In Thailand, New Year's comes three times a year. In 2005, it falls on 1 January, 9 February and 13-15 April. The more occasions for fun the better — this is the Thai Way. But of course there's more to the abundance of New Years than the mere inclination to have a good time as often as possible.

The original and still traditional Thai New Year's is Songkran, which marks the beginning of the Buddhist year (AD 2005 = Buddhist Era 2548). This is celebrated between April 13 and 15, at the height of the hot season and in the break between the rice harvest and the next planting. January 1, on the other hand, has been the official version of New Year's ever since Thailand adopted the Gregorian calendar. Economic development in the modern age has demanded a standard calendar worldwide; and Thais now celebrate 1 January in much the way Westerners do. Then they go ahead and have a good time at Songkran as well.

But the Land of Smiles takes still one more opportunity to ring in the new. Many visitors don't realize that much of Phuket's population is ethnic Chinese; and the Chinese New Year is by far the most important festival of the entire year for this large group of Thai citizens. It marks the beginning of the first lunar month and lasts three to five days, depending on how enthusiastic the celebrants get about proceedings. The Chinese year begins with the second new moon after the winter solstice, which occurs between 21 January and 19 February. Thus, Chinese New Year never falls earlier or later than these dates.

Chinese New Year is everything a combination of Christmas and New Year's is for people in the West and more. The island's Chinese have settled mainly inland, away from the sea, and visitors stand the best chance of witnessing some of the festivities if they go into Phuket City. Preparations, which start more than a week ahead of time, can be the most impressive part of the holiday. Everywhere on the shophouse fronts, red-paper banners are emblazoned in gold with the Chinese characters for good health, good luck, and prosperity. Special foods and gifts of the season are piled high on all sides. Pyramids of tangerines and shiny imported apples compete for attention with tempting arrays of cakes and other sweets. Ducks and geese and chickens hang in bunches, while shoppers throng the markets even more densely than usual, buying food and new clothes for the season. You might also go to one of the Chinese Buddhist temples, which are quite different from the ethnic Thai varieties, and which at this time of year offer especially colourful glimpses of an ancient culture.

You will see offerings to the spirits set out with incense and candles on shophouse floors, lavish feasts that often spill out onto the sidewalks. And, with luck, you may witness the Dragon Dance. This is one archetypal image of Asia — gaudy cloth and papier-mache dragons, many metres long, twist and wind their way through the streets, writhing and darting to the insistent clamour of drums and cymbals. From time to time someone will set off a string of firecrackers, instigating the rattle and crack of hundreds of little explosions running riot through the back streets and lanes of the community. Strictly speaking, firecrackers have been prohibited; but then of course so have unmuffled motorcycles. Firecrackers symbolize happiness, in the local culture, with noise in general tending to be equated with good times.

This is some of what the visitor may witness. But there is much more. Houses have been given a thorough cleaning beforehand, symbolically ridding the home of all that was bad and disorderly in the old year. In households where the traditional forms are still observed, a ritual feast to Heaven and Earth is offered early in the morning of the first day of the New Year, an expression of thanks for past favours and hope for new ones to come. Next, respect is paid to the family gods, with still more food, incense, and candles being presented to the household shrine. Offerings much like the others are placed before the tablets of the ancestors, as well, paying respect to these spirits. Further respects still are then paid to living parents and grandparents.

All this represents a ritual acknowledge-ment of a hierarchical family order within the household, at the same time it re-establishes the entire household within a larger cosmological order.

The preparation and enjoyment of the New Year's banquet, meanwhile, goes to reaffirm the unity and harmony of the family. This is extended, then, to the larger community in the custom of calling on relatives and friends to talk and share food and watch movies together. It has also long been common for many people to gamble on New Year's Day, with the cards and mahjongg sometimes going on all through the night till the next day.

Chinese New Year is not recognized in Thailand as a national holiday. But given the importance of the Thai-Chinese community and the central role they have come to play in the business and financial life of the nation, the occasion has nevertheless come to be a commercial and bank holiday.

On the afternoon of New Year's Eve, businesses give dinners for their employees. Then almost everything in the Chinese community closes down — a rare break in the dedication to work that sees many shops open from early morning till late evening seven days a week year-round, but for these few days.

In Thailand, New Year's comes three times a year. And why not? If once is sanuk, after all, a whole bunch of times has got to be more fun still. And think of all the New Years' resolutions you get to make. This veritable smorgasbord of festivals suggest an admirable Thai trait — the readiness to accept diverse elements and make them their own.

If you were born in any of the following years, you're a Rooster: 1909, 1921, 1933, 1945, 1957, 1969, 1981, 1993 or 2005. Celebrity Roosters include Michael Aspel, Eric Clapton, Confucious, Mia Farrow, Yoko Ono, Rod Stewart, Verdi and Wagner.

The Year of the Rooster follows the Year of the Monkey (2004) and precedes the Year of the Dog. Flamboyance and feistiness are traditionally considered part of the typical Rooster personality, which would seem to fit the popular image of the rooster. Never mind that, according the Chinese horoscope, this year's animal is feminine, so perhaps 2005 should properly be referred to as the Year of the Hen. And Rod Stewart may thus be described as being as flamboyant and feisty as a hen. Anyway, Roosters are also considered hardworking and trustworthy, which fits the description of this writer's neighbours' rooster, an obsessively diligent creature that believes in practising reveille at around 4am, blasting loose again at sunrise. Early morning dreams of rooster soup.

Roosters display any number of other characteristics, a claim the reader is invited to explore by referring to relevant websites or books. But we can say here that these traits, in any given case, are supposedly tempered, according to a 5-year cycle overlaying the basic 12-year cycle by one of the five elements of metal, water, wood, fire or earth. Here's a sample analysis from the Internet, something to aid brides looking for compatible grooms:

Metal Roosters can come off as arrogant and stuck up at times. They need a cushion for that overextended ego and someone to make sure it stays inflated. They are reasonable people who seem to analyze every decision they make and every situation they find themselves in. They are standoffish at times and can let their aggression get in the way of a blossoming friendship or romance. These Roosters should take a breather from their egos long enough to really enjoy what they have to offer.

This Rooster is a bit more docile than the other Roosters. He is quieter, more tranquil, not as vocal or as spotlight hungry as other Roosters. These Roosters are great communicators probably because they do possess the ability to tone things down a bit. They have boundless energy that sometimes gets caught up in detail, which causes a lapse in concentration. They have to learn to appreciate detail but not to harp on it, otherwise they may miss the final destination.

This Rooster is different in that he enjoys being a part of the team rather than in the spotlight like other Roosters. He likes the company of others and is a genuine friend. These Roosters work for the betterment of society, working diligently to change the evils of it. They expect quality attempts from others involved with the causes and sometimes expect too much of their co-volunteers, as they do of themselves. Often, because of this desire to help society, these Roosters over-commit themselves, unable to finish what they've started.

(From www.usbridalguide.com/special/chinesehoroscopes/Rooster.htm.)