By Shirley N Lew
AsAmNews New York Correspondent
You didn’t have to wait till Monday, February 8 to kick off the Lunar New Year. Celebrations began on Saturday. There were several events throughout the weekend to celebrate Year of the Monkey!
Two double decker buses with two lion dance groups were part of a promotional event called, “Madison Street to Madison Avenu
e.” It was the first time that the Chinatown BID (Business Improvement District) and the East Midtown BID collaborated to bring awareness of the holiday to both Chinatown and the shops along
Madison Avenue. The cymbals and the drums echoed from Chinatown’s Madison Street to 79th Street while lion dance groups were dancing on the top deck of the buses. Pedestrians watched in delight. Once they arrived uptown, they gave a street performance at the intersection. After representatives from the two BIDs spoke to the crowd, the lion dance groups went on to participating shops that wished to be blessed by the lions.
Did you know that noodles symbolize long life? Try making your own hand pulled noodles at The Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met). The children seemed to have the most fun with their piece of dough as they followed along with the chef. There was also a Chinese
calligraphy demonstration, but all those that wanted to give it try used electronic tablets instead, so everyone could erase mistakes and start over again. Some other fun activities included making monkey masks and noise makers.
For entertainment, Alan Muraoka of Sesame Street sang and danced along with two other puppeteers at the museum. He even sang a song that taught the audience how to count in Chinese!
A littler further Downtown, there was a display of Chinese art and culture at the Jacob Javits Convention Center featuring contemporary Chinese artists from China and America, The exhibit called, “The Fantastic Art China: International Creative Festival,” was organized by the US-China Cultural Institute. The exhibit included paintings, sculptures with different types of medium. There was also Chinese opera singing.
Saturday was also debut of the Year of the Monkey stamps from the U.S. Postal Service. A ceremony was held at St. John’s
University in Queens, NY with dignitaries and the artist, Kam Mak. Mak used an intricate paper cut design of a monkey by Clarence Lee and the Chinese character for monkey on the stamp. They were available for sale at the ceremony, but they ran out quickly and more had to be brought in.
Well, you can’t celebrate Lunar New Year without fireworks. The Chinese invented them after all. They’re also very important because they are used to ward off evil spirits. Well, there shouldn’t be any evil spirits left in the NY Tri-state area after a spectacular firework display. The colorful lights and sounds of exploding fireworks were over the Hudson River at West 44th Street Saturday night. When it began at 8:30pm, the Empire State building which was already lit up in red and gold for the evening, strobed in different colors that could be seen in most of Manhattan. The fireworks display and the strobe lights on the Empire State Building
was also organized by the US-China Cultural Institute.
On Monday, Lunar New Year, there were even more fireworks. Manhattan’s Chinatown had it’s 17th Annual Firecracker Ceremony at Sara D. Roosevelt Park organized by Better Chinatown. The ceremony also had cultural performances including lion dancing.
In 1997, Chinese Americans in New York weren’t happy after fireworks were banned by Mayor Rudy Giuliani due to the religious significance of the holiday, but Giuliani said they were illegal and that safety was an issue. However, a compromise was made and in the last 17 years, the annual firecracker ceremony has been held at a local Chinatown park with on-lookers at a safe distance.
Some parts of Mott, Bayard and Elizabeth Streets were closed on Monday so that lion dance performances could take place throughout Chinatown to celebrate the first day of the Year of the Monkey. Confetti noisemakers were on sale at two for five dollars. The shiny colorful confetti that bursts out of them littered the streets of Chinatown. Young and old had a good time trying to twist hard to get them to pop open!
What was most significant to New Yorkers for this Lunar New Year is that public school children had the holiday off for the first time. Mayor Bill de blasio made it official last year by putting it on the school calendar.
Jacqui Getz, principal of PS 126 in Chinatown said this about the new school holiday, “It only makes sense and it’s a matter of respect.”
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