Lantern Festival

The Lantern Festival marks the end of Chinese New Year. So, we (along with the rest of Taiwan) went to Taipei's Lantern Festival. I don't think I've ever seen that many people in one space in all my life.

Once we got in and past the main crowd we were greeted with the traditional red lanterns that were all over the city.

Traditionally, there are riddles on each lantern for children to solve.

The trees were decorated with colorful lights and there was a big stage, right when you walked in, with lots of musical performances.

And of course, there was the monk with an iPad. That's right, a monk with an iPad.

In the back of the festival there was another stage where there was supposed to be a big show. At least, that's what was advertised, that this show happened two times an hour. It sounded like something we couldn't miss! A lot of other people felt the same way.

It was insane how orderly they were, everyone just sat down on their own and waited quietly for the show to start.

Year of the snake!

The light show wasn't anything special, but I'm used to Disney and the 4th of July at the lake, so I'm hard to impress!

 I did like the other lanterns that were all around. 

After the light show a singer came on the stage.

And that's when we decided to be on our way. 

We walked into a convention center type place and were literally chased by some organizers. They asked about what we were doing there and how we were liking it. Then, we were introduced to the organizer of the whole thing, or the "big boss" as the man translating called him. Then they asked if they could take a picture with us for a magazine. Um, sure?

The "big boss" gave us each a metal stamp that he made himself, and then they sent us on our way. We walked through the rest of the center and on our way out a lady came up to me and said "Sarah?!? You're so young!" I'm sure I looked at her like she was crazy wondering how this woman knew my name. She then explained she was with the other organizers. They were back, this time with a camera crew. They asked us if we could talk about recycling on camera. She explained (while filming us) how the whole festival was made of recycled items. Meanwhile, there was a crowd of people forming outside looking at us through the window. Weirdest moment of my life!

Interesting night...

You can check out more pictures here. 

<3