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The Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) tonight (September 8) is holding the lantern carnival at Victoria Park, featuring a series of entertainment programmes and spectacular lantern displays to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival.
Decorated with dazzling lanterns, Victoria Park is filled with festive joy with "Our Childhood Years" as the carnival theme. The "Toy Kingdom" lantern set, featuring a colourful giant toy-block castle, wooden horses, a robot, teddy bears and a chess board, is taking visitors on a nostalgic journey to childhood. Adjacent to it is a play area in which children can enjoy riding wooden horses and playing hopscotch.
Other spectacular lantern displays have also become hot spots for photo-taking, such as a hexagonal Chinese-style lantern measuring 7.5 metres high. The lantern comprises five levels with the body, using the "hanging works" style, displaying three-dimensional scenes of people living in the Qing dynasty imperial palace. Two lantern sets entitled "Dinosaur Pals" and "Hello Taiwan", which were displayed at the Taiwan Lantern Festival 2014 earlier this year, have also been well received by the public.
Members of the public are also enjoying the carnival's festive programmes. The highlights include spectacular folk songs, dances and acrobatic shows by the Beijing Arts Troupe. There are also demonstrations of Beijing's traditional folk crafts, such as lantern crafting and zhayan kite (swallow-style) crafting by folk craft masters. Furthermore, folk arts including images of peasant life based on paintings from Longmen on the Mainland and Foshan lanterns are being featured, and local craftsman Leung Chi-shing is demonstrating traditional lantern making.
Children's songs, folk songs, shuttlecock kicking, rope skipping and yo-yo demonstrations are also rekindling memories of childhood years, while other entertaining programmes such as a fire dragon dancing parade, a creative market and a lantern quiz are further key attractions.
The LCSD will also hold another lantern carnival at Tai Po Waterfront Park tomorrow, with details as follows:
New Territories East Mid-Autumn Lantern Carnival
September 9 (Tuesday), 7.30pm to 10.30pm
Programme: Spectacular Chinese ethnic dances and
songs, acrobatics, demonstration of
Chinese folk craft, Chinese and Western
music, modern dance, Chinese traditional
shadow play puppet show, pantomime,
storytelling, a workshop on light-painting
photography, a lantern quiz and
a wish-making corner.
Another lantern display entitled "The World in Colours" is being held at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Piazza from now until October 5. The lantern display's design features different ethnic groups of the world and demonstrates that Hong Kong is a metropolis where East meets West.
People are urged not to litter or burn wax while celebrating the festival.
For more information on the above programmes, please visit the website:
www.lcsd.gov.hk/en/eo/territoryevents/midautumnlantern/2014.html.
Ends/Monday, September 8, 2014
Issued at HKT 20:30
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