During the Tet (Lunar New Year) festival, it is a tradition for Vietnamese families to put up ornamental plants outside and around their houses to liven up the atmosphere while expressing a wish for good luck, happiness, and prosperity in the new year.
Kumquat – enduring symbol of Tet
Apart from peach blossoms that symbolise the strength and vitality, Vietnamese people also decorate their houses and offices with kumquat trees in the festive season.
Kumquat trees are believed to symbolise the prosperity because they are always laden with fruits.
During Tet, it is believed that the more fruits there are on a kumquat tree inside a house, the more luck will come to the owner in the new year.
A kumquat tree with many fruits makes a house brighter and warmer, especially in the cold weather in the north.The tree is a popular decoration for the living room during Tet. Its fruits symbolise the fertility and fruitfulness that the family hopes will come in the coming year. Greeting cards and good luck symbols are hung on the Tet tree.
In addition to such national dishes and products as "Fat pork, pickled onions, parallel sentences written on red paper, long bamboo poles planted upright, strings of fireworks, and square glutinous rice cakes", it is indispensable for each Vietnamese family to mark their Tet with colorful golden kumquat trees, peach blossoms as well as yellow apricot flowers as the symbol of good fortune for the coming year.
