Ox Meets Dragon

Here’s one New Year’s celebration that doesn’t end the morning after. Chinese New Year is a fifteen-day event (having begun this year on 26 January), culminating with the Lantern Festival, when brilliantly decorated paper lanterns are strung and parades mark the end of the New Year festivities. On 1 February you’ll get to start at the top in London’s Chinatown and surrounding areas, where lion and dragon dances, music, arts, fireworks and food await you. This year marks the Year of the Ox. Legend has it that Buddha invited all the animals to meet him on New Year’s Day. Of the twelve that arrived, Buddha named a year after each one. The other animals are rat, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog and boar. The ox is denoted as hardworking and dependable, marking a characteristic of those born every twelve years under its influence. As an English proverb says, “The old ox plows a straight furrow.” May your path be long and prosperous.