Chinese lantern festival

Last Saturday the Chinese in Christchurch celebrated their New Year with a Chinese lantern festival. That sounded pretty appealing so we went to take a look. In the small park of Victoria Square a large stage was built up, on which many Chinese performers were strutting their stuff. Some acts were very nice, others looked like an Idols audition. On another stage a Karaoke show was going on. Between the stages a lot of lanterns were put up, and on the ground they had placed paper animals. The lanterns were not lit though, because when the event started it was still light outside. It all looked nice, but not really special. Until the sun had set. At that moment the lanterns were lit, and the scene became very cosy. Oh, and I sang Karaoke, too :-)