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China First Birthday Celebration, Zhua Zhou
Actually, the first important celebration to newly born baby is One Hundred Day Celebration. When the newly born baby is 100 days old, and ready to meet his/her relatives and receive blessings, his/her parents would gather all relatives to share the happiness with whole big family members. However, Zhua Zhou, one of the most important traditional customs on a child's first birthday anniversary in China for it is a ceremony to predict child's future and decide how to educate child. So it has big ang great influent to the child and the family. According to some written records, the earliest Zhuazhou can be traced back to the Song Dynasty (960-1279), which means it has lived in China with a history of near 1000 years.
"Zhua" means Pick up, "Zhou" means first anniversary. Zhua zhou is a ceremony that parents place an assortment of articles in front of their child, and the child is to choose from the articles. The items laid out for boys and girls are different. What the child has chosen is said to determine his or her future inclination and capabilities. Meanwhile, each symbolic of a future career path, on a plate and then have the child pick one. The things the child picked up will not only reveal their future career but also certain personality traits and interests.
In ancient China, items like a ruler, makeup, needles and thread were placed on a girl’s plate, as women were expected to stay at home and the purpose of their zhua zhou was to see which area of housework or crafts they would excel at. For boys, parents would select swords, pens and books to see if they would become a scholar, hero or poet. It was also common to have shallots and celery for both boys and girls as additional choices, because both of these vegetables possess Chinese names with positive homonyms of virtuous temperaments: If a child picked celery (芹, qín) it meant the child would be industrious (勤, qín) and shallots (葱, cōng) denote intelligence (聪, cōng).
Since I am a young father and had prepared a Zhua Zhou ceremony for my daughter and talked so much with my elder relatives days ago, I do have someting to tell you. Traditionaly, the stamps, classic Confucian, Buddhist and Taoist books, a Chinese brush pen, ink, paper, an ink stone, abacus, coins, an accounting book, jewelry, flowers, food and toys should be prepared required by the elders, and if there is a baby girl, a scoop, spoon (representing cooking utensils), scissors, ruler (representing 
sewing items), thread and a design book (representing embroidery) will be added. Selecting the stamp means the child will be an officer in the future; if the baby chooses the stationery, the baby will be industrious and endowed with great literary talents; the abacus suggests a penchant for statistics and financing. A girl baby who first grabs a sewing item or cooking utensil will be a good housewife. On the other hand, when the child picks a cake or a toy, he or she will know how to enjoy the pleasures in life and so on. As my daughter, she picked up a cash RMB100, that's so funny, because we have two explanations. One is she loves money so much, could be a moneygrubber, the other explanation is she will be good at making money, a smart girl.
However, nowadays, stamps, classic Confucian, Buddhist and Taoist books are lost for stamps are not popular any more. Children have seldom chance to know Confucian, Buddhist and Taoist ,neither their parents. Besides, effected by improving computer technologies, computer, Cell phone are added. All in all, Zhua zhou ceremony is a chance the parents expressing their good wishes and high hope on the future of their children. It reflects how the parents and relatives will encourage the child, and how they will conduct enlightenment education. Therefore, even though some parents may not be superstitious, they will still carry out the custom to express their wish for the next generation.
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China First Birthday Celebration, Zhua Zhou
Actually, the first important celebration to newly born baby is One Hundred Day Celebration. When the newly born baby is 100 days old, and ready to meet his/her relatives and receive blessings, his/her parents would gather all relatives to share the happiness with whole big family members. However, Zhua Zhou, one of the most important traditional customs on a child's first birthday anniversary in China for it is a ceremony to predict child's future and decide how to educate child. So it has big ang great influent to the child and the family. According to some written records, the earliest Zhuazhou can be traced back to the Song Dynasty (960-1279), which means it has lived in China with a history of near 1000 years.
"Zhua" means Pick up, "Zhou" means first anniversary. Zhua zhou is a ceremony that parents place an assortment of articles in front of their child, and the child is to choose from the articles. The items laid out for boys and girls are different. What the child has chosen is said to determine his or her future inclination and capabilities. Meanwhile, each symbolic of a future career path, on a plate and then have the child pick one. The things the child picked up will not only reveal their future career but also certain personality traits and interests.In ancient China, items like a ruler, makeup, needles and thread were placed on a girl’s plate, as women were expected to stay at home and the purpose of their zhua zhou was to see which area of housework or crafts they would excel at. For boys, parents would select swords, pens and books to see if they would become a scholar, hero or poet. It was also common to have shallots and celery for both boys and girls as additional choices, because both of these vegetables possess Chinese names with positive homonyms of virtuous temperaments: If a child picked celery (芹, qín) it meant the child would be industrious (勤, qín) and shallots (葱, cōng) denote intelligence (聪, cōng).
Since I am a young father and had prepared a Zhua Zhou ceremony for my daughter and talked so much with my elder relatives days ago, I do have someting to tell you. Traditionaly, the stamps, classic Confucian, Buddhist and Taoist books, a Chinese brush pen, ink, paper, an ink stone, abacus, coins, an accounting book, jewelry, flowers, food and toys should be prepared required by the elders, and if there is a baby girl, a scoop, spoon (representing cooking utensils), scissors, ruler (representing sewing items), thread and a design book (representing embroidery) will be added. Selecting the stamp means the child will be an officer in the future; if the baby chooses the stationery, the baby will be industrious and endowed with great literary talents; the abacus suggests a penchant for statistics and financing. A girl baby who first grabs a sewing item or cooking utensil will be a good housewife. On the other hand, when the child picks a cake or a toy, he or she will know how to enjoy the pleasures in life and so on. As my daughter, she picked up a cash RMB100, that's so funny, because we have two explanations. One is she loves money so much, could be a moneygrubber, the other explanation is she will be good at making money, a smart girl.
However, nowadays, stamps, classic Confucian, Buddhist and Taoist books are lost for stamps are not popular any more. Children have seldom chance to know Confucian, Buddhist and Taoist ,neither their parents. Besides, effected by improving computer technologies, computer, Cell phone are added. All in all, Zhua zhou ceremony is a chance the parents expressing their good wishes and high hope on the future of their children. It reflects how the parents and relatives will encourage the child, and how they will conduct enlightenment education. Therefore, even though some parents may not be superstitious, they will still carry out the custom to express their wish for the next generation.
