2014 Christchurch Lantern Festival

On 22nd and 23rd Feb 2014, Fo Guang Shan (FGS), South Island and Buddha Light International Association (BLIA), South Island jointly participated in the Christchurch Lantern Festival. The Festival was organized by Asia NZ and was held in Hagley Park, Christchurch. About 40 members of BLIA SI, led by Venerable Jue Xi, BLIA President See Shen Lee and BLIA Advisor John Lai, took part in the event by setting up a vegetarian food store selling a variety of vegetarian food. On the first day of the Festival, more than 10,000 people, from all walks of life around Christchurch and neighboring regions, visited the Festival. Unfortunately, on the second day, due to thunder storm, the Festival could not proceed and was called off early in the evening. Despite this bad turn of event, members of FGS South Island, through their unity and hard work, once again were able to rise to the occasion and fulfill their mission of promoting healthy palatable vegetarian food. This was demonstrated by the tremendous response from the public.

The Annual Christchurch Lantern Festival features prominently in the Cultural Calendar of the City of Christchurch. On these two days, the people of Christchurch and Canterbury Region converge to Hagley Park to participate and celebrate in the Festival. They are, without fail, treated to good Asian food, beautiful display of Lanterns and, Cultural and Musical shows by both local as well as international artists. For the year 2014, the Organizer, Asia NZ, specially brought in “Tang Dynasty” Rock Band from Beijing, “Shanghai Jiangzhou Drum Troupe”, “The Butterfly Troupe” from Hangzhou, and Kite Artist Guo Hongli, to entertain the audience. These many performances enabled the audience to feel and enjoy the various Chinese Cultures even though they were physically in New Zealand and away from China.

As usual, the variety of vegetarian food sold by FGS south island remained the main star attraction of the food fair. Meantime, many patrons of the FGS Tea House eagerly enquired about the reopening of FGS South Island Temple as they missed the delicious vegetarian food served by the Tea House. In the two-day Festival, members of FGS South Island fully exhibited the spirit of esprit de corps and this had resulted in the meticulous and orderly manner in food preparation, courteous service provided, and the many nice and healthy food offered. On top of all these, the efficient demobilisation and cleaning-up operation by the members won praises from the public, and left good impression with the Festival organiser.