Year of the Rooster Begins

While the city and the country were celebrating the secular holiday surrounding the Super Bowl this weekend, Seattle's Vietnamese population observed the Lunar New Year, Tet, and welcomed the Year of the Rooster.

Some interesting facts about Tet:

• The New Year does not fall on the same date each year, although it is always in January or February.
  
• Prior to the celebrations homes are cleaned and painted. However cleaning during Tet is avoided.
  
• The Tet holiday is officially three days but is often celebrated for seven.
  

(Seattlest would stretch a holiday where cleaning was avoided to three weeks, easy.)

We'd like to encourage everyone to broaden their cultural and culinary horizons this week by consuming numerous bowls of Pho, homemade or store-bought.