Chinese New Year’s Eve / The Year of the Goat. Since I skipped out on solar New Year’s, I decided to head out for Lunar New Year’s celebrations here in Beijing. I looked up where to go on TimeOut Beijing’s website and it suggested to head to a few clubs which I wasn’t sure I was going to enjoy. I’m not against clubbing but I was honestly thinking I’d be back by 1 am at the latest (including the cab ride home). Well, things didn’t turn out that way.
Things started out rather slow. I saw a group of foreigners standing at the entrance to Shichihai subway station and thought that maybe I’d missed the party. But as I walked around Qianhai Lake I could see a few people setting off fireworks. I needed a drink as it was New Year’s and there was no way I was going to not have a beer in hand.
I headed over to 4Corners for their New Year’s celebrations but found it was not only packed, but it was extremely hot, the service took forever, and, much to my disappointment, there was no live music. I bought two Tigers, looked around for somewhere to hang my coat but found nothing. I could see that this was a party for groups who had shown up about two hours earlier to grab the seats. I opted to leave.
Taking my two beers with me outside to cool off, I walked toward the sound of fireworks going off in the distance and was pleasantly surprised. The types of fireworks depended on who was setting them off. The one good thing about this night was that there were no offers for lady bars by the entrepreneurial night staff.
I wanted music and found a larger bar that was surprisingly sparsely populated. It was mostly filled with Chinese couples but had a few guys up on stage performing a few songs. I didn’t record any of their music but it was enough to keep me there. I sat down and pulled out my celebratory cigars and ordered a beer, and then changed my mind to get a straight shot of vodka. Cigars and beer don’t really go well together but cigars and vodka aren’t a bad combo.
I wasn’t sitting down very long before the it-happens-often-enough request for a picture was put forth. The two boys sitting behind me and one of their girlfriends wanted a picture with me. I don’t know why and I don’t know what they do with these photos, whether they draw pictures over them and post them online or if they show their friends in an effort to exude some sort of cosmopolitan-ness by having a picture with a bearded, fattening white guy. (In regard to being “fat”, in Chinese terms I am, in Western terms I’ve just got a gut.) But anyway, I usually try to get a picture on my camera too so I can remember the evening.
Well that was interesting enough. After that, they sat down we exchanged a few words before the conversation ended with a “gonbai” (“one shot/cheers”) and then we returned to our respective WeChat conversations. Anyway, shortly thereafter they left and, to my surprise, the band stopped playing. It was only 1145 and there was no music. I did see that the bar staff was bringing in food from a nearby restaurant. I wondered if they were going to feed the whole bar or if it was a private affair. While they were setting this up a rippling thunder was heard: it was someone setting off a “snake” of fireworks in front of the bar for good luck. When I saw people running away from them I decided I’d let the fireworks die down before going out to take a closer look.
With the band off the stage and the seemingly private affair going on (it’s traditional to eat dumplings at midnight as the shape of the dumplings looks like silver ingots which is supposed to bring prosperity to the family), I ventured outside to view the fire works. If I was let down by the lack of fireworks, I wasn’t for long. When midnight struck a series of fireworks erupted from a dozen or so places around Qianhai Lake. I guess my Canadian mind thought that there would be one big, “official” display of fireworks. Instead, here in Beijing, the fireworks seemed to be personal affairs, though not private. That is, everybody bought fireworks and set them off.
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Meanwhile, right in front of where I was standing, someone from a nearby restaurant brought out a stack of boxes and said something to a few passersby. It was more fireworks. “Here’s more gunpowder. Set if off.” Needless to say, if you see others running you should probably at least cover your eyes.
And then…
Overheard there was an even larger display of fireworks going off over the Lake.
I can honestly say that the CNY fireworks were probably some of the best I’d seen. It wasn’t so much that there were a lot of them in one place as is popular with Western fireworks displays but the numerous smaller sets of fireworks going off in every direction. Before you could finish watching one display, another snake went off a few yards away sending debris flying and forcing you to cover both your eyes and ears. Part of the fun of the fireworks, as I could see it, was the danger of setting them off as the wicks are really only an inch or so long. But the age-old love affair with colourful gunpowder remains alive and well here in Beijing.
And I thought that would be the night but on it went pretty much all night. All around Qianhai Lake you could see firework displays in, around and above the hutongs.
I decided to pop into a nearby bar for “one last drink” (a poor choice of words at any time) when I got talking to a guy from the US who was vacationing in Beijing with his girlfriend. We got talking and two more vodkas later, we sit down upstairs and then meet a couple of Belgian (Belgish?) students, one of whom is interning here in Beijing. And that went on for a few more hours. As it turns out, the students didn’t bring enough money and so I grabbed their bill. They were surprised I could use a card here in China but I just told them it was the “Karma Kard.”
And so it went, Chinese New Year’s 2015. I would like to say that I hopped a taxi back but I couldn’t find one. I ended up walking to the subway station and waiting for the thing to open. Instead of getting home at 1 I got home at 6 am. Happy New Year! Gong xi gong xi fai cai!