Update City, Part Four: Celebrating February

Gung Hay Fat Choy! Seeing as China is hosting this year's summer Olympics, and London the next (2012), Mayor Ken Livingstone wanted to pump up Chinese New Year Celebrations this Year of the Rat. Unfortunately, that meant that everyone and his dog (rat?) were out, and this is all I could see of the parade...
Three hours later, when we finally made it to Chinatown (it usually takes about 15 minutes on foot on a regular day) we got a little bit of food in our system... but to get this street stall food, we basically had to push and shove, which meant that all five of us took little bites from one Oyster pancake...
However, it was quite exciting to see Chinatown all dolled up in lanterns - even if it did take hours to push through the crowds!
And whaddaya know, they even had fireworks during the day! A definite first! Unfortunately, with the crowds (and the daylight) we only saw this:
... it was more of an acoustic show.

And speaking of acoustic shows... Valentine's Day was a musical one this year. We headed to a club near Kilburn station called the Luminaire, for a Valentine's gig featuring the Heartstrings http://www.theheartstrings.com/ (how Valentine's appropriate!)

The first 25 singles got in for a reduced cover price, and the first 25 hand-holding couples got in for free! Plus, if you kissed each other and declared your love for one another, you got two free "buy one, get one free" drinks tickets!

Unfortunately, the only beer on that you could get with the ticket was Foster's, so we had to pre-medicate with some real beer (Cronenberg). Result: well... I think these pictures will give you an idea...

(Genie is wearing her beer goggles)

(This is what she saw with her beer goggles on)

(Team X-pat)

Okay - updates are OVER, friends. If you want more updates, keep commenting so I know you are reading! And Happy Valentine's Day to our friends at home, in Japan, in the States, in Dubai, and wherever else you may be!