Celebration

The pageantry, entertainment and cuisine of a traditional Tet festival drew thousands of Vietnamese refugees to a Santa Ana park Saturday in a nostalgic cultural celebration marking the beginning of the Asian lunar calendar's Year of the Buffalo. Blue-robed celebrants chanted prayers to Vietnamese ancestors in an opening procession that concluded with smoke from a burning prayer scroll billowing heavenward past flags of the United States and South Vietnam.

A celebration of life for Corey Allen, the actor-turned-director who died June 27 at age 75, will be held at 2:30 p.m. Sunday at the Howard Fine Acting Studio, 1445 N. Las Palmas Ave., Hollywood.

This year's Pow Wow celebration at the Autry National Center -- an annual event celebrating Native American arts and culture -- has been canceled as a result of diminished financial resources, according to its organizer, the Southern California Indian Center. For 40 years, the Pow Wow has brought Native American heritage to the public with musical performances, dancing, arts exhibitions and family activities. It is the largest Native American cultural event of its kind in Southern California.

A little more than 50 years ago in the desolate interior of northeast Brazil, there rode an outlaw named Lampiao, who wore a large leather hat with a broad brim turned up in front and back. Fringe and strings of beads hung from the brim. Lampiao and his comrades, vigilantes of the sertao, or back lands, ransacked farms, killed those who got in their way and seemed unstoppable until they were finally ambushed and gunned down by government troops.

Russia's gold-medal celebration went into overtime. And that prevented the team from boarding a flight Thursday morning, a day after Russia won the title at the World Junior Hockey Championships at Buffalo, N.Y. About 30 members of the Russian contingent were asked to get off a Delta Air Lines flight because of their unruly behavior as they boarded the plane, a spokesman for Buffalo Niagara International Airport said. Players and managers spent the day at the Days Hotel across the street ?

Last year's first installment of Fashion's Night Out, an effort to jump-start a sagging industry with an evening full of shopping events in major cities all over the world that was brought to us by New York-based Vogue magazine and the Council of Fashion Designers of America, was, not surprisingly, very Manhattan-centric. Southern California was barely represented, with a few local scattered efforts staged at Neiman Marcus in Beverly Hills and the Fred Segal Center on Melrose Avenue. What a difference a year makes.

Turns out Cinderella wears hockey skates after all. L.A. Live exploded in celebration Monday night, the Kings' 19-year rebuilding plan finally coming to fruition. And their fans to full ignition. Boisterous and beery-eyed, they took to the streets surrounding Staples Center, hugging, high-fiving, even crying as they celebrated something their sports-obsessed city has never had: an NHL championship. OK, Kings fans, you can exhale now. Your Cup runneth over. The celebration - and I knew you'd worry - was fervent but largely peaceful, at least in the initial 90 minutes.

For weeks, Jaime Abreu and his family have spent every waking moment of their spare time getting ready for Carnival. Scattered about the stucco patio behind their house are swatches of glittering costume materials and half-made plywood cutouts of black cats and evil eyes. All the Abreus' preparations will come together by this Thursday, the day their town's six-day pre-Lenten festivities begin. Abreu, a quiet, gray-haired music teacher, is president of the Serrote (Handsaw)