Lantern Festival and Volvo Ocean Race

This week I got to celebrate the Chinese New Year once more. In Auckland it was celebrated with an extremely popular lantern festival this week. I went there with Marcus, the Swede I introduced you to in the Getting settled post. He studies at Auckland University and lives south of the city center, so meeting in Albert Park in the city center was easy for both of us.

The west side entrance was not overly crowded

The East side was. Are you there Marcus?

I found Marcus at the opposite entrance to the park after navigating through a massive crowd. The entire park was packed with people creating a sharp contrast to the quiet atmosphere that you would usually find in Albert Park. Marcus commented that perhaps it was supposed to make us feel more Asian and I agreed that there was some sense to that.

Multiculture is when people eat hotdogs and grilled squids

The two of us went looking for food in the many Asian stalls. There were snacks served on sticks everywhere and we both made some good and bad choices. I love to try new foods, but we quickly tired of the extremely slow pace of movement in the street. Back in the park we had a look at some of the lanterns and a couple of shows as well. The karaoke stage nonplussed me with its lack of quality singers, synthesized audio and impressively engaged crowd. I had to stay and watch for a while before finally getting myself together enough to move away. We also saw a group of martial arts talents show off their skill in a great show combining gymnastics with fighting dance moves.

Opera singer lanterns reminded me of last week's festival

At night the lanterns really came to life

Volvo Ocean Race arrives

I'm a massive supporter of sailing as a sport, so I am thrilled to be in a host town of the Volvo Ocean Race tour around the world. The sailors finished a leg from Sanya in China to Auckland in the early morning Sunday. I would have loved to see the finish and the boats entering the harbour, but I settled for being there in the afternoon instead.

The race village area has dj's playing live most evenings

My first glimpse of the boats, 3 are on shore already

There are three in the water and Vestas Wind is sadly missing

This race is so cool and I can almost touch their sails

Walking through the boatyard, which was dressed with images from the last 40 years of races, made me feel like a true fan. It's a difficult sport to follow and only few of the sailors become famous, but we can all appreciate the amazing boats they sail and the challenge of being fastest around the world. Even today with modern equipment the race is still as merciless and relentless as it was 40 years ago. If anyone doubted that, Vestas Wind made sure to remind them when they crashed their boat onto a reef in the middle of the Indian Ocean.