13 Fun Chinese New Year Ideas, Activities, and Games for Work

Team Building Resources
Team Building Resources October 26, 2023 13 Fun Chinese New Year Ideas, Activities, and Games for Work

Here is our list of best Chinese New Year ideas, activities, and games.

Chinese New Year ideas are fun and engaging activities that employees can participate in during the celebrations. Examples include Chinese New Year Decorations, Dress-Up Party, and Office Spring Cleaning. This holiday marks the year’s first new moon and gives folks the chance to celebrate a fresh start.

These celebrations are similar to virtual holiday parties and can function as online diversity activities.

This list includes:

  • Chinese New Year activities for adults
  • Chinese New Year celebration ideas
  • Chinese New Year office party ideas
  • Chinese New Year games
  • Lunar New Year activities

Let’s get started!

List of Chinese New Year ideas, activities, and games

From Hosting a Firework Show to Toss the Yusheng to Mahjong, here is our list of the best games and activities to try during Chinese New Year.

1. Office Spring Cleaning

Office Spring Cleaning is one of the best Lunar New Year activities because employees can clean and reorganize their workspace. The Chinese believe cleaning out dirt during the celebrations helps remove bad luck and misfortune. Colleagues can use this opportunity to sort out files, throw away unused office items, and rearrange the workplace.

Employees can work individually by cleaning out their personal workspace or work together as a team to clean out the whole office. This exercise creates a welcoming environment for good fortune and gives employees a fresh start into the new year.

2. Chinese New Year Decorations

Putting up Chinese New Year Decorations is one of the best ways to mark the Lunar New Year. These decorations often signify spring’s onset and bring participants good fortune, happiness, and good luck.

Some decoration ideas include:

  • Red lanterns
  • Blossoming flowers, like peonies, orchids, and plum blossoms
  • Paper cuttings
  • Kumquat trees

The most prominent theme colors for this celebration are red with traces of gold, which symbolize good fortune and wealth and also help ward off evil spirits. You may use red paper to make origami plants and paper Lunar New Year animal cuttings. For example, the year 2023 is the year of the rabbit. Therefore, decorating the office and work environment with rabbit paper cuttings is a great idea. You may also hang paintings as a sign of your new year greetings to guests.

3. Toss the Yusheng

One of the best Chinese New Year celebration ideas is Tossing the Yusheng, or doing the prosperity toss. This traditional practice involves tossing a large bowl of colorful salads with good wishes said in between each toss. The Chinese believe that the higher you toss the salad, the more prosperity you get in the year ahead. The yusheng is typically a Chinese raw fish salad, and each ingredient symbolizes an important wish for the future.

Some ingredients in the yusheng salad include:

  • Raw fish for prosperity and abundance
  • Pomelo for good luck
  • Oil drizzled in a circular motion for abundant cash flow
  • Carrots for good fortune
  • White radish for business prosperity
  • Crushed peanuts for valuable home possessions
  • Golden crackers for wealth
  • Plum sauce poured in one spot for strong ties with family and friends

To eat the yusheng, colleagues must gather around the salad tray and use chopsticks to toss it as high as possible while saying hopeful wishes. The teammates must ensure they push the salad to the center while tossing, as this signifies wishing good fortune upon every member at the table. The teammates will then gather to eat the yusheng, ensuring that some salad spills onto the table to represent abundance.

4. Dress-Up Party

Dress-Up Parties are one of the best Chinese New Year activities for adults because they allow employees to get into the holiday spirit and connect with Chinese culture and tradition. It is important to note that red is essential to the Chinese New Year garb. Red symbolizes strength and prosperity, and folks often wear it during this holiday. Some folks also incorporate gold in their garments as a symbol of wealth and good fortune.

Some important dressing taboos to note for the holiday include:

  • Do not wear damaged clothes, as they may bring bad luck. These garments may include distressed jeans or clothes with tears.
  • Do not wear black, as it is associated with death and mourning. The Chinese consider this color unlucky during the Lunar New Year celebrations.
  • Do not wear new shoes. As funny as it may seem, the Cantonese word for shoe sounds the same as a sigh. So, the Chinese believe that wearing new shoes during the new year celebrations will bring disappointment or sad events that may cause you to sigh all year long.

Colleagues can dress using the red color as their theme for the celebrations. Employees can also choose to dress in traditional Chinese clothing, like a Tang suit or hanfu, for the festivities. Wearing these clothes in the right colors reduces the chances of committing a faux pas. For workers who prefer a more casual look, a red sweater and plain white trousers are great outfit combinations for this holiday. Colleagues will then walk across a designated runway to parade their outfits. Then, each member will take a vote for the best attire. At the end of the event, colleagues can take pictures and create fun memories together.

