Chinese New Year: The year of goat or sheep?

IN the Chinese zodiac calendar, 2015 is the year of the wooden goat.

With the Chinese New Year just around the corner, large herds of sheep are stealing the limelight becoming temporary home decorations as well as the façade of shopping malls, offices and homes.

The burning question, does this year resembles the sheep or the goat?

To get the lowdown on this, Astro AWANI talks to feng shui master, Kenny Hoo, famed as the founder of Good Feng Shui Research Geomantic.

According to Hoo, the Chinese in general prefer to call it the year of the goat as it sounds better and brings an abundance of positivity compared to the word ‘sheep’.

In Mandarin, ‘san yang’ or ‘goat’ brings similar definition as ‘mian yang’ or ‘sheep’ and also ‘clown’.

“I prefer the year of the goat because it sounds more positive. In English, for instance it sounds better when we say ‘wishing you a good year of the goat’. It is a double goodness there because the word ‘goat’ and ‘good’ sounds similar. Unlike the word ‘sheep’ which sounds very close to ‘s**t’,” said Kenny.

It is a taboo, said Hoo for the Chinese to associate Lunar New Year with all things morbid or negative as its is believed to have brought bad luck throughout the year.

Hoo explained that the sheep is far popular as ornaments for the homes and spaces for during the festive season as the sheep is just cuter than the goat.'