Beijing - The Night the Sky Broke

Spring Festival is heralded in by the Lunar New Year which is celebrated all across Asia. We arrived in Beijing on Saturday which was the eve of New Year's day. There is a tradition in China where people make dumplings and then go out and light off fireworks. The dumplings are to ease Family strife and tension; pounding and grinding pork, flattening dough, and carefully mending and sealing the ingredients together in a lovely little pouch. The fireworks are for scaring away evil spirits in order to ensure a prosperous new year. The Chinese have never struck me as a particularily supersitious people, but they do know a thing or two about fireworks.

They did invent them after all.

It began around 8pm Saturday evening. Loud pops could be heard from our tour bus and flashes of light reflecting off of the windows from roman candles that people were firing off of their balconies. It seems that fireworks in China are crafted not only for their luminous qualities, but also for their audible power. These things were loud, louder than anything, so loud that your stomach jumps up into your throat only to find your heart beat it there...so loud that your girlfriend's thumb and fingernails meet each other in the center of your arm.

We went out walking about the city around 10pm, there was already a reddish haze cast over the city from the light of the fireworks and the red lanterns that were lit everywhere. People were lighting off strings of firecrackers every few meters or so.

They were really loud and the men who were lighting them seemed to have an almost juvenile mischief about them. We later learned that this was probably due to the fact that it was the first time that the government had allowed people to light them off in the streets. Previously, fireworks were limited to the city limits or parks.

A small shop illuminated by the light of the fireworks.

The fireworks grew in intensity until, around midnight, they reached their crescendo. By this time we had found a vantage point along the embankment of a river along the Second Ring round near the center of the city. The explosions reached a fever pitch the likes of which I have never and will never experience again. Every degree we turned was layered with light and explosion, my senses could not keep up with it all. The noise was so deafening that it was an effort to deny my body's instinct to duck and run for cover.

In silence we walked back towards the hotel. Although the fireworks continued, we felt full, overwhelmed and ready for shelter. The noise and the smoke was becoming oppressive and we still had to constantly jump and forth to avoid exploding things.

By this time, the streets were littered with the red paper of countless firecrackers. China Central Television in Beijing reported 260 injuries related to firework misuse.

...at least they took care of those evil spirits