It's basically the musicians, it's the band, the beating of the drums, it pulls everybody
together, and everybody wants to come and see the lions. I was born and raised in Chinatown.
My father was born and raised in Chinatown. The energy in Chinatown has always been strong.
They're one of the main attractions in Manhattan, so we're pretty proud of our neighborhood.
Chinese New Year's is 15 days long. It starts with lion dancing, fireworks, celebrations,
family getting together. That's the whole thing of New Year's. Our Chinese New Year
parade is totally different. We come out and we bless every single business establishment
that wants a blessing. The lions do three bows to each establishment, and they collect
the little red envelope called the home bow, and that's the offering to the lion.
How our organization started was in the very early 1970s. My son, he was about eight years
old, so he was very interested in lion dancing. Back then, you had to either belong to an
association or a family organization, and they were basically for people that were
born in China, not for the American born Chinese. We said, Mom, will you help me? I really
want to do lion dancing. It started out with him and a couple of his friends who were also
American born. They would come to my living room, and that was like the first clubhouse,
and it just kept growing. Forty-three years later, we're four generations deep now.
We have a basic beat, which is traditional, but what we do is we beat a little harder,
a little faster, because we're a youth group, and it's the same thing like in any type of
music. When young people do it, it's louder, and it's faster. I have four children, twelve
grandchildren. They come in every Chinese New Year's, every one of them are lion dancers,
and it's a very good feeling just to see that it's continuing. A lot of pride, a lot of
pride.
