How long are Lunar New Year festivities? What is the Chinese Zodiac? Here's what to know as the Year of the Snake celebrations begin.

Wrapped cakes of glutinous rice, green beans and pork belly have been a Lunar New Year speciality in Vietnam for centuries.

As the week-long holiday approaches, shoppers bustled through the market in Hanoi’s Old Quarter, picking up essentials for the celebrations. (AP video shot by Hau Dinh)

The Lunar New Year is almost here, and the United States is jam-packed with fabulous options if you want to celebrate in a truly traditional manner.

Each culture that celebrates the Lunar New Year has traditions passed down from generation to generation that are thought to bring good luck. NPR readers share theirs.

Since food is the cornerstone of Lunar New Year celebrations, we’ve rounded up some of the holiday’s most essential dishes, shared a bit about the dish’s cultural significan

While Lunar New Year’s legislatively recognized holiday status in Washington is recent, some local groups have celebrated the holiday for decades. Here’s what’s going on this year.

Lunar New Year celebrations are coming up, marking the beginning of the year of the snake. What to know about the holiday how it's different from Chinese New Year.

Abbate explained that the Lunar New Year follows a 12-year cycle, each year represented by one of the 12 animals in the Chinese zodiac: Rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, ram, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig.

Tết in Seattle, now in its 29th year, is "a time when we celebrate our ancestors, to wish them good luck, and we ring in the new year to get good luck.”

The Lunar New Year begins Wednesday, but celebrations around the area are spread over multiple weeks, making it easier to find street parades, lion dances, concerts, family-friendly performances, night markets and new beers.

-- Nguyen Hue Flower Street 2025 opened on Monday evening in District 1, Ho Chi Minh City, the southern hub of Vietnam. The event attracted thousands of visitors as part of the annual celebrations for the upcoming Lunar New Year. The festival will run until February 2.