Chinese New Year

Sadie couldn't wait to welcome in the Lunar New Year. She helped her parents decorate their home with red and gold banners for luck, picked out a red embroidered outfit to wear to school and made sure to tidy her blue-walled room to sweep out evil spirits. It is the Year of the Ox, the first time that zodiac sign has appeared since the year she was born, thousands of miles away in China's Hunan province.

Painter Wei Haibin is carefully weighing every purchase as he heads home to Hebei province for China's biggest family holiday -- a time when the economy typically enjoys a bounce. "The total that I spend buying things for the Lunar New Year will be about half of what I spent last year," he said. "Though I will probably spend the same amount buying gifts for family and friends in my hometown because it's a matter of face, I will be really tight on the things I buy for myself."

The Chinese New Year begins Sunday, and several Southern California festivities are planned through the end of February to celebrate the Year of the Boar. "With nearly 1.5 million persons of Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese descent living in the Los Angeles area, we should see big celebrations like the ones back in Asia," said Steven Lee, vice president of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce. In the U.S.

Mao Tse-tung's image has received the iconic Andy Warhol treatment. It's been plastered onto tens of millions of kitschy cigarette lighters, medallions, watches, T-shirts and snow domes. Yet when a painting bearing the former Chinese communist leader's visage was displayed this week as part of a lunar new year celebration in Alhambra, it set off a debate in Southern California's Chinese community about ghosts from the past and the promise of the future.

The floats won't begin rolling for two weeks. The giant slinking dragon costume remains mothballed. But a push by the controversial Falun Gong sect to march in the city's Chinese New Year Parade has ignited political fireworks over whether China's government is trying to meddle in U.S. politics. Falun Gong, which is outlawed in China, has been barred by sponsors of the Feb.

Despite the years of sacrifice and grueling practice, ballet dancer Vina almost turned down a plum role in her first 2004 Chinese New Year show. Since emigrating from China nearly eight years before, she'd given up dancing because of a nerve injury that radiated pain from her lower back through her left leg, making it difficult for her to stand for longer than 10 minutes at a time.

With layoffs spreading and the traditional annual bonus cut or eliminated this year, many Chinese were in no mood to splurge during this week's Lunar New Year holiday -- even in a well-off city like this one. So just before the Chinese calendar turned to the Year of the Ox, the local government issued millions of dollars' worth of store coupons to encourage its penny-pinching residents to go out and spend. Si Gendi, 55, wasted no time in redeeming some of her vouchers.

"The Dancing Dragon" Marcia K. Vaughan In China they always celebrate Chinese New Year. Every year there is always a lot to do. On Chinese New Year they always celebrate because it is a tradition. I like when the dragon appears, and that means the firecrackers go on. Reviewed by Seven, 8 Los Feliz Charter School for the Fine Arts Los Angeles "Song Lee and the 'I Hate You' Notes" Suzy Kline Mary sends Song Lee hate notes, because Song Lee bothers her. When Harry and Doug find out, they tell the teacher.

Falun Gong: An article in Thursday's California section about Chinese government opposition to performances produced by backers of the Falun Gong spiritual movement identified Joe Trentacosta as a spokesman for New Tang Dynasty Television, the company producing Chinese New Year shows in Escondido and Los Angeles. Trentacosta is a spokesman for the Chinese New Year show in New York.

Nervous and down to his last dollar, Wayne Nguyen shook the plastic bowl, then slammed it on a game board. Nguyen, and those around him hollering and waving their fists, believe that the three etched dice in the bowl can forecast their luck for the Year of the Rooster, which begins today. "Three little fishes! Three little fishes! Open up! Open up!" they chanted in Vietnamese. The dice spilled out. One had a deer, the other a chicken, and the third had the fish they had wished for.