The traditional dragon and lion dances greeted several hundred Asian-Americans over the weekend at Fair Oaks Shopping Center in northern Virginia. They had gathered to ring in the Year of the Pig. Hank Chao is a Chinese-American and with the Hai Hau Community Center in Falls Church, Virginia. He said, “We used to call it the Chinese New Year. But we have a lot of Southeast Asians, like Korean, Japanese, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia. Those people came to us and said, ‘Hey, we celebrate, too.’" Members of the community center have gathered to celebrate the Lunar New Year for the past 16 years. The holiday begins on the first new moon of the lunar calendar. Because the holiday is based on the moon, it falls somewhere between the end of January and the end of February. This year’s holiday is on February 5. It marks the year 4717 of the lunar calendar.
