- New Years Traditions in the Philippines

 The Philippines, like many nations of the world, has many of its own cultural traditions for the New Year; some are very wide-spread and some are practiced by only a few.

In our home we did a couple of them just for fun. One was eating 12 different round fruits to celebrate the new year. This was a lot of fun since we love fruit. Some people believe that this will bring good luck throughout the year.

12 fruits to eat at midnight New Years Eve--
our fruits

Another tradition we did was eating pancit on New Years Day. I cooked a big bowl of pancit bihon, a rice noodles dish with vegetables (cabbage, string beans, carrots, onions, garlic) and meat (shrimp, chicken, or pork), my own original recipe. Even Wendie, Lyn's sister ate some after we tried it on a dog first. Wendie survived, but I have not seen the dog lately. No, seriously, Wendie did the hard part, chopping the ingredients. Some people believe that eating pancit on New Years Day brings long life.

Cooking pancit

Pancit bihon

Wendie's Famous Mango Float

Other traditions and superstitions many Filipinos follow are:

• Making a lot of noise at midnight--fireworks, banging pots and pans, yelling, revving motorcycles or vehicles
• Nocha Buena--a feast at midnight including the fruits and pancit above
• Jumping as high as you can to make you grow taller
• Wearing polka dotted dress
• Eating sweets so that you will be sweet all year
• Eating sticky rice or biko so that the family will stick together all year
• Filling pockets with coins or money at midnight to make you richer
• Opening doors and windows at midnight to allow good luck to enter

There are many others, but these are some of the most common. We ate our Nocha Buena at midnight and watched the fireworks from our front door. 

New Years Day is a happy celebration in the Philippines. Happy New Year to all!