Year of the Dragon

Happy New Year, everyone (sorry so late)! We really enjoyed our first Lunar New Year in Hong Kong, especially because it is the year of the dragon. This is the most special symbol in the zodiac, signifying the luckiest year.

People here warned us that it's always very cold during the New Year, and they were right. The highs (and lows) were in the 40s for most of the week, which doesn't sound that cold to anyone with a REAL winter, but it still felt pretty chilly. We don't have heat in our apartment, either, so we had our little plug-in heater blasting away the whole time! But the cold didn't stop us from getting out and having fun.

Before the New Year, every district has flower markets to sell supplies for the holiday. Evangeline and I checked out the one in our area, just to the northeast of us in Sha Tin:

In front of some kumquat trees with her Thomas balloon

And the weekend before the New Year, the three of us went to the biggest one, which is in Victoria Park on Hong Kong Island.

Flowers for sale

Mums are very lucky

Lovely orchids

Not exactly sure what these are!

The first morning of the New Year, on Monday, we went to the big temple on the other side of our village for the temple fair.

It was absolutely packed with people coming there for good luck. Everyone was banging on the big drums and spinning the golden pinwheels.

Lucky paraphernalia

Our lucky girl!

On Tuesday we decided to check out the Hong Kong Wetland Park in the western part of the New Territories. A lot of birds spend the winter in the marshes around Hong Kong, and luckily for them, the government decided to preserve some of the wetlands for them. It was a really neat place, and we practically had it to ourselves.

The view of the main lake from the visitor's center. You can see a few of the hides.

It was crazy that there was this preserve right by a densely populated area. Those are all apartment buildings.

But the highlight of Chinese New Year for Evangeline was definitely the Lion Dance! Our estate had one for the residents, and we stumbled upon some more when we were out and about. I don't know why we didn't bring our real camera, so you'll have to make do with iPhone pictures.

The percussion crew and the two lions at the beginning

One of the lions leaping on the podiums

The lion comes by the crowd for the kids to pet him

Here is a video that Joseph took of part of the performance. He took another that showed more of the acrobatics, but unfortunately Evangeline deleted it! But this features the climax, which maybe is better. The lions spend the dance looking for auspicious fruits and vegetables to eat. Earlier, they ate plates of mandarins and "spat" them into the crowd--Evangeline got one! This video shows them finding the lettuce, "eating" it, and then spitting it out:

Needless to say, the whole thing was very exciting for Evangeline. She talked about it endlessly afterwards, and I had to tell "the story of the Lion Dance" for weeks. She was too shy to pet the lion at our estate, but after the last dance we saw at a shopping mall, she screwed up the courage to give a lion a pat.

E poses with the lions and kids and one of our security guards

It was an amazing holiday and we can see why it is so popular!