Spending spring festival abroad

More Chinese revelers are heading overseas to celebrate the traditional New Year

The approach of Spring Festival could be easily detected in overseas Chinatowns shortly after the clock rang in 2015. Although the new year of the traditional Chinese calendar starts on Feb 19, Asian restaurants, groceries and supermarkets in large foreign cities around the world were stocking up on seasonal goods of all kinds, from red lanterns to Spring Festival scrolls, for local Chinese residents to do their Chinese New Year shopping.

Still, there are nostalgic voices among Chinese who complain that the lively Spring Festival mood that prevailed before the 21st century seems to be fading, even though standards of living were not as high back then.