Potala Palace in the Tibetan Autonomous Region

　　Ringing in the New Year, Tibetan-style

　　By Priscilla Jiao

　　At 2.7 million people, Tibet is the most sparsely populated of any province or autonomous region belonging to China.

　　About 93 percent are ethnic Tibetans. Significant populations of people of Tibetan ethnic group also reside in Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces. Tibetans in Tibet and all over the world celebrate Tibetan New Year, or Losar, on the first day of the Tibetan calendar. This year, the celebration falls on February 9, coincidently the same day as the Chinese Spring Festival.

　　"The dates for Tibetan New Year and Chinese New Year can fall in four different ways: The same day, a one-day difference, a one-month difference, or a one-month-plus-one-day difference," says Professor Sonam Doje, director of the China Tibetology Publishing House.

　　The first year of the Tibetan calendar is AD 1027, Ghang Tso, assistant professor of the Central Minority University, told the Entering Tibet webpage on the CCTV website. "Before, most festivals were connected with religion. But now it has changed," Ghang says. "For instance, Saga Zlaba Festival is related with Sakyamuni's birth, entering into monkhood, and passing away. Most celebrations are religious, but some not, such as horse racing and archery. Some religious customs have changed into folk customs, which will develop toward a modern culture."

　　On the 29th day of the last month of the Tibetan year, a festival called dgu thug is held in Lhasa. Everyone whitewashes and cleans their houses, especially the kitchens. Families cook special noodles: dgu thug.

　　"Dgu thug is made of nine different ingredients, including dried cheese, peas, wheat, sweet potatoes, vermicelli, highland barley, meat and other grains," says Doje. "Inside the bigger dough balls [which no one eats], there are different fillings, such as wool, pepper, salt, stone and charcoal. Before eating dgu thug, the family soaks tsampa (roasted highland barley flour) with water, rolls it into a small ball and touches it on their clothes, symbolizing the removal of evil and diseases."

　　The item found inside a person's dough ball comments on that person's character. If a person finds pepper in his dough, it means he is talkative and direct; wool means one is good-hearted and pure; stone means one has a hard heart; salt means one is lazy; and charcoal means one is evil and black-hearted. "Family members always laugh and tease each other. It's all in good fun," says Doje.

　　After the meal, the leftover dgu thug is placed in a broken old pottery pot. The hostess takes the pot outside the house, and the host goes to each rooms shaking burning wheat straws while shouting to drive away evil apparitions. In the meantime, the hostess takes the pot away from the house and cannot turn her head to look back until she throws the pot away at the first intersection she comes across. The other family members light fireworks in the yard.

　　The last day of the old year is spent decorating and cleaning the houses and placing offerings in shrines for followers of Buddhism. "We change old thangkas (colorful cloths) for new ones and present new kha-btags to the Buddha," says Doje. Kha-btags are the ribbons that Tibetans use to show their respect for their gods or their hospitality to guests. The color and length vary according to the receiver, but for Buddha, they are mostly long white narrow flags.

　　"We decorate our rooms' walls with white flour and fortunate patterns such as the scorpion, which represents the dragon," says Doje. "Also, old kha gdan, a kind of Tibetan carpet, are replaced with new ones." In the evening, people display flour cakes, go log (sheep's skulls) and highland barley sprouts.

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