Community
26 January, 2025
Lunar New Year
RED lanterns, dancing lions and delicious banquets will all be protagonists at the Chinese New Year celebrations as the community prepares to welcome the year of the snake with joy and hope.
Once again, the Cairns and District Chinese Association Inc (CADCAI) is inviting the Cairns community to celebrate the start of another lunar year through a 15-day festival full of culture, delicious cuisine and traditions to bring good fortune in the new year from January 29 to February 15.
Classic features of the event are returning, including the lantern festival and lion and dragon dancers.
“The snake is the sixth animal in the Chinese zodiac calendar so January 29 will be the first day of the year of the snake. On this day we’ll have a big welcome to the year with firecrackers by the lagoon which are traditionally lit to ward off evil spirits. This will be on from 6 to 7pm and we will have Joe Blake from the Taipans to meet and greet the crowd,” said CADCAI’s president Lai Chu Chan.
“The snake is an animal that symbolises wisdom and transformation, the snake sheds its skin and then is reborn, so they represent resilience because it’s able to persevere, so we’re hoping this will be a year of good changes.
“We’ll have a traditional Chinese New Year banquet because the Chinese New Year is also about food and the food has special meanings, fish represents abundance, prawns happiness, so Chinese New Year is a time of reunion.
“This dinner will also be our fundraising because we’re announcing that we are looking at building Queensland’s first Chinese Culture and Heritage Centre in Cairns and will be launching the fundraising at the banquet and the state government has committed funding for stage one.
“Over the 15 days that we celebrate the end of the festival is actually called the lantern festival at the lagoon plaza area from 5pm to 7.30pm. It’s a family event and we’ll have lion dance, dragon dance, cultural artists from the community, Chinese songs, stalls selling Chinese New Year lanterns and fireworks at 7.30pm.”
Mrs Chan said this was an opportunity for the whole Cairns community to come together in unity and wish for prosperity in 2025.
“I think for us to be able to share our culture openly and at these public, free events, and then later, when we get our culture centre built, is for people to come and realise that we can be harmonious, multicultural and be one,” she said.
“So we’re really proud to be able to host this event with funding from (the) council and state government to help us bring this event to the community in Cairns and to our international visitors.”
For a full program, information and tickets for the ticketed events, visit https://bit.ly/4hqHjk2