5. Mahjong

Mahjong is one of the most interesting Chinese New Year games. Like poker, the goal of the game is to form matching pairs and sets, but instead of cards, this game uses tiles. To win the game, players must form one pair and sets of tiles.

To organize this activity:

  1. Get a set of Mahjong tiles. Each set contains 144 tiles.
  2. Learn the symbols and character suits of each tile.
  3. Roll a set of dice to choose the east wind player, the tile dealer for that round.
  4. The player with the highest numbers on the dice is the east wind.
  5. The colleague to the right of the east wind will play first.
  6. Shuffle the tiles by placing them face down and moving them around randomly before dealing.
  7. The east wind will deal 13 tiles per player.
  8. The players will pass the tiles using the Charleston method, meaning the first player will pass tiles from right to left. This process is called the first pass.
  9. Players may attempt a second pass, but other players must first agree. If a player refuses, then there will be no second pass.
  10. The next player will then pick a tile from the deck and discard one of their tiles. Players must keep tiles that match their set and discard others that do not before the end of the game.
  11. Players can pick up a discarded tile if it matches their set.
  12. The game will continue in this order until players have formed several sets and a pair.
  13. The participants must say, “I am calling,” when they are a tile away from winning the round.
  14. Once the sets are complete, colleagues will display them to colleagues and say, “Mahjong.”

This game is a great way for colleagues to spend time together and enjoy each other’s company during the Lunar New Year celebrations.

6. The Chopstick Game

The Chopstick Game is a fun and engaging activity that colleagues can play during the Lunar New Year celebrations. The rules of the game are simple. Colleagues must transfer all the beans from one bowl to another in record time.

To organize this activity:

  1. Arrange medium bowls filled with beans on a long table.
  2. Set empty bowls with a pair of chopsticks beside each bowl of beans.
  3. Set a timer for 60 seconds.
  4. The players must race against time to pick up beans and transfer them to the empty bowl.
  5. Participants must not touch the bowl with their hands.
  6. If any beans fall on the ground, then the player is out of the game.
  7. The first player to transfer all their beans before the timer runs out wins the game.

This game is quite challenging, so you can give employees a better chance by ensuring they use bamboo chopsticks, as they are less slippery. This game is an excellent way for colleagues to bond and develop good work relationships.

7. The Ping Pong Game

The Ping Pong Game is an exciting activity where teammates must attempt to blow ping pong balls past a row of cups. Ping Pong is China’s national sport and is a great source of pride for the Chinese. The country has won numerous ping pong medals in the Olympics. This version of ping pong is a simple and fun way for colleagues to pass time during the Chinese New Year celebrations.

To organize this activity:

  1. Split the players into groups of four or five.
  2. Set up a row of five to ten disposable cups filled with water.
  3. Each team must line up in front of the cups.
  4. The first player from each group will get a ping pong ball and place it into the first cup.
  5. Players must blow the ball into the last cup in the row. If the ball falls out of the cup, then that member is out.
  6. The cup’s order represents their point values. Therefore, the teams get ten points for blowing the ball into the last cup in the row and two points if they blow into the second cup.
  7. When the first player finishes their turn, the next teammate will try.
  8. The players will take turns gathering points for the team.
  9. At the end of the game, the team with the most points wins.

This game is best for large groups, as it can get exciting and rowdy. In addition, employees can use this activity to bond, chat, and get to know each other better.

8. Exchange Red Envelopes

Exchanging Red Envelopes is a tradition most commonly practiced during the Chinese New Year celebrations. These bright red envelopes usually contain money that family and friends give each other as a sign of their good wishes and luck for the year ahead. Colleagues can replicate this tradition at work during the Lunar New Year celebrations.

Some important factors to note when giving and receiving red envelopes include:

  • Do not open the envelope until you part ways with your guest.
  • Always use new bills.
  • Give bills in even numbers, except the number four, as it rhymes with the Chinese word for death.
  • Do not add coins to the red envelopes.

To organize this activity:

  1. Each employee will write their name on a tiny scrap of paper.
  2. Fold the paper, and toss them into a bowl.
  3. Mix up the names, and each employee will pick a random piece of paper from the bowl.
  4. Give participants empty bright red envelopes a day before the celebrations.
  5. Colleagues must put money in the envelopes and bring them to work during the festivities.
  6. Have employees give their chosen colleagues their red envelopes.

