GONG XI FA CAI the chinese new year has come and with it the liondancing season ... but back to the beginning; two weeks before chinese new year new bridge road gets illuminted with colourful pieces of art and chinatown fills up with stalls and tents, selling anything one could need to welcome the new year in style: sweets, sugared fruit, spiralled bamboo, cherry tree branches in bloom, new clothe, handbags, shoes, chinese new year decoration in all forms, sizes and shapes, but of course only in two colours -red and gold- scrols and chinese art, oranges, pomelo, funny shaped pumpkins, nuts, seeds, pinapple tarts, and, and, and, the list is endless, but all the bits and pieces are equally important, as one has to welcome guests to the house, hence the food, decorate the house for luck, present guests and hosts alike with mandarins to bring money, wear new clothe on the first day of chinese new year at least, and preferably red or related colour ones. all in all we are talking a real colourful affair here, and i love it to bits... not the least because this is also the season for liondance... hmm and here we are, back to the beginning! well people engage liondancers to come to there shop or house in order to bring good luck. for this we use the southern lion, which first plays with and then eats the presented mandarins and lettuce, while returning some of them to the host, basically just like a domesticated cat does with mice, fist play, then eat or bring dead animals to the owner... same concept, so you know where i am coming from here hihihihihi the lion is seen as a bringer of luck and has to be treated with repect and undergo ceremonies to get awoken etc. consequently a mandarin (or in one of the cases even a huge life fish!) handed by the lion to the shopowner is a far more laughterinducing affair than the above mentioned pet owner finding the recently deceased mouse or co on the doormat in the early morning just before breakfast.... yummy... the other difference is that the lion is accompanied by the liondrum (which i do play but not good enough to be able to follow the lions every step) and the cymbals, which is all very loud and good for luck. in short we bring the lion, trolley in the drum, dance the dance, bring luck and get the necesary small cash in return ;) we in this case is chin woo, or jin woo, my martial arts association. which brings me to something totally different: fearless!

now you simply have to go and see this film if you can: www.fearlessthemovie.com . the reasons for this are as simple as important:
1. fearless is the story of huo yuan jia, the founder of chin woo
2. the film is beautifully filmed
3. jet li is playing huo yuan jia, and this is his last film
4. jet li is simply the best martial artist, he does my style and does it the way it ought to be done.
5. there is hardly any digital animation in the film, apart from a couple of seconds all the fighting is real! so go and see it, and in the meantime some pictures of the first liondancing, yesterday, the 2nd day of chinese new year!!! gong xi fa cai... happy new year :)