Yilan Lantern Festival

Lantern Festival is held on the 15th day of the Lunar calendar (about 2 weeks after Chinese New Year), and it marks the end of the CNY celebrations.

 But the celebrations in Yilan have been going on even longer because the city is hosting the national Lantern Festival. Every night I hear fireworks that shake my house, and on the weekends there are traffic jams on all the roads....did 

I mention that I only live about 3 minutes away from the festivities? 

I had a chance to go a couple days before it began, just to check out the set up. It was kind of fun! I took a TON of pictures, and I'll show you some of my favorites on here. I went later in the week with some friends,

 once the festival started. 

This year is the year of the Ox, so true to form, there was a GIANT ox lantern in the middle of the field. In my opinion, it looked a lot better when it wasn't lit up with far too many sparkling colors. But anyways, every 30 minutes they'd have a  short announcement and music/light show which included the cow lighting up and spinning. Winnie mentioned that she was reminded of the golden calf in Exodus... 

Another area had lanterns made by students, where there was an inordinate amount of Spongebob Squarepants....it's a mystery to me.