One of the Legends About the Tradition: A Legend of Staying Up For the New Year

Staying up awake on the eve of Chinese (Lunar) New Year’s Eve (Shousui 守岁) is a tradition of Spring Festival. Many families have a big meal and stay up until midnight or even the whole entire night to greet the arrival of the New Year after having a big meal on that night. It’s originated from There is an interesting folk story associating with this practice.

In ancient times period, there was a one fierce monster called “Year” scattered over the that lived deep in the mountains. It was naturally had a ferocious with a and villainous appearance. From birds to beasts and living human, no one None could escape their fate of from being eaten devoured by the this monster. Hence at the mere mention of “Year”, people always turned pale People turned paled at the mentioned of its name. Afterwards Gradually people gradually began to grasped the rules of its activities its habit – that every other after 365 days, in other words, in the night that is on the last night before the lunar new year, “Year” started to prey on human to taste fresh. Until the cock crowed, it returned to deep forests. the "Year" monster would come out of the mountains and began to wreck havoc by devouring humans until the cock crows.  Then it would stop and return to its liar.

Since then, families would began to have a great feast to enjoy and spend the last night together since no one knows who is going to be ended as the monster's meal.

Knowing about the regulation, people prepared supper in advance on that day. Since they could not predict their life and death, each family would have a hearty dinner together. Then they would stayed up the whole night to chat with each other to embolden themselves. Finally with the aid of a god who masqueraded as in the guise of a commoner people, helped the people figured out a set of complete methods to survive the night. Whenever this day came, people kept their On this night houses were lit up in great brightness.  all night, pasted Red colors were put on couplets on the doors and when the monster approaches,  set off red firecrackers were set off with other noise makers tc to scare off away the monster who was afraid of red things and loud explodes. (he God had told them of the monster's secret.  It was frightened of anything that is red and loud sudden noises.  Hence thus red is an auspicious color to the Chineseis  a symbol of luck in Chinese culture.)

In the past, it was time for prayers for the longevity of the older family members.the purpose of staying up is to pray for our elder members in our family for their longevity. However much has changed.  Now its meaning changes a lot. For some it is a day of relaxation, watching TV, gambling and entertainment for most people, it’s a day that they have fun in playing cards or mahjong. Most people just chat, laugh, tell stories or watch TV to relax themselves.

I guess maybe it is afraid of the red color that it doesn't bite or simply eat people as the bright red color would scare it off.  That's why it devoured its prey in one gulp.  It is a nice story.  I didn't think gun powder was invented until the Sung Dynasty and new year has preeceded before its discovery.  Maybe the crackers in the pre-gun powder days simply make some sudden noise and not explode.  I don't think paper was invented until the Han Dynasty.  So I assume people painted red on their doors rather than have red paper couplets pasted on their door posts.  There is a folk tale about Ming Dynasty founder, Chu Yuan Chang ordering people to paste red couplets on their door because he was considered an illiterate by the literati class of scholars because of his humble beginnings.

One of the Legends About the Tradition: Staying Up

Staying up on New Year’s Eve (Shousui 守岁) is a tradition of the Spring Festival. Many families stay up until midnight or even the whole night to greet the arrival of the new year after having a big meal on that night. It’s originated It originates from an interesting folk story.

In ancient times period, one fierce monster called “Year” scattered over the deep mountains. It was naturally ferocious with a villainous appearance. From birds to beasts and living humans, no one could escape their fate of being eaten by the monster. Hence at the mere mention of “Year”, people always turned pale. Afterwards people gradually grasped the rules of its activities – every other 365 days, in other words, in the night before the lunar new year, “Year” started to prey on human to taste fresh flesh. Until the cock crowed, it returned to the deep forests.

Knowing about the regulation, people prepared supper in advance on that day. Since they could not predict their life and death whether they would live or die, each family would have a hearty dinner together. Then they would stayed up the whole night to chat with each other to embolden themselves. Finally with the aid of a god who masqueraded as a common people commoner, people figured out a set of complete methods full set of rules to survive the night. Whenever this day came, people kept their house lit up all night, pasted red couplets on the door, set off firecrackers etc. to scare away the monster who was afraid of red things and loud explodes explosions. (Thus red is a symbol of luck in Chinese culture.)

In the past the purpose of staying up is was to pray for our elder members in our family for their longevity. Now its meaning changes has changed a lot. For some people, it’s a day that they have fun indoors/inside playing cards or mahjong. Most people just chat, laugh, tell stories or watch TV to relax themselves.

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Really interesting! Some words I wasn't even aware of myself here!

The part in grey doesn't make sense and I can't really think of an alternative keeping the same sort of sense you seem to want to imply.

For "etc.", it's not a full stop/period after that word, it's to show that it's an abbreviation.