Chinese New Year is the most important festival for Chinese people all
over the world. It is also called the Spring Festival or the Lunar New Year.
The exact date of the Spring Festival on the western calendar changes from
year to year.However, Chinese New Year takes places between January 1 and February 19.
On the Chinese calendar every year has an animal's name.These animals are the rat, ox,
tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, ram, monkey, rooster, dog and pig.A Chinese legend says
that these twelve animals had a race. The first was named after the rat, the winner. The other
eleven years were named according to the order in which the animals arrived in the race.
The clever rat jumped onto the ox's back, and then at the end jumped over the ox's head to
arrive first.
The Chinese believe that a person born in a particular year has some characteristics of that animal.