Hey everyone! We finally got confirmation and details about the parade! The CNY parade will be on Saturday, February 11th. Participants must meet at Pacific and Columbus by no later than 3PM.
The parade doesn't officially start until around 5:30PM, but with hundreds of participants they'll need all the prep time they can get! It will be extremely chaotic! Expect to be put into some kind of costume - don't worry, it's usually just something simple like a Chinese-style shirt or a black sweatshirt (to ensure homogeneity amongst the people in the parade). Your attire will differ depending on which section of the parade you are assigned to. While the official duration of this event is from 3PM to 9:30PM, most of you will be done by seven or eight by the latest. It all depends on where you are in the parade! If our entire group shows up on time (or preferably, EARLY!), we will most likely be put into the beginning sections of the parade, which means less down time and an earlier finish. With this in mind, please try to show up early by all means. Our biggest competitor for the early spots is probably Washington High School (and their group leaders are notorious for being very persistent about these kinds of things!), but there will be volunteers from many high schools all across the Bay Area present. It's an awesome opportunity to make some new friends!

We can't make any guarantees about the end time though, so don't make any plans for before 9:30PM on the 11th - just in case!

Some of you may be not be familiar with the parade, so here's a brief description (it's aimed at tourists!):

Named one of the world's top ten parades, Chinese New Year Parade in San Francisco is the largest celebration of its kind outside of Asia. Over 100 units will participate in the parade, many of the floats and specialty units will feature the theme of this year's Chinese zodiac sign. Nowhere in the world will you see a lunar new year parade with more gorgeous floats, elaborate costumes, ferocious lions, and exploding firecrackers. Some of the parade highlights include elaborately decorated floats, school marching bands, martial arts group, stilt walkers, lion dancers, Chinese acrobatics, the newly crowned Miss Chinatown USA and the Golden Dragon. The Golden Dragon is over 201 feet long and is always featured at the end of the parade as the grand finale and will be accompanied by over 600,000 firecrackers! The Golden Dragon was made in Foshan, a small town in China. The Foshan dragonmasters formerly made all the costumes for the Cantonese opera, and the Golden Dragon bears many operatic touches, such as the rainbow colored pompoms on its 6 foot-long head. It is festooned from nose to tail with colored lights, decorated with silver rivets on both scaly sides and trimmed in white rabbit fur. The dragon, made on a skeleton of bamboo and rattan, is in 29 segments. It takes a team of 100 men and women to carry the Golden Dragon. This is also considered an honor to be chosen for the grand finale.

While our group will not be carrying the coveted "Golden Dragon," you'll probably get a chance to see all the props featured in the parade up close! If you're lucky, they might even put you on TV! Regardless of whether you'll be making your television debut or not at this event, you'll definitely be noticed by the hordes of locals and tourists alike watching along the parade route. Volunteers will either be on floats, waving to the audience, or walking alongside the floats carrying flags advertising the various sponsors of this event. The parade route can be seen on the image below - follow the arrows on the black lines!
This event is currently worth three event credits, but there is a (very big) possibility that it will be bumped up to four. This is a great opportunity for you to get a big chunk of your FIVE CREDITS done!

The actual amount of time you spend in the parade is miniscule compared to the amount of down time there will be. As you can imagine, parades move at very, very slow speeds. There are often performances (like special dances, etc.) in the middle of the street, so all the floats stop every few feet for the performers to do their thing. You will most likely spend a majority of the time waiting for your turn to enter the parade. In the meantime, you'll get to watch the parade from its starting point - while all the performances are still fresh! I would highly suggest you get a few of your friends to volunteer with you at this event because you guys will have a lot of time to hang out and chat together while you wait. You can earn almost all the credits you need and catch up with your buddies at the same time! It's an awesome opportunity.

If you're volunteering for the parade, you cannot sign up for the Saturday PM shift for the Community Fair! Sorry, but the events overlap too much.

We're teaming up with Chinese Club for this event once again. (Don't we make a great team?! :D) You may not receive double credit for volunteering at the parade, but if you would like to split the credits (two for CC and one for MAD, for example), please contact me personally and we'll see what we can work out.

Alos, please don't hesitate contact me with any additional questions - I'll be glad to answer them!

I hope to see you all at the parade! It'll be a blast.