On the first day of the New Year, Luoyang City woke to the sound of firecrackers.
Before dawn, scattered explosions rang out through the streets and alleys, answering one another, growing ever denser until crisp cracks filled the city. The smell of gunpowder mingled with the cold, clear air after the snow and drifted between every ward wall.
Every household had put up fresh peachwood charms, red paper bearing black ink. Some read, "A thousand doors, ten thousand homes, beneath the radiant sun"; others, "How shall we welcome the New Year?" Still others simply showed a plum blossom branch and a magpie. Though the brushwork was clumsy, it brimmed with vibrant life.
The door gods had been freshly pasted up as well: two mighty heavenly guardians, one wielding a whip, the other holding a parasol. Black face and red face stood to either side, glaring as they guarded each household's threshold, more devoted to their duties than real people.
By full daylight, the streets were already boiling with activity.
The pedestrians all wore new clothes. Men wore folded headcloths and bordered robes, their hems curling gently in the wind; women wore silk shoulder scarves over jackets and skirts, silk flowers or velvet ornaments pinned beside their temples, their steps graceful and swaying.
The children were dressed in a riot of color. Some had tiger heads sewn onto their hats, others wore fragrant sachets at their waists. As they ran, the tiger heads bobbed and the sachets bounced. Whenever they met someone, familiar or not, they clasped their hands and called out with cheerful smiles, "Happy New Year!"
The South Market was even livelier. Having taken New Year's Eve off, the vendors all poured out today. Sellers of candied hawthorns shouldered straw racks, the bright red fruit wrapped in translucent sugar