Having Chinese New Year's Eve dinner at Kangqing Farmstead
The dinner on Chinese New Year's Eve is a pivotal event among the festivities celebrated during the Spring Festival. In Jiande, slaughtering a pig is another big thing for every household.
The slaughter traditionally takes place in the last month of the lunar calendar and it takes three to four adults to complete it. The animal is killed and then placed on a long wooden stool and bathed in hot water to remove the hair.
A pork banquet will usually follow, while the pig's head is saved for the ancestor worship on New Year's Eve.
People also start preparing niangao, a rice cake generally taken at breakfast, on the first day of the year, with a homophonous meaning of "increasingly prosperous year in and year out."
In the Kangqing Farmstead, beside Xin'an River, you can still see how locals make traditional niangao by beating the cooked rice powder in a large stone mortar.
The food market is also worth a visit. You can also find, not only fresh vegetables and meat but, unique preserved food, dried food, local wine and a variety of rice-made products.
On the last day of the year, people will clean their houses as it is considered bad luck to use the broom in the New Year. Traditionally every household will write, or ask someone to write, spring couplets to decorate the doorways.
The village operas also stage open-air concerts, where you can enjoy authentic theatrical performances that have remained unchanged for hundreds of years.
How to get there from Shanghai: G60 Expressway – G60N Expressway – Yangcunqiao Exit – G320 – Xiaya Town – Kangqing Farmstead
Picking fresh strawberries in Yangcunqiao Town
On January 13, the 10th China Strawberry Festival was disclosed at the Yangcunqiao Town in Jiande. It also saw the official launching of 18 strawberry cultivars all planted locally.
The town has long been related with strawberry growing and is now the largest produce area for the greenhouse strawberry, with a cultivating area of more than 820 acres.
Benefiting from the local Xin'an River, the strawberries here taste juicy and sweet. In recent years, sightseeing parks have been set up and strawberry picking tours are offered as an extra service.
If you want to escape the smoke and din of the New Year celebrations, Yangqiaocun for strawberry picking and fresh air is a perfect way to end the Spring Festival holiday.
The strawberries picked can all be delivered to your home.
How to get there from Shanghai: G60 Expressway – G60N Expressway – Yangcunqiao Exit – Yangcunqiao Town
