'Hood #13: Chinatown for Chinese New Year

I timed my visit to the neighborhood of Chinatown to coincide with the Chinese New Year celebration, this year being the year of the horse.  To get there, my friend Jenifer and I drove to Union station, parked for a bargain $6, and walked the half mile or so to where the parade was scheduled to take place.

As a teenager, my son used to take the train to Chinatown all the time to "just poke around" (read: "stock up on fireworks"), but I think the only time I've gone was when my ex-husband's band used to play in some park there about 13 years ago.

When we first got to Chinatown, we walked around the crowded streets to check out the shops.  I'm not into shopping for cheap tchotchkes, but I did like seeing all the teas and dehydrated foods—fruits, mushrooms, flowers, etc.

I stopped to buy a deep fried banana from a vendor because... DEEP FRIED BANANA!  Later, I also had a sesame seed ball filled with bean paste, which was delicious for about two bites, and then got really odd.

Chinese New Year is marked with a parade, which was awesome mostly in how small town it was.  People meandered across the street between floats, bands stopped mid-march to regroup, and at one point, people just gave up on the parade and started milling around—even though some poor group of cheerleaders was still trying to march through.

I especially enjoyed the marching orchestras (it can't be easy marching with a violin), and, of course, all the dragons. 

However, the highlight for me was the very end of the day— we only luckily stumbled upon it.  It's the part of the Chinese New Year celebration involving fireworks being set off. By what I could see through the crowd, I was expecting confetti to be shot into the sky.  I should have been tipped off the the sheer number of firemen standing by.

What it turned out to be: dragons dancing around, painfully loud fireworks, complete with billowing smoke, and a ton of confetti and debris being shot into the crowd to the point where we had to duck, cover our eyes and our faces.  We were literally being pelted with it.  Spectacular!!!

Anyway, the original plan was to get Chinese food, but the restaurants after the parade were packed, so we opted for a taco off a food truck—which we decided was a nod to Olvera Street nearby.

I have wanted to do this since I moved to Southern California since 1984... took me until I gave myself this challenge.  

,