Thursday, January 31, 2013

Celebrate the Year of the Snake in Chinatown LA

Photo Credit: LA Chinatown Business Improvement District
Head out to Chinatown LA to celebrate the Year of the Snake with a midnight ceremony, a memorable festival and parade weekend, and a world record-breaking attempt in paper folding! 

The events in Chinatown kick-off on Saturday, February 9th at 11:00pm.  Head out to Thien Hau Temple for a midnight ceremony inclusive of Buddhist and Taoist traditions, lion dancers, and 500,000 firecrackers. 

On the weekend of February 16th-17th, celebrate the Year of the Snake with Chinatown LA's annual Chinese New Year Festival and the 114th Annual Golden Dragon Parade.  Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and LAPD Chief Charlie Beck will be Grand Marshals of a parade that features floats, dancers, and bands.  The parade starts on Saturday, February 16th at 1:00pm.  Following the parade will be a weekend festival of cultural performances, children's activities, cultural workshops, food trucks, and more!  You'll also have the opportunity to participate in helping to break the world record for paper folding.  Festival attendees and volunteers will attempt to assemble the 80,000 individual pieces that will create a large paper-folded snake sculpture.

For more information, visit the Chinese New Year Festival listing on ExperienceLA.

If you're looking to celebrate some more, you can also participate in the 2013 LA Chinatown Firecracker 5/10K on February 23rd-24th.

-Charity Tran

2 comments:

Kristy said...

I am interested to see how the paper fold sculpture turns out. It sounds very cool.

Anonymous said...

My family participated in this - it was easy to make the construction pieces - nine steps to make a triangle shape, but the way there were used to make the snake was very creative.