The last of the 24 solar terms is known as Greater Cold (da han) in China, usually falling between the 19th and 22nd of every January. But even though the temperature is chilly and snow piles up thick on the ground, it is seen as a time for renewal. Greater Cold signals that the Chinese New Year and Spring Festival is mere days away, the most important time for families and communities. This is when they gather together for 16 days of feasting, exchanging gifts and much-coveted red envelopes, giving thanks for the year gone by, and articulating their wishes and desires for the year that has now come.
Few symbols are as deeply connected with Greater Cold than the pine, bamboo shoot and plum blossom. The pine and bamboo are evergreen; so even in the deepest of winters, when nothing grows, they stand tall. On the other hand, the plum blossom may flower into a frozen world, but it is a sign of the imminent thaw. Its arrival means winter will soon end, heralding the start of spring. Together, this troika is known as the "Three Friends of Winter" and symbolise all of the qualities a Chinese "gentleman-scholar" was expected to possess in ancient times: perseverance, resilience and steadfastness. The Three Friends have such great significance to the Chinese that they feature time and again as motifs in art, literature, poetry and folklore.
But Greater Cold anticipates something else too: the festival of Xiaonian. This is when the Chinese propitiate the Kitchen God with offerings of incense, lotus cakes and other sweets. Every year, the Kitchen God is believed to report on each Chinese household's doings to the Jade Emperor in Heaven. If the family has performed good deeds and acquitted themselves well throughout the year, the Kitchen God will give a favourable report and the Jade Emperor will bless them with prosperity. But if they haven't, then the Kitchen God makes a bad report and the family is cursed with bad luck.
Most households have a paper figure of the Kitchen God pasted above their stove or hearth; the lips of the God are smeared with honey. There are two reasons for this: 1. to sweeten the God's report to the Jade Emperor or 2. to turn his lips sticky and therefore "seal" his mouth so he can't say anything unfavourable about them. Along with sweets, paper versions of utensils, houses and other goods are also offered to the Kitchen God, so he is better disposed towards the family.
There are several origin myths for the Kitchen God, but most follow a similar motif: of an ordinary man who abandoned (by choice or by compulsion) his wife, and suffered tremendous ill fortune. Years later, when they reunite by chance, the wife is compassionate towards the man, moved by his sorry state. As the deeply ashamed man tries to end his life, the wife implores the heavens to help him, and he is transformed into the deity who now presides over the Chinese hearth.