By Oscar Liu

Copyright scmp

Thousands of people lined the narrow streets of Hong Kong’s Tai Hang neighbourhood in Causeway Bay on Sunday night to witness the annual fire dragon dance, with spectators calling the performance “unique” and “stunning”.
Troupe members began the procession on Wun Sha Street at around 8.25pm, hoisting up the fire dragon straw frame adorned with more than 10,000 burning incense sticks as drums, gongs and cymbals were struck.
Spectators cheered and hurried to snap photos as the 67-metre (200 foot) fire dragon danced past them.

Restaurants around the neighbourhood were packed, and stalls outside selling refreshments drew long queues of people in search of a cold drink on the hot night.
Among them were Rosie Chen, 28, a marketing officer from Shenzhen, and her boyfriend, and they had enjoyed a Thai meal before the parade started.
“You don’t see people packed for one thing very often,” Chen said. “The fire dragon dance is absolutely unique. Before the performance, a group of children were dancing with a smaller dragon with those LED lights on and were just adorable.”

Tom Smith, 23, a postgraduate student from Britain, came with friends he met at school in Hong Kong a few years ago.
“Chinatown in London has dragon dances, but nothing like the one in Tai Hang,” Smith said.
The troupe members began the performance near Lin Fa Kung Temple and wound through Warren Street, Brown Street, Ormsby Street, Sun Chun Street, King Street, Jones Street, Lai Yin Street and School Street.

A significant extension of the route takes place during the Mid-Autumn Festival on Monday, when the performance concludes with a special appearance at Victoria Park at around 10.30pm.
Cherry Yeung Lai-yi, a 38-year-old teacher, brought her four-year-old daughter to watch the performance for the first time.
“I wanted to come last year, but back then my daughter probably would not have understood what was going on,” Yeung said. “Today, she asks what everything is and why. I think it’s a great opportunity to teach her about Hong Kong culture.”
Carson Tsang Tse-yat, 28, a filmmaking assistant, came to capture the moment for his social media platform, saying it did not look like anything he had seen on television.
“I am absolutely in awe of what those dancers are carrying, spinning the structure while the ashes of the incense sticks keep dropping. Seeing it live is genuinely stunning because you see the smoke and smell the burning incense,” Tsang said.

This year’s Tai Hang Fire Dragon Dance runs from October 5 to 7, coinciding with the 14th, 15th and 16th nights of the eighth lunar month, in a ritual dating back to the waning years of the Qing dynasty (1644-1911).
According to legend, the dance began as a protective rite in 1880 to drive out a devastating plague that struck the Hakka village in Tai Hang at the time. The tradition was included in the national list of intangible cultural heritage in 2011.