The Dragon Dances

So, Sunday we saw the dragon dance. Also, lions eat cabbage. And started the New Year for the third time in two months.

I refer of course to the Chinese New Year celebrations to mark the beginning of the Year of the Snake. In years past we've seen some pretty spectacular celebrations down in the International District, including drumming on giant drums and plenty of strings of little red firecrackers. No time for that this year, but did find out they were having a scaled-down event at Uwajimaya's in Renton, so we made time to drop by. The Lions (who look more like foo-dogs) were two-person costumes; they had about a half-dozen, some of whose dancers were v. young (say eight to ten) -- so much so that at the end one team cdn't reach the traditional cabbage hung over the store's entrance their 'lion' was supposed to gulp down and scatter about. The dragon (red: my favorite color for dragons) was a nine-person team, who were v. good.

All in all, a memorable event. And in the course of looking for a good parking place, we discovered that the Renton 8 movie theatre, which closed down a while back, has now re-opened and showing Indian films. I've long thought that there shd be a Bollywood theatre in the area; now that we've discovered there is one, we'll have to put together a movie night outing with friends sometime.* We'll see.

--John R.

*not that I know anything about Bollywood, other than seeing snatches of elaborate dance routines while waiting to pick up carry-out orders (and chai!) from my favorite Indian (actually Pakistani) restaurant, in downtown Renton.