Happy Chinese New Year!! Last weekend, Auckland celebrated the Chinese New Year with its 14th annual Lantern Festival, celebrating the incoming Year of the Dragon, in Albert Park, downtown Auckland. We had the great fortune of spending some time there last Friday evening. However, one of the downfalls of having a lantern/new year festival in the southern hemisphere, is that it is summer, and darkness falls around 10 p.m.--not a perfect timeframe for a 5 and 3 year old. Our kids were troopers, but 9 p.m. was about as late as we could push it, and you can barely see the lights sparkling in the photos. I am sure that the lights were stunning once it was dark, but despite the less than ideal circumstances, we have a lot to share. I'm adding a break here, because of the large number of photos...please go to the website for more...
Early on during our time here in Auckland, we noticed the abundance of Asian restaurants (i.e., sushi bars on every block, and the exciting existence of numerous Malaysian establishments for us to investigate). However our foodie inclinations are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to NZ/China relations. (Several posts are in the offing following this vein. according to R, who says he will be recollecting experiences from Fiji, Shantytown, and other places with some Chinese influences and players). The relationship between New Zealand and China shouldn't really be hard to fathom, considering geography, but we really hadn't thought of it at all prior to our arrival. In the US, we primarily hear about the trade imbalance and the economic powerhouse that is China (and on occasion its output of pollution), but for little New Zealand to have China a much closer neighbor, the relationship seems keenly different than how the US/China relationship is portrayed. These two lanterns were created for this special year, to reference the ongoing relationship--a taniwha (Maori sea monster) by a local NZ artist Darryl Thompson and a dragon by a Shang-hai artist living in Auckland, Dennis Yuan Ma.
The Chinese are the oldest non-white migrant group, having helped shape much of this country's history since the mid to late 19th century. Nearly 10% of Auckland's population is Chinese. There are about 150,000 ethnic Chinese in NZ, in contrast to the approximate 566,000 Maori (about 14% of New Zealand's population). And 10% of Auckland's population is ethnic Chinese. In addition, the number or Chinese is expected to double in less than 10 years, as one of the fastest growing immigrant groups in New Zealand.
So, it isn't so strange that there have diplomatic ties between the two countries for 40 years, that this festival has grown to be one of the biggest Lantern Festivals outside of China (over 200,000 people went last year, and the place was jammed packed this year too), that we had a fantastic Chinese grocery store near us at our other place in Auckland, and that a number of the lanterns were gifts from different Chinese cities. But enough of the facts, we were overwhelmed by the variety of lanterns and vistas.
Lanterns ranged from playful dragons and children...
to serious (a game of Go, dedicated to my brother, if he's reading this...)
to educational and culinary.
Why, you may ask, is this quaint, idyllic lakeside scene culinary? Well, L figured out immediately and said, "Mom, you have to take a picture of me because you know how much I LOVE Peking Duck." Viola, a smiling subject!! Only after that conversation did I notice the rice farmers, conveniently next to this display. Not sure if L had the revelation before or after seeing that lantern, but Peking Duck isn't often out of his mind and he is always pointing out hinting to go to Chinese restaurants with "duck" in their names...and there are quite a few here. By the way, did you know that there are 725 million ducks in China?!
So, you would think that these beautiful displays were enough. But there was more! We had more than (I'm guessing here) 75 different food vendors to choose from for dinner. I'm saying there were 2 city blocks chock full of food vendors ON BOTH SIDES of the street!! It was nearly impossible to decide, but we we limited ourselves by what seemed most feasible on the street (therefore, we ruled out the fried squid bodies, which were about the size of a saucer, and other such delicacies). We sampled coconut shrimp, some type of Malaysian noodle dish, fried rice, Chinese donuts, Taiwanese sausage, green tea bubble drink, fresh coconut and lime ice cream, and some other things we can't recall.
And then, then there were performances. We only stayed for the first three hours that first of three evenings, and didn't even make it to the opening ceremony that night. Nonetheless, we weren't disappointed. As fair warning, I am not sharing the Chinese version of American idol singer, sounding a bit like Andrea Boccelli, performing a Chinese rendition of La Dona e mobile from Rigoletto--but we were amused.
a fantastic lion dance with two lions (four dancers),
and to top it off, two magical, dramatic, dragon dances (a short-dragon version, and then this amazing long-dragon version).
Here's a 3.5 minute video of part of the 15 minute performance of what I termed the "long-dragon dance" because of all of the performers and length of the dragon, obviously. Please excuse some of the middle part but we don't have a video editing program here.
Whew! By that point, well, after another set of dancers that the kids insisted on seeing, it was just time to swim through the massive crowd, catch our bus, and go home...
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