At the time of this writing, slightly over 8 hours ago Malaysia and other countries observing GMT+8 time zone welcomed the year 2008. Countdown parties are still going on in many other parts of the world in time zones to the west of GMT. While right over here countdown parties are as good as over, in slightly over a month, 37 days to be exact, we will be welcoming the Chinese Lunar Year of the Rat. The rat is the first of twelve zodiac animals in Chinese astrology. While the new Chinese Lunar Year will begin on 7 February 2008, the Chinese Astrology Year however begins on the day the Start of Spring (立春), which is on 4 February. Babies born on 4 February onwards will be born under the Rat zodiac.

In the next few weeks, popular shopping venues will be decorated with Chinese New Year ornaments and decorations. Many events ranging from lion dances, Chinese orchestra performances and etc. will be staged in major shopping malls. The sale of Chinese New Year decorations and ornaments will be everywhere, well, I’ve seen some shops started selling even in the last one week!

Chinese New Year songs will be played almost everywhere where people shop and dine. Well, new albums for the Chinese New Year have been around for the last 1 month in fact, which I bought 3 of them, and even blogged about it recently.

So, while the countdown to 2008 is over, let us now countdown towards the Year of the Rat, which is 37 days away.