“Kung hei faht choi!”

That's what they were saying in China, in the Philippines, as well as in any country with a large Chinese population, not to mention Chinatowns all over the world. Today begins the lunar new year in China -- to be more exact, “The Year of the Ox.”

Valentine's Day is this Sunday. Celia and I will be wearing a lot of red all this weekend.

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I took Paul to his first "dragon festival" in DC's Chinatown back in 1987, when he was two years old. He fit right in with his bright red snowsuit. Such is the culmination of a fifteen-day celebration that begins today (or yesterday, depending on your side of the planet).

Meanwhile, the video clip above was taken at the National Building Museum back in 2007 with a phone camera. That was the Year of the Pig, but at least a dragon showed up. Obviously camera phones have come a long way in thirteen years, don't you think?

Or don't you?

NOTE: As my beloved is one-eighth Cantonese, the above title is the traditional greeting in Cantonese, as opposed to the more common Mandarin. Meanwhile, learn more than you could possibly want to know about the occasion on Wikipedia.