Confucian Carnival!!!!... sorta

So, Colin and I attended a Confucian Carnival in Causeway Bay on Sunday. It was an interesting time, though confusing at best. The CEDARS (Center of Development and Resources for Students) at HKU sent out an email to the students describing a Confucian Carnival full of Chinese culture to celebrate the New Year which will occur this week. The website for the carnival was this: https://sites.google.com/site/confuciuscarnival2011/home-english. From the website, things seem awesome! We were going to get to watch a Lion Dance and there would be people in traditional dress and there would be performances and games! It sounded exciting!

Sunday comes and Colin and I head toward the metro station to go to Causeway Bay (again you can google it), but lo and behold! Before we even get to the metro, we run into a street fair. This past weekend seems to have been the weekend for closing down the streets and filling them with vendors. I imagine the next week will be very similar to this on a larger scale. Tents were set up: some selling jade and hand-made crafts, others showing off their latest products from fungi to Kinex toys. This wet our appetites for fair time and we got on the metro to Causeway Bay.

The metro was pretty nice. I hadn't ridden it before, so I got a new experience in that. I found the trains to be nicer than most of the other metro systems I'd ridden in. Nice and clean with decently comfortable seats and line maps over the doors that showed you with blinking lights your location and connections. One of the best parts is that because we're in Hong Kong and the population is, on average, quite short so the rails, poles and hand grips from the ceiling are very reachable from my height. SO NICE! It's nice to be able to feel in control of your body and not as though you're arm is being ripped off as your body leaves the ground when the train comes to a stop (which is what happens when the hand grips are made for people at least 5 inches taller than you).


We got off of the metro and made our way into the bustling Causeway Bay district. It's a district full of brand stores and chains, characterized by large electronic billboards and, seemingly, money. I was quite drawn in by the large scale marketing ventures, enough so that I didn't actually see the little tents lined up on the street at first. Once we found the "Reception/Media reception" booth, we started figuring out the layout of the 'carnival'. The event was sponsored by the HKUGA (HKU's Graduate Association) and a few other sponsors. There were a dozen tents, half of which were set up with HKUGA information and prizes and the other half were set up for games. We went in search of games to participate in, but they were all geared toward children and required extensive knowledge of Cantonese. In fact, we couldn't read most of the signs. We did manage to get a free "New Year Banner", though the meaning of the symbols on it are still baffling us. It says "Dragon, Horse, Energy/essence, God/divine being/soul/(something undefinable and spiritual)". We're not sure how that relates to the new year, or even if it's supposed to convey a message of some kind. But we got a pretty sign made by a lady with nice cursive Chinese characters, at any rate. :)


We also got to see a few men dressed in traditional costume, but no women, unfortunately. The Lion dance and traditional fashion show were all held on a very small stage that couldn't be seen, because all of the seats (and there weren't many) were reserved and the crowd in front of the venue was impossible to see over. We tried to watch the dance for a while, but eventually gave up when people pushing through the crowd became insistent and we still couldn't see over them.

That seemed to be it. Really. The end of the festival. So Colin and I headed off into the city (in the completely wrong direction) to find a park that Colin thought he knew where it was. We got there eventually - it had been a few blocks in the other direction, but we made a nice circle around the area and got to see some steps that commemorated the Olympics and getting to see the Hong Kong Central Library, which looks like it might be the destination of one of our next outings. We eventually came to the Victoria Park which seemed to be having a giant fair of some kind. Huge crowds of people were walking along the rows of tents. It was hard to do anything but move with the flow. The first set of tents primarily sold flowers, both cut and potted. It's a huge thing for the New Year and it was absolutely gorgeous. Next we came to the food. This was unfortunately placed next to the toilets which completely obliterated any good smells that might have been coming from them and was completely off-putting. Also, most of the foods seemed to revolve around the theme of "hot dog" done in different styles with different toppings. The next few rows was full of junk, ranging from toys to entice the most ADD of children to big gigantic tiger paw mittens (which once you put on render your hands useless) to pinwheels of infinite variety to iPhone covers to random junk sellers that looked like they'd be at home in a flea market. Snack vendors graced the corner of every section. It took a while for Colin and I to be able to fight our way out of the current of people. By this time, we realized that we were only a few blocks away from the original "carnival" and wondered if they were connected. They were far enough away and with somewhat different signage, so we don't think they were the same. It was very strange.

Another metro ride and mile-long walk and we were home again, exhausted from wandering and negotiating crowds. It wasn't as exciting as expected, but certainly not a total waste of time. We had a good time wandering the city and exploring places for future trips out that direction (including one really ridiculous looking, way overpriced "Western" sandwich shop called "Graze: Eat. Drink. Indulge." Overpriced, yes. BUT you can get a margarita there.

So, Confucian Carnival? Eh, there were a few pictures of Confucius there at the educational game table for kids, but other than that? Very confused. We're hoping that the upcoming week will show us the New Year celebrations we've been wanting to attend.