Chinese New Year’s Eve
I stayed in Santai for the Chinese New Year and it was pretty amazing. In America we like to think that the Fourth of July is a pretty special day and that the fireworks are great to watch. Yeah. I enjoy the Fourth and look forward to the spectacular displays as much, (and as little), as the next American but the displays in the States are so structured and arranged that they can seem redundant and even get stale. Not so much in China. The fireworks began early in the day with lots of things going bang and a few pretty large BOOM’s as well. Not just in one specific area either.
I began walking about the town around 9:30 with the hopes of finding some dinner. Eventually I returned home because most restaurants were closed for the holiday. No doubt off to make things go boom. Along the way I stopped and bought some fireworks near where I usually rent videos. Nearly every store had a supplemental business of fireworks for sale. I was pretty quickly surrounded by some kids so I bought some to light right then much to their delight. Once back at home I cooked up some rice while the sounds of a not-so-far-away war raged outside and decided to head back out around 11:30 and boy was I in for it. I seriously could not walk more than a block without a pretty significant display of fireworks. I had run into Shirley, Reashan’s daughter, and asked her for a suggestion on where to see the fireworks from and she suggested I stay home. She may have been right but the experience I got from walking around, under and even through these spontaneous celebrations was remarkable.
I ended up, as frequently happens, at Allen Story which despite being on a tightly tree-lined street had a flurry of fire starting activities in the street in front. The number eight is a lucky number in China so the first thing I saw them light was a very large roll of 880 firecrackers. Wow. They immediately involved me in lighting simple sparklers to large 18″ square boxes that shot large roman candles into the air as well as some pretty hefty rockets. I was pretty excited. All of this was with seeming disregard to the electrical wires overhead much less the neighbors. With the large boxes beginning to clutter the street it was only necessary to keep them in a straight line so traffic could continue to pass. As rickshaws, taxi’s and police weaved through the exploding boxes I couldn’t help but smile.
As I type this, a week later, I can see roman candles lighting up the sky with red, yellow and green bursts. S’wonderful.