Colours of luck and prosperity

On 1 March people give each other martenitsi, small tassels or dolls of red and white thread. They are worn until the first stork or blossoming tree is seen.

Red stands for good fortune and happiness. Brides traditionally wear it, doors are hung with red couplets at New Year, and gifts of money come in red envelopes.

Decorated Easter eggs are called kraslice, a name that comes from an old word for red. Girls give them to boys on Easter Monday.

Many Hindu brides marry in a red sari or lehenga. In much of north India a married woman wears sindoor, a red powder, along the parting of her hair.

It is a custom to wear new red underwear on New Year's Eve for luck and love in the coming year. Shop windows fill with it in December.

At Dashain, elders press tika, a paste of rice, yoghurt and red vermilion, on the foreheads of younger relatives as a blessing.

On 1 March people give a martisor, a small charm on a red and white twisted cord, to welcome spring. It is worn pinned to the coat for several days or weeks.

A wedding invitation is called a red bomb, because it arrives in a red envelope and the guest must send back a red envelope of money.

At Tet, the lunar New Year, children and elders are given lucky money in red envelopes, and homes are hung with red banners. Brides often marry in a red ao dai.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez kept a yellow rose on his desk for luck, and yellow butterflies follow a lover in One Hundred Years of Solitude. Readers mourned him with yellow paper butterflies.

The luzzu, the traditional fishing boat, is painted in bright yellow, blue, red and green. A pair of eyes on the bow is said to guard the fishermen at sea.

On New Year's Eve many people wear yellow underwear to bring money in the year ahead, and red to bring love.

On New Year's Eve, street stalls in Lima sell yellow underwear, yellow flowers and yellow paper garlands. Wearing yellow at midnight is held to bring good luck.

Each day of the week has a colour, and Monday's is yellow. King Bhumibol and King Vajiralongkorn were both born on a Monday, so yellow is worn to honour the monarchy.

In the south, families bring home branches of yellow apricot blossom, hoa mai, for Tet. A tree that flowers on New Year's morning is taken as a good sign.

The mines of Muzo and Chivor produce emeralds prized for their deep green. The Muisca people traded them long before the Spanish arrived.

Paper money is nicknamed the greenback, after the green ink on the backs of notes first issued during the Civil War. Green has stood for money ever since.

The light blue of the flag stands for rain. In this dry country the word pula means rain, blessing and the national currency.

Pink is Tuesday's colour. When King Bhumibol left hospital in 2007 in a pink blazer, pink shirts sold out as people wore them to wish him good health.

In the north, pink peach blossom is the flower of Tet. Families in Hanoi buy a flowering branch or small tree for the house before the holiday.

On New Year's Eve crowds on the beaches dress in white for peace in the year ahead. The custom comes from the Afro-Brazilian religions, whose followers wear white.

White, ak, means pure and blessed in Kazakh. A common blessing is ak zhol, a white road, wishing someone a good journey through life.

In the baci ceremony, elders tie white cotton threads around a person's wrists to call back their wandering spirits and wish them well. The threads are left on for three days.

The lunar New Year is Tsagaan Sar, the White Moon. White stands for milk and purity, and the table is laid with dairy foods called white foods.

Dubai is called the City of Gold for its gold souk, a market of hundreds of jewellers. Much of what is sold is bridal jewellery for South Asian and Arab families.

Gold stands for wealth. It is paired with red on New Year decorations, wedding invitations and shop signs to wish for a prosperous year.

Gold jewellery is bought on Dhanteras and Akshaya Tritiya, two days held to be lucky for it. A bride's gold is both ornament and her own store of wealth.