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Lunar New Year
2026-Feb-22, Sunday 13:23
Sidestepping the whole debate about what to call it[1], we went to the Lunar New Year parade and celebration on Argyle Street yesterday:
We left later than I wanted to--we didn't get out of the house until 11:45 a.m. and didn't get down to Argyle until 12:15 p.m. We put in our name at Immm Rice, but when it was only twenty-five minutes or so to the parade we decided that even if we did get in we wouldn't be able to eat in time, so we tried stopping in at a bakery for some buns. The first one we went to had a cash-only sign that had been hidden by the long line, so we had to duck our and search the rest of the street.![[instagram.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/profile_icons/instagram.png)
sashagee spotted one on the way back run by an old Vietnamese man and got a couple buns for Laila and herself, and they ate them while we settled onto the side of the street to wait.
I wasn't expecting too many people to show up since it was -5°C with a biting wind, but the streets were still lined when the parade stepped off at 1:05 p.m. Laila had been complaining and wanting to go home for quite a while, but once the parade started all that fell away. She watched the lion dancers and the dragon puppets, watched the floats going on, and was very excited when one of the parade-walkers gave her a lollipop! She didn't complain once as we stood out in the cold, but we left a couple floats early so we could get into a restaurant. And a good thing too--we walked in, were immediately seated, and within ten minutes or so there was a giant line waiting for a seat. We ate--with a brief detour while Laila and I walked around outside because she was getting rowdy--and by the time we were done basically all the festivities had ended, so we just went home.
Next weekend is the parade in Chinatown, but we won't be able to go.
[1]: A few years ago there was a push to call it Lunar New Year instead of Chinese New Year, since more cultures than just China celebrate it. Of course now the problem is that e.g. the Islamic and Jewish calendars also have lunar new years since both calendars begin months on the new moon, so "Lunar New Year" is ambiguous.
We left later than I wanted to--we didn't get out of the house until 11:45 a.m. and didn't get down to Argyle until 12:15 p.m. We put in our name at Immm Rice, but when it was only twenty-five minutes or so to the parade we decided that even if we did get in we wouldn't be able to eat in time, so we tried stopping in at a bakery for some buns. The first one we went to had a cash-only sign that had been hidden by the long line, so we had to duck our and search the rest of the street.
sashagee spotted one on the way back run by an old Vietnamese man and got a couple buns for Laila and herself, and they ate them while we settled onto the side of the street to wait.I wasn't expecting too many people to show up since it was -5°C with a biting wind, but the streets were still lined when the parade stepped off at 1:05 p.m. Laila had been complaining and wanting to go home for quite a while, but once the parade started all that fell away. She watched the lion dancers and the dragon puppets, watched the floats going on, and was very excited when one of the parade-walkers gave her a lollipop! She didn't complain once as we stood out in the cold, but we left a couple floats early so we could get into a restaurant. And a good thing too--we walked in, were immediately seated, and within ten minutes or so there was a giant line waiting for a seat. We ate--with a brief detour while Laila and I walked around outside because she was getting rowdy--and by the time we were done basically all the festivities had ended, so we just went home.
Next weekend is the parade in Chinatown, but we won't be able to go.
[1]: A few years ago there was a push to call it Lunar New Year instead of Chinese New Year, since more cultures than just China celebrate it. Of course now the problem is that e.g. the Islamic and Jewish calendars also have lunar new years since both calendars begin months on the new moon, so "Lunar New Year" is ambiguous.
