Editor’s Epilogue: Lunar New Year memories burn through my mind like incense

The house is decorated in various yellows and reds — from flowers to tablecloths to the cups on my grandparents’ altar. Between the firecrackers thundering outside and the screaming and shouting from my family members playing in the bầu cua cá cọp gambling match, I could barely hear my thoughts. My olfactory neurons are working overtime with the warm piquant smell of the incense burning and the rich, familiar aromas drifting out from the kitchen. Fighting every impulse not to shove all the food on the table into my mouth, I was overstimulated with everything around me.

But I was never overwhelmed.

As I close my eyes, I can vividly remember what Lunar New Year sounded like, smelled like, looked like, tasted like, felt like — all my senses fire up as I try to travel back to the good old days.

I’m not sure when everything changed. Suddenly, the weeks-long celebration was just a weekend and the commanding stimuli I received around this time of the year quieted down to just a whisper. So quiet that I hadn’t noticed the holiday had passed.

The Vietnamese New Year celebration consists of 12 days, each dedicated to a specific task or person. 12 days of warmth, smiles, lion dancing, gambling, family and fond memories. So, when I say that it shrunk down to just 1-2 days of festivities to none, it makes my heart sink like an anchor through a frozen lake.

Last year, I swept through the kitchen on the first of February casually with the broom until I crumpled to the dusty floor when I remembered what Feb. 1 meant: the New Year. For some context, growing up it was embedded in me by all my aunties and uncles that bad luck clings to the dust and dirt around you, but as you enter the new year, luck reenters your home. And I had just swept all of the luck out of my apartment.

Now, do I really blame all the traumatic experiences and the hell that was 2022 on my decision to sweep my crumb-filled kitchen floors? Maybe. 

But it wasn’t just the loss of luck that hurt, it was everything. How could I have forgotten? Even though the celebrations shrunk to just a weekend after my dad died, it was still celebrated. I had always celebrated, no matter rain or shine.

I think it was the one thing I felt still connected me to all those before me and all those currently with me in my community. Coming from a family full of immigrants, finding any form of common ground is a Sisyphean task. Despite all of the differences between my mom and I, it was something we could celebrate together. Superstitions put aside, forgetting Lunar New Year was synonymous with forgetting to honor my family and ancestors.

It’s hard to say the least, to feel connected to your family and culture when it feels like everything you do goes against their old-fashioned (slightly outdated) beliefs. But on Lunar New Year, none of that matters. The giant red booming firecrackers scare all evil spirits and muffle our differences as the sticky rice cakes and braised pork bring the family together to the table. Memories of the nagging and strictness that suffocates me pause as I find myself gambling away my red envelope money and screaming playfully with my mom when my brother ends up taking all our money.

It’s strange to say that this time of year brings melancholy feelings when for most of my life, it was the time of the year I cherished the most. So this year, in an attempt to scare away the melancholy like the firecrackers did years before, I sat down and wrote this article. Putting my emotions into words always took a weight off my chest. But in addition to that, I called up my relatives and lived vicariously through them as I asked them about their New Year plans.

I know that 12 days of Lunar New Year celebration shouldn’t be the only thing that brings family together, but at the moment it’s a path I’m familiar with that I feel comfortable enough to go on. What does that entail? Well, it starts off with me recruiting my roommates to deep clean our house before the New Year to prevent the 2022 fiasco. Then, it involves me making a “small” trip to IKEA and Chinatown for Lunar New Year supplies and decorations. Finally, it involves me figuring out a new way to celebrate the new year with the people currently around me while honoring those that are miles away from me.

Not celebrating the new year with my family makes my heart ache a little. Still, I want to put the melancholy behind me, forgive old grievances — even if it’s just for a few days — and create new memories in honor of the ones that continue to connect me to my family. I’d forgotten once, but those memories remind me that the new year will come once again. It’s just up to me to make it mean something.

My house is in the process of being decorated in various yellows and reds. Firecrackers live inside party poppers and screaming and shouting will most definitely come to life when I introduce my friends and roommates to bầu cua cá cọp. The kitchen might smell like smoke as I try to recreate familiar Viet dishes but just the thought of celebrating the new year in a new way makes all my senses fire up again and warm my heart once more.

“Editors’ Epilogue” is a rotating column featuring a new Daily Trojan editor in each installment and their personal experiences of living in what seems to be an irrepressible dumpster fire of a world.