Festivities from the Religious to the Ridiculous

Hong Kong is a great place to experience both Chinese and Western festivals and sometimes and you can find an interesting blend of both. Another great thing about living in Hong Kong is that not only are the Chinese religious holidays recognized but also Christian holidays. We have enjoyed a long weekend or longer every month since we have arrived.

Here are some pictures from our festive year.

We joined the crowds during Mid-Autumn Festival the watch a spectacular fire dragon dance. The dragon is 67 meters long with lite incense long the entire length of its body. There appeared to be at least one hundred people involved in dancing the dragon through the streets.




























Here's Bret, Bella and I at a Mardi Gras festival in Lan Kwai Fong, an series of streets lined with "foreigner" pubs and bars. The streets are packed on a regular weekend so during a festival it can get beyond crazy especially when you are surround by people wearing wings, wigs, capes...



















We brought in the Lunar New Year with our friend Raymond. The streets are pretty quiet during the Chinese New Year Season so the tourism bureau tries to liven things up for the tourists by hosting a very over commercialized parade. We made our own fun.














Hong Kong Sevens, an event that truly demonstrates that colonial past times are still going strong even ten years after the hand over of Hong Kong back to China. This event was sold out months before it took place but my fine toned skill of bulletin board scanning spotted a poster advertising that full-time students, which we are, get into the event for free! Wondering why it was a sold out event? Well because it's an entire weekend of a lot of beer drinking, blasphemous chanting and RUGBY!

The Canadian Women's team came in second and our Men's team didn't do so hot. Here's a fellow Canadian mourning our loss against England.





















Tom's parents and Aaron were lucky enough to be in Hong Kong on Buddha's birthday. There are various activities taking place all over the city to celebrate this event and we chose to check out the very unique celebrations on Cheung Chau (Long Island). I'll let this link explain more about the festival.
Take a close look at this picture. Is the little girl with the Hawaiian shirt floating? Spooky!






















Lion Dance in the sky.






















Dragon's are pretty fine dancers too!




















This is a tower but not just any tower, it's a bun tower. Really! It's a tower covered with buns and at mid-night on the day of the festival people climb up the tower and grab as many buns as they can.














See look, they are round steamed rice buns with a red stamp on top. Great for a gluten free diet minus the red dye.




















Just a couple of weeks ago Bella and I decided to brave the street of Lan Kwai Fong during the Beer Festival. We opted for an icy cold sangria in these funky glasses instead of beer.











































The best view of the festival is from above.

When we arrived in Hong Kong in August we were just in time for Tom's favorite festival. Shopping Festival. Yes, it's true, Hong Kong has a Shopping Festival. I'm not too sure why there is a designated festival when everyday seems like a shopping festival in Hong Kong.

This coming weekend is a long weekend in celebration of Tuen Ng Festival better known as Dragon Boat Festival. I hope the rain holds out for the races.