Chinese New Year: The world's best cities for celebrating the Year of the Goat

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Chinese New Year: The world's best cities for celebrating the Year of the Goat

By Paul Chai
Updated
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It's lunar new year time, and also the time of year for the world's largest human migration as hundreds of millions of Chinese people head home to celebrate the year of the goat with family and friends. But there are plenty of public parties for the biggest event on the Chinese calendar, where you will see street parades, fireworks and traditional lion and dragon dances. Here are the cities you want to be in to have the best new-year parties:

Beijing

It is not only the modern capital of China, Beijing has also been home to ruling dynasties like the Ming and Qing empires in China's glorious past. The streets of the former Peking come alive over Chinese New Year with myriad performances at the city's famous Temple Fairs, sprawling street parties at the capital's storied temples that date back to the tenth century Liao Dynasty. Displays of local martial arts, dance, acrobatics, even arts, crafts and flower shows make this the number one spot in the world to see in the year of the ram.

Shanghai

Stage after stage of live music is how China's most populous city celebrates the new year. Shanghai, which was once the financial (and party) hub of Asia in the 1930s, puts on performances of everything from traditional Chinese folk music to rock concerts. But there is a serious side to the celebration too with locals heading to the city's major temples like the City of God Temple for prayer and to strike the temple bells to help bring about good luck.

Hong Kong

Fireworks are part of any Chinese New Year celebration, but watching the colours reflected in the skyscraper crowded along Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour is like having hundreds of screens reflecting the display back at you. Already known as a city that likes a night out, in the bars around Lan Kwai Fong you might see a spontaneous lion dance or if you arrive into the special administrative region during the key dates of new year Hong Kong airport will give you a traditional red packet – usually given to family with money inside these packets (called lai see, or hong bao, depending on where you are) are a key part of celebrations.

Singapore

Locals in the Lion City will be ringing in the new year by throwing vegetables and raw fish into the air. The new year salad, or yee sang, is a key part of festivities where a large bowl of salad – made from capsicum, picked ginger, turnips, crisp crackers and raw fish– is tossed high into the air by a group of diners to represent the "tossing up of good fortune". Make sure you also check out the light display in Chinatown where the streets are filled with lanterns shaped like rams and follow the sound of drumming to see traditional lion dances. The secret spot? The second floor of the Chinatown Food Complex (335 Smith Street, Singapore) where each shop will pay to have an auspicious lion dance, and locals swear these performers are the island's best. See yoursingapore.com

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Sydney

Locally, Sydney is putting on the best show for the Year of the Ram. The city of Sydney has positioned 90 light-up terracotta warriors along the harbour foreshore at Dawes Point. The warriors are made to look like Chinese lanterns and all face towards the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Over in Sydney's well-defined Chinatown area, the month-long party is one of the largest outside of the Chinese mainland with a month-long calendar of events culminating in the Twilight Parade of colourful floats. See sydneychinesenewyear.com

London

Concentrated on the West End, the UK capital will have an all-day celebration that kicks off on February 22 with a parade and lion dances and floats parading down Shaftsbury Avenue. There is also a range of smaller events at the city's many Chinese restaurants. It's just a shame that Wong Kei, long known as London's rudest restaurant, has stopped its over-the-top grumpy antics – the most fun being staff shouting at you to "Go upstairs" until you reached the fourth (and top) floor only to be yelled at to "Go down" – because there is a little less colour in the Chinese New Year without this dinner theatre.

Los Angeles

San Francisco lays claim to the best Stateside new year, but no one can quite top the home of Hollywood for year of the ram grandeur. The centrepiece to the celebration in LA is the Golden Dragon Parade which is celebrating its 115th year this year and which attracts hundreds of thousands of attendees, as well as being broadcast on television. The parade, which takes place on February 21 this year, is celebrated by LA's almost 1.5 million residents who start the celebration with a Midnight Temple Ceremony on February 18 at the Chuan Thien Hau Temple with the lighting of incense (and fireworks!) as well as visits from Buddhist monks.

Rome

One of a handful of European cities "twinned" with Beijing, Rome's Chinese New Celebrations are already in full swing with a big show at the Italian capital's Auditorium Parco della Musica at the weekend – the performance included a great cultural mash-up as Chinese opera students sang pieces from Giuseppe Verdi's La Traviata. This Saturday will see the annual street parade where thousands of people watch city's Chinese community celebrate the new year with floats and, yes, more fireworks. Well, they did invent them!

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