On the 9th, it became the Year of the Rooster on the Chinese calendar. Chinese New Year is upon us and it is a good time for all.
I took the girls down to Chinatown in LA for them to get a little taste of their heritage. The parade started around 2 two o’clock on Satuday and we were lucky enough to but into friends and get seats on the curb.
This is a close to a small town parade as we get in LA and the mode was fun and casual. I forgot my regular camera, so you get my phonecam photos.
There were a few floats paying homage to the Rooster.
Among them were several floats with Chinatown Queen/Princesses, but the images were crappy.
I have to give props to the Teo Chew Association for their spectacular float.
The people on the float tossed out candy & red envelopes to the kids.
Zoe was lucky (and fast) enough to get a red envelope with a lucky quarter in it.
The highlight of the parade was the dragons.
They danced around the street with the drums beating.
Beautiful colors and designs on the dragons.
This dragons came in for a close look at the girls.
I highly recommend a visit to Chinatown. The food is cheap, the bargains are plenty, and it’s the complete opposite of the ‘planned shopping environments’ popping up across the Southland.
Thanks for the pics. And, thanks for today.
Hey, did you guys know there was a “Lunar Parade” in Old Pasadena on Sunday? We ended up there because we couldn’t make it down to C-Town on Saturday. I would imagine many of the floats were the same as you saw, plus lots of old cars conveying waving strangers. The coolest part was the pyro, at the beginning and end they set off about 300K firecrackers and the lions (your bottom photo is a lion, not a dragon, as we were told by a nice Chinese guy who gave Nate a spot at the railing) dance around in the smoke. Loud, but cool.
Totally small-town as well, but the festival afterwards down at the park was pretty crappy. I’ll bet you guys got better food.