Chinese New Year Celebrated in Three Charts
Passengers wait for trains at the Hangzhou East Railway Station to be back home for the Spring Festival.
Photographer: ChinaFotoPress via Getty ImagesThis article is for subscribers only.
It's time to paint the town red, blow things up, visit grandma and eat hundreds of millions of chickens. Yes, it's the Lunar New Year, and cities from Shanghai to Singapore to Vancouver are preparing to usher in the Year of the Monkey.
In China, the biggest annual human migration in the world is under way with 332 million people packed onto trains — some for days — to return home for the traditional reunion dinner, boosting sales of snacks and adult diapers. Here's an insight into some of the more obscure effects of the festivities.