Forever Chinese new year?

It's still festival time (新年快乐！xīn nián kuài lè = Happy new year). Chinese new year is the longest festivity in China. But since last week Wednesday we do have to work again.

How do you notice that it is still Chinese New Year?

Every night at approximately 8 or 9m pm still more or less noisy fireworks can be heard outside.

Another thing is that Chinese new year is a lot about food. On special days special food needs to be eaten. Tomorrow is the day of sweet rice balls:
"no Lantern Festival celebration would be complete without yuanxiao, the sticky rice balls that are symbolic of family reunion and happiness. Recipes vary from region to region: In Taiwan many people make yuanxiao without fillings. But in different parts of China, yuanxiao often are stuffed with sweet pastes made with sweet red beans, dates, lotus seeds, coconut, peanuts, and sesame seeds. All are served in a sweet soup."

Today at work Xuguang, a colleague of mine, distributed a package of peanut rice balls for everybody in our department. My colleagues explained to me how to prepare and eat them, so I tried them today. Tastes a little bit like "Dampfnudeln"(typical German yeast dumplings) with peanut paste inside.