It’s Chinese New Year’s Eve and I’m in Melbourne’s Chinatown with friends for the countdown to the new year which will be the year of the monkey! From early afternoon the sounds of drums and cymbals have reverberated through the streets and laneways to ward off evil spirits. Crowds follow the noise to watch high-energy lion dances as ear-splitting ribbons of red colored firecrackers explode filling the air with smoke. It’s quite a spectacle and the energy is palpable.

I literally ran from one lion dance to the next like an excited child, my eyes almost as wide as the huge smile I had. It was amazing, chaotic, colorful, and noisy!

Today’s picture was a really tough choice because earlier in the day I visited the Lyon Housemuseum, a family home belonging to Corbett and Yueji Lyon which is open to the public and houses their impressive collection of Australian contemporary art. It’s a truly amazing house and it was really great to meet Corbett and Yueji.

I also took a picture of a young boy sitting on the roof of his family’s car in Chinatown as a lion danced on the street. The lion approached the boy and I managed to get a great picture of that moment. It was really hard to choose the picture of the day, and while some might say this one is a cliche, I chose it because for me the celebrations of Chinese New Year in Chinatown was just fantastically noisy, colorful, and full of joy!

So Xīnnián kuàilè everyone!