Chinese New Year in Chinatown

As planned, I went to Chinatown in Binondo last week. Anyone who has gone there knows that the traffic and the crowd make visiting Chinatown quite a stressful event, and visiting it right smack in the middle of the Chinese New Year celebration is just plain crazy. But what’s life without a little craziness, right?

So, with a group of equally insane friends from the office photography club, I went to Chinatown. Officially, our trip to Chinatown’s purpose was to take pictures of the festivities and the people (however amateurish our photos may be, we are still a photography club, after all). But of course we ended up doing more eating than taking pictures. We were in Chinatown, after all, the home of handmade noodles, a hundred varieties of dimsum, perfectly roasted duck, mooncake, hopia and all sorts of other lovely, lovely food. Resistance was not only futile, but also stupid.

We went to four restaurants that day. Or at least I think they were four; I lost count after the second restaurant (eating too much MSG will do that to you ). Although everything we ate tasted great and all restaurants deserve a second visit, Masuki’s beef and wonton noodles was the day’s clear winner for me. The firm, hand-made noodles, the tasty broth, tender beef and slightly sweet wonton —okay let’s stop talking about food because it’s making me hungry and it’s already 10 in the evening and eating this late can’t be good for anyone.

Let’s talk about the festivities.

When I entered the Arch of Goodwill, which basically signaled that we were officially in Chinatown, one of the first things that I noticed was how colorful everything seemed to be. There were red Chinese lanterns hanging from above. The streets were littered with vendors selling all sorts of brightly colored lucky charms. And then there were the fruits! Oh my god there were tons of them: cherries, oranges, pomegranates, dragon fruits, apples, kiwis—okay I’m talking about food again.

One of the reasons why I wanted to go to Chinatown during Chinese New Year was because I wanted to see a lion dance (which until last week I thought was the same as a dragon dance. Read my other embarrassing  confessions of lion dance-related ignorance below), and by god was I successful. There were “dragons” and “lions” everywhere and the drum beat they were dancing to were so rhythmic I was almost tempted to dance. But of course I didn’t.

 

Why I am ignorant:

1. I thought that all "lions" looked the same (red with gold trimmings) and was seriously surprised and delighted that they came in pink, purple and orange too.

2. I thought that lion dancers (and I am 90% sure that's not what the performers under the lion costumes are called) were given money by the owners of the establishments they danced in after their performance as some sort of payment/gift. Turns out the business owners actually try to hide the money and it's the lion's job to try and find it.