If you were to mistake yourself in a battle zone, you could be forgiven. But no, this isn’t World War 3, this is Beijing, China and the beginning of the Chinese Spring Festival… plus a fireworks display that will never be forgotten!

From the moment I stepped out the door this morning I have been bombarded with the loud bangs and shrill cracks of fireworks on the streets of Beijing. Fireworks here come in all shapes and sizes – from small bangers and fountains to large mortars and firecrackers – the Chinese have the lot (after all, they did invent gunpowder!). Whilst during the daytime, it was just the occasional banger or rocket, things really started to pick up as dark closed in and soon the streets were vibrating with the sounds of fireworks. Things got so noisy that car alarms started going off, dogs and cats were yowling and people were forced to shove their fingers into their earholes to try and block out the phenomenal sound.

You see, a firework display in China isn’t something official. There’s no official start time and no official end. Its just a massive gathering of crazy pyromaniacs with shopping trolleys and car boots overloaded with carton upon carton of rockets, mortars, fountains, sparklers, firecrackers and bangers. Furthermore, unlike our orderly shows in Britain, here, safety goes to the trash can. People weave their way around the crackling objects on the ground to light yet another magical box of tricks that will go off with a boom. Cars drive by (and often over) the numerous already-lit fireworks that are strewn all over the street. Some people even hold lit fireworks in their hands so as to better guide the missiles that are shot from within.

Yet the one thing that surprised me the most is quantity. The sheer quantity of fireworks here is insane. At any one moment in time, the amount of fireworks in the air in the small district I live in alone by far exceeds the finale of any fireworks display I have ever seen. However, this finale goes on for seconds, minutes, hours. In fact, as I am writing this, the finale is still going on outside (although it began many hours ago) and there is no signs that things are going to calm down soon (its already almost 2am!). Now if we put things in perspective, the small district I live in is only a tiny fraction of a larger district in Beijing called Haidian; which is one of many large districts that form up Beijing. If such a small district can put on such a big display for such a long time, it is frightening to try and think of the total number of fireworks that will go up into the sky tonight… and this is just Beijing!

Anyway, I took some photos and took a video to try and give you some idea of just how serious the Chinese take their fireworks over here! If you haven’t seen a Chinese firework display before then you might not understand just how impressive this really is – the whole city really does come alive! All I can say is I feel sorry for the street cleaners, they are certainly not going to be having any fun tomorrow!

UPDATE: It is now almost 10 o’clock in the morning and the fireworks are showing no sign of retreat whatsoever. I’m starting to wonder just how long this can go on for!! Off to a temple festival this afternoon which should be fun. Again, more photos will be on here soon.

Colourful Trails

Red Swoosh

A good desktop background

Pretty Patterns

Fountain

Multiple Bangs

Piaoliang

Big Bang

Playing with Fireworks

Silly Woman!

Fountain

Swoosh

Blowtorches

Blowtorches

Bang

Bang

Red Bang

Red Bang

Red Bang

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Yellow Bang

Bang

Bang

Bang

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Bang