At last...

Well, it's been a long time coming, but I finally made it to a Dragon Boat race. It's June 6th, and so it's 端午節 (Dragon boat festival), a public holiday devoted just to this event. If I was going to watch a Dragon Boat race this year, I figured it had better be today. The public holiday commemorates the sport (which is pretty ancient) as well as the story of Qu Yuan, which you can read about at the wikipedia link, if you're interested.

Now there are many different dragon boat races on today, but I wanted to go back to our old neighbourhood, and enjoy the familiarity of Tai Po. I've walked many times in Tai Po waterfront park, and figured it was as beautiful a place as any to watch some racing.

Loved all the bamboo structures

My interest in Dragon Boat racing came about because of a book that I read by two New Zealanders called "Time to eat the dog", which was an attempt to put some numbers on the environmental impact of many common activities, such as sport, keeping pets, or whatever. Their discussion of which sports had the smallest carbon footprint concluded that the best, at least out of the ones they examined, was Dragon Boat racing. Now at the time, I don't think I'd even heard of it, or at least it hadn't made much of an impression on me. Their analysis at least intrigued me enough that when we moved to Hong Kong I thought, 'I must see one of those races', and so here I was. The 271 bus provided a convenient, and uncommonly peaceful, way to get there, and the place was buzzing with people, even at 8.30am.

So what did I learn about Dragon Boat racing? Well, only what I could learn with my eyes and ears, because I didn't see any explanations of the proceedings, and I didn't understand the commentary, except for the numbers and the word Tai Po! Every dragon boat seems to have twenty rowers, ten on each side, each with an individual paddle. There is also a drummer, who keeps time up the front with a regular beat on a big drum, and an oarsperson at the back who stands up and keeps the boat heading in the right direction. I liked the way it is a mixed sex sport, as there aren't that many of these, and certainly a mixed ability one, as some of the teams were very strong and fast, while others seemed to be just happy to finish. I think this is because most, and perhaps all, of the teams are formed by local businesses, community groups, or whoever (at least one team was connected with a bar in Tai Po), and so they will all take it with varying degrees of seriousness depending on the culture and size of the organisation.

All the teams getting ready to race

I was expecting the boats themselves to be a bit more varied. I love the dragon-head prow, and dragon-tail stern, but they all seemed very similar, at least to my undiscerning eye. Perhaps there is a standard design to try and level the playing-field for the sport? One of the curious aspects of it was the difficulty in getting six to eight very long thin boats lined up at the starting line. When the wind got up a bit, many of them got blown around so that they were facing sideways, and often this seemed to necessitate one boat, and then another, paddling around in a circle to get in place again. I don't know how common this is, but certainly one race seemed to take about ten minutes before everyone was lined up to the satisfaction of the starter. Perhaps this is normal for boat races - I'm certainly not a regular visitor at any others.

One of the most startling things to me, as a newbie to Hong Kong, was the complete absence of commerce at the Dragon Boat races in Tai Po. With so many spectators, athletes, and officials, I would have assumed there would have been many small food stalls, if nothing else, and perhaps a bit of a mini-fair besides. Certainly the Tai Po district council had organised things very well, with a number of different bamboo VIP viewing platforms, plenty of portaloos (Kenny eat your heart out), a number of St John ambulance divisions, and various police, Leisure services staff, and others I couldn't identity, on duty. So where was the commerce? I mean, this is Hong Kong, where there must be more places to shop per person that anywhere in the world. And nothing?!? It was actually reassuring to have it be all about the racing, rather than anything else, though given the sticky 31°C day, I was secretly hoping for at least an ice-cream vendor. As there seems to be with many festivals here, there is a particular food associated with the Dragon Boat festival - sticky rice parcels wrapped in, I think lotus leaves. There weren't even these for sale at the racing, which would have at least fitted with the theme. Fortunately I got in early, and tried a vegetarian version of one a day or two earlier, so that I didn't miss out. I learned at Chinese New Year how fast some of these special foods can disappear, once the holiday is over, and I'm always happy to experience Hong Kong through my tastebuds, as well as my eyes and ears.