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Photos: Super Saturday Lion Dances Draw Big Crowds And Tons Of Confetti To Chinatown
By
Scott Lynch
Published Feb 8, 2020
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Scott Lynch / Gothamist
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By
Scott Lynch
Published Feb 8, 2020
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They've started calling it Super Saturday, the day before Chinatown's big Lunar New Year Parade when dozens of Lion Dance crews hit the neighborhood's streets to bring good luck and fortune to—and ward off evil from—the neighborhood.
In exchange for performing their ritualistic dance outside and inside stores and restaurants lining Mott and Pell, Doyers and Elizabeth, Bayard and East Broadway, the "Lions" are fed red envelopes filled with cash by business owners. The lai see is then put back into the community through various local non-profit organizations.
Those are the transactional mechanics of the event, but it's actually much more festive and fun than that sounds. The crews vary in size, from a couple of little kids seemingly wandering around solo to parade-sized contingents with bands, dancers, and local civic leaders waving flags. Some even brought dragons. Most of the bigger outfits are accompanied by a rolling trolley of drummers, and there are often several crews working the same block, lending a wild, raucous air to the proceedings.
And, of course, there are the hundreds of confetti cannons, which are a total blast and definitely the primary way many people participate in the festivities. Most of the confetti action takes place near the corner of Bayard and Elizabeth (all of the streets are closed to vehicular traffic for the day), and within an hour or two the asphalt was blanketed by bright bits of paper. Silly String (or, actually, off-brand "Crazy String") is a popular mess-maker as well.
Even though NYC has so far had zero cases of coronavirus, fear and ignorance have reportedly caused a drop in visitors to Chinatown in recent weeks, as well as ugly incidents of anti-Asian racism citywide. Maybe the streets were a little less crowded yesterday for Super Saturday than in years past, but not by much. Out of the hundreds, possibly thousands, of people I encountered during the early afternoon, I only saw three wearing any sort of surgical face mask.
The Lunar New Year Parade steps off at 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, February 9, from Canal Street down Mott Street. Mott definitely is the most fun place to be, which means it's also the most crowded, but if you want to just drop by to see what's it like, the confetti mayhem on Baxter and Elizabeth is a good place to start.
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lion dances
lunar new year
Chinatown
Scott Lynch
Photojournalist, food writer, preschool receptionist. Love NYC.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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