Lucky flowers for the New Year

Well here it is, the eve of Tet. I am finishing up the last of cleaning chores after a long day of learning how to record training sessions at work (learned a LOT of new things today about training delivery methods, it's awesome) and then a long meeting at church.

This flower is called Bong Mai in Vietnamese. I don't know the English translation for it but it a symbol of good luck and it's always been difficult to find. I found this plant on our recent trip to Houston and it was full of beautiful blooms. It only has a few left now but at least it survived and seems to be thriving. After the new year, I'll have to ask my mom or sister where it should go next. Potted on a porch or in the ground, shade or sun? My sister is named after this bloom. You may have seen the name Mai here and there; it's not an uncommon Viet. name.

In preparation for tomorrow, here is some advice for those born in the Year of the Rat (from Suzanne White's The New Chinese Astrology):

Enjoy! This is your own personal year and you are going to have a whale of a time being happy, healthy and preposterous as ever...you'll be on top of the world...in this year, you should plan the next dozen years carefully.

To find your Chinese zodiac sign, visit this site or read about it on Wikipedia.