It is important that colleagues draw names for this activity to ensure the gift exchange is fair and no teammate gets left out. Employees may also offer a few kind words and well wishes as they give each other the red envelopes.

9. Dragon and Lion Dance

The Dragon and Lion Dance is a popular traditional Chinese dance where performers mimic the movements of a lion or dragon in a large costume. The performers usually carry out this dance by controlling the movements using poles. The major difference between both dances is that two performers do the lion dance, while nine to 15 dancers organize the dragon dance.

In Chinese culture, the lion symbolizes strength and stability, while the dragon represents excellence and boldness. You can invite professional dragon dance performers to teach colleagues this intricate traditional dance or have the performers entertain colleagues with this outstanding performance.

The significance of this tradition makes it one of the best Chinese New Year ideas for work.

10. Host a Fireworks Show

Hosting a Fireworks Show is a simple and fun way to celebrate the Chinese New Year with friends and family. The fireworks show can come after other activities and games. You can also encourage guests to bring friends or family to celebrate this event. This event works best on the eve of the Chinese New Year. As soon as the clock strikes midnight, launch colorful fireworks into the sky, and allow guests to enjoy the view.

A fireworks show is one of the best Chinese New Year office party ideas because you can share food and drinks at this event or even play games with teammates. A great idea for this event is to pass around traditional Chinese snacks, like sachima or youtiao, because the Chinese believe food helps bring harmony and improves relationships.

11. Chinese New Year Crafts

Chinese New Year Crafts are fun, creative sessions where employees can show off their artistic talents. Colleagues can design red envelopes, paper lanterns, paper folding fans, and Chinese New Year banners.

To organize this activity:

  1. Set up individual art stations. Each participant will have a stool and a mini canvas.
  2. Provide art materials like construction paper, colorful tissue paper, scissors, and glue.
  3. Play traditional Chinese music as employees work on their craft.

You can even gamify this activity by setting a timer for ten to 15 minutes. Participants must then ensure they finish their craft within the given timeline. The first worker to finish before the timer runs out wins!

12. Chinese New Year Karaoke

Chinese New Year Karaoke is a great way to celebrate the Lunar New Year with colleagues. Chinese communities often listen to traditional Chinese music during this event.

Some artists who create traditional Chinese music include:

  • Zhou Yu
  • Lei Qiang
  • Wu Fei
  • Sa Dingding

Employees can practice traditional Chinese songs a few days before the new year, then host a karaoke party. Teammates will take turns singing these songs as they appear on a screen.

13. Chinese New Year Trivia

Trivia is one of the best Chinese New Year ideas. The game is an educational session where colleagues get to learn facts about Chinese culture and traditions. Teammates will gather to answer different trivia questions on the Lunar New Year.

Some questions for this trivia include:

  • What color is taboo on Chinese New Year?
  • How do you remove bad luck from your home during Chinese New Year?
  • What is another name for Chinese New Year?
  • What are the elements of the Chinese Zodiac?

To make this trivia session even more exciting, you can add fun lifelines like calling a friend. You could also include the fifty-fifty lifeline, where players get two options to choose from when they do not know the answer to the question.

Conclusion

Chinese New Year ideas and activities are great and fun ways for colleagues to spend the Lunar New Year together. These fun gatherings are easy ways to educate workers on Chinese culture and tradition.

Celebrating this holiday also promotes a positive company culture and encourages inclusivity in the workplace. Employees will learn to accept diverse cultures and traditions and foster a welcoming work environment.

Next, check out Valentine’s Day team building activities.

FAQ: Chinese New Year ideas for work

Here are frequently asked questions about Chinese New Year ideas for work.

What are some good Chinese New Year ideas for work?

Some good Chinese New Year ideas for work include Office Spring Cleaning, Tossing the Yusheng, and Hosting a Fireworks Show.

How do you celebrate Chinese New Year in the workplace?

To celebrate the Chinese New Year in the workplace, start by cleaning out the office to remove bad luck and misfortune, then decorate with red- and gold-themed decorations, such as paper lanterns, banners, and blossoming flowers.

You may then toss a yusheng with colleagues while saying well wishes to attract good fortune, abundance, and wealth. Other fun celebration ideas include organizing a karaoke session or trivia game with friends and family.

What are some good Chinese New Year activities for employees?

Some good Chinese New Year activities for employees include Office Spring Cleaning, Exchanging Red Envelopes, and the Ping Pong Game.

written with 💖 by Tasia Duske

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