Chuc Mung Xuan Moi

Happy New Year! Tet is coming. I live in a large city in the south of US. We have a pretty good Vietnamese population, but the celebration here is pretty lame. I can say that because I've seen how people in California do it. Now those Californians know how to bring in the New Year! They set the bar high.
Some of my favorite childhood memories are of Tet. I love hoa mai (I think these are called peach blossom?). Of course, the best part is getting those red envelopes with money. My family would buy a live chicken a few weeks before Tet. We would feed it so it would be nice and fat. Then our housekeeper would chase it around the open patio and kill it and then pluck the feathers off (I vaguely remember something to do with hot water).
Neighbors would light a whole strand of firecrackers. We're not talking about those little dinky ones, but long ones tied together. We would also burn paper clothes for our ancestors. I read somewhere that you can buy paper cars now. How cool is that?
We would also make banh que. My favorite cookies and I love them homemade.
Someday, I'm going to go to Vietnam to celebrate Tet. That's on my list of things to do before I die.