So it’s no surprise that followers of the Zodiac take birthdays very seriously: if a boy is born in the Year of the Tiger, instead of the Ox, say, he may end up a bullfighter and not the doctor his parents were hoping for.
While a person’s birth date shapes his fortune in China, in Japan, certain ages are considered lucky, regardless of a person’s birth date. It’s a very lucky child, indeed, who turns three, five, or seven, and not just because there’s a big festival in honor of those birthdays. Every year on November 15, Japan holds the Shichi-go-san (Seven-Five-Three) Festival, in which children who are seven, five, or three participate. Participation means dressing up in fancy clothes—either kimonos or Western (Occidental, not cowboy) clothes—and visiting a shrine or other place of worship. Their families give thanks for their health and welfare at shrines, and ask that the good fortune continue. Then the fun really starts for the birthday boy or girl when the family throws a party with presents and—you guessed it—food.
In the Chinese culture, birthdays are celebrated with a lunch of a whole boiled egg in a bowl of long-noodle soup. The egg symbolizes birth, and the noodles—long life. For sweet tooths, the white flour bun with lotus seed flavoring makes a popular birthday treat. But certainly one of the best-received traditions on birthdays are red envelopes of money.
