Tibetan New Year coincides with Spring Festival, Valentine's Day

The 2010 Tibetan New Year falls on February 14 on the solar calendar, coincidentally, that day is also China’s Lunar New Year, as well as the western holiday Valentine's Day. The three festivals arrive on the same day, which is quite a coincidence and very rare over the last one hundred years.

Like many ancient ethnic groups, the Tibetans have their own calendar, the Tibetan calendar. The year 1027 is identified as the first year on the Tibetan calendar, and it is from this year that the calendar begins. The Tibetan calendar is divided into odd months and even months, odd months are 30 days, even months are 29 days, non-leap years are 12 months, and leap years are 13 months. Around the New Year, people will hold various activities to say goodbye to the old year and welcome the New Year, making the Tibetan New Year the traditional festival.

The Tibetan New Year falls on Feb.14 this year the same day as the Spring Festival

The Tibetan calendar counts the years by combining the five elements in Chinese culture, metal, wood, water, fire, and earth, with the Chinese Zodiac: rat, cow, tiger, rabbit, snake, dragon, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog and pig. Among these, the five elements are divided into Yin and Yang, which correspond exactly to the ten heavenly stems, and the Zodiac also coincides with the twelve Earthly Branches, therefore, the combination of Yin Yang, the five elements and the Chinese zodiac forms a sixty year cycle.

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Tibetan Buddhist believers make New Year wishes

Although the Tibetan calendar and the lunar calendar both fall within the scope of the lunisolar calendar, each belongs to a different, independent calendar system, and thus each sets the leap month and odd and even months differently, which leads to different dates for the Tibetan New Year and the Lunar New Year, sometimes they are consistent, and sometimes not. However, no more than three kinds of situations most often occur: on the same day, one day apart, or one month apart. It has been very rare that Tibetan New Year and the Spring Festival fall on the same day, and it is a once-in-100-year event that these two holidays coincide with Valentine's Day.