Hong Kong Village Marks Python's Death With Fire Dragon of Straw and Incense

TAI HANG, HONG KONG — According to Atlas Obscura, the Tai Hang Fire Dragon Dance was first performed in 1880, when Tai Hang was a small Hakka fishing and farming village. It continues today on the evenings of the 14th, 15th and 16th days of the 8th lunar month.

Oral history, as the entry relates it, holds that a python had been devouring the village's livestock until it was hunted down and killed. A severe plague followed at once, and the villagers came to believe it was retribution, the serpent being thought the son of the dragon god.

The plague is said to have persisted until a village elder claimed that Guanyin, goddess of mercy and compassion, had appeared to him in a dream. She reportedly instructed that a Fire Dragon Dance be held and firecrackers let off around the village. The entry states that the plague then vanished, and the dance has been repeated yearly to ward off famine.

The dragon is built anew each year of rattan frames, ropes, iron wires and straw, a labor of two weeks. It has 31 sections, measures 67 meters and weighs just over 100 kilograms. Its head alone exceeds 45 kilograms and requires a rotating team of eight to ten performers.

The ceremony opens with an eye-dotting ritual at the Lin Fa Kung temple, symbolizing the dragon's awakening. Between 10,000 and 12,000 lit incense sticks are then placed on the creature along Wun Sha Street before it winds through the district. Spectators receive the sticks afterward, which are supposedly blessings and good fortune.

On the final evening, according to the entry, the dragon is taken to the Causeway Bay Typhoon Shelter and launched into Victoria Harbour in a rite called 'Dragon returning to Heaven', signifying misfortune carried away. Visitors outside the festival may consult a small exhibit at the Tai Hang Fire Dragon Heritage Centre on School Street. The writer calls the live parade, with its smoke, incense and dagu drums, a sensory overload.