Into Another New Year.......

This Sunday January 29th marks the year 4704 in the Chinese calendar...the Year of the Dog. This year will last 385 days...reportedly only the 12th time in the last 2300 years that the variable Chinese lunar/solar year has seen so many days...occurring the last time in 1944. Seems auspicious enough a beginning.......and provides an alternative view to the western...or gregorian...notion of time.......which is too often accepted as being the absolute and only way to view time......in disregard for calendars developed and used by native peoples of this earth for milleniums.
My kung fu school...a non-profit...survives in large part due to funds received from our performances...and Chinese New Year is the time when a good percentage of the performances are held. This year...somewhere in the vicinity of ...42...are scheduled over the span of the next 3-4 weeks...lion dances...kung fu...and banner...demonstrations...and the invitations will take us to Indian Country...South Dakota. What was our Shifu thinking??? I'm sure I don't know the answer to that one...but I do know that endurance and resilience testing... and pushing...are an integral part of being a kung fu-er...so the lesson will be there somewhere....along with the good experiences this time will bring...
Must admit that the most interesting and enticing aspect of it for me this year will be going...once again...to the sacred territory of the Lakota...and since the 1880's also home to many Chinese people.... But more about that...as it unfolds.......