celebrate Tet. 

Traditional Vietnamese food during this holiday, which is clearly hard to find in a foreign country, is one of the main reasons that make me miss it the most. Just only mentioning the food can make me feel hungry right away. On these days, we eat “thit kho hot vit” (meat stewed in coconut juice with eggs) and “canh kho qua” (bitter melon and meat soup) with rice. In Vietnamese, bitter melon is pronounced as “sadness is gone”, and we believe if we have this soup on the first days of the year, it will bring us a good year with luck. In addition, there are two traditional cakes that everybody should have in the house on the Tet holiday: “banh chung” (sticky rice wrapped filling with meat and bean) which is the symbol of Earth, and “banh day” (sticky white rice with rounded pork) which is the symbol of sky. What makes them unique is that they have a very good story about their origins, and it takes days to cook them, not simply just a few hours. While cooking, the older people will pass the story of the cakes to the next generations this way. On the other hand, it is not impossible to cook those kinds of foods in America, but it takes a lot of work so usually Vietnamese people here just order them, which is very easy, just grab it and eat it like that. That’s why it is not special anymore, and it’s just considered the same as “American fast-food”.

Moreover, my nostalgia is also caused by the lack of family. Therefore, when it comes to Tet in Vietnam, knowing my family and relatives are preparing for the holiday, I feel so lonely in the U.S. In addition, I’ve been told, Tet will be the worst time of the year when you are not be able to be with your family. That’s true. Even though I live in Vietnamese town in the U.S and people do celebrate Tet holiday, I still sense something is missing. Unlike the holiday in Vietnam, people over here just celebrate Tet for one or two days. The neighborhood relationship here is also not as close as in Vietnam. Tet’s purpose is for people to show love and happiness to each other. In addition, you will be able to see flowers and red and golden decorations everywhere in Vietnam, the only thing I can only find in Chicago is the white color of snow, which makes me miss my house even more. In my uncle’s house, where I currently live, even though we do have flowers and “hoa mai” the tradition flower for Tet holiday, they are all fake. The climate here makes it hard to find those kinds of flowers. When I was in Vietnam, whenever Tet came, I felt happy for being with my family, relatives and my friends. It’s the miracle of Tet that I can’t find here. 

Overall, Tet is not a miracle anymore when you are not with family and can’t enjoy the holiday with them. I was proud of myself that I’ve caught up the lifestyle in this new country pretty fast and I thought I didn’t feel homesick that much. However, the Tet holiday still makes me want to go home. The coldness of winter in a different country makes the loneliness in my heart grows bigger, but in order to be successful in life and to achieve my goal, I have taught myself how to stay strong. Once I reach my dream, I can go back home and have a happy Tet holiday with my family. That’s the miracle I can bring for myself and my family.