By Jean Sorensen

Vancouver has a love affair with lions, not just because of the Lions Gate Bridge and the B.C. Lions Grey Cup champions, but also because the lion dance has become a cultural mainstay of many Chinese festivals within the city’s large Asian community. 

Now Royal Pacific Realty, with three offices (Kingsway, Oakridge and Richmond) believes it is the first real estate organization in Canada to start its own lion dance team made up of Realtors.

“We had more people want to join than we needed, so we had to cut it off (at 20),” says Ed Fung, vice-president/development for Royal Pacific Realty. A waiting list now exists. Only 13 to14 people are needed for the firm’s lion dance demonstration, which consists of two lions, plus individuals playing musical instruments such as the gong, drum and cymbal that paces the lion as the teams dance. The lion dance is often confused with the dragon dance. However, the lion has only two people in the costume with one as the head and the other as the tail. The faces of the two dancers are mostly hidden. The dragon can take many individuals and usually the head is on a pole so that the lead dancer’s face is seen.

The lion dance is most familiar at Chinese New Year as it prances throughout the commercial sector in Vancouver in search of the green lettuce that shopkeepers place outside their doors. The lettuce symbolizes money and the lion snatches the lettuce to signify good luck and prosperity for the new year. At one time the lion dancers were senior martial artists who came from kung-fu organizations. Lettuce was placed up high and the acrobatics used to reach the lettuce was part of the show. Today’s dance is more moderate, although kung fu clubs are still the guardians of the event.    

The lion dance is also performed at special events such as weddings, house warmings, shop openings, or, as Fung says, when the B.C. premier attended a banquet to mark the launch of a trade mission to China. “It brings good luck to the shop or good luck to the home,” he says. 

Fung became interested in the lion dance about l0 to 15 years ago when two lions came to a party and demonstrated. “I want to do that,” said Fung, but he didn’t get the chance until much later. Last year he went to Vancouver’s Chinatown and amongst the hustle and bustle of this vibrant commercial area, with its fresh produce sidewalk stands, dim-sum shops, barbecued meat hanging in windows and herbal shops, he found several kung-fu clubs that taught the dance routine. 

He was queried about whether he would be able to dance, as carrying the heavy lions can be taxing during a dance or parade. Most of the dancers in these teams are younger individuals and Fung was 55-years-old. But he was determined and over the last half-year has studied the lion dance.

One might wonder why it takes so long to learn to carry a lion’s head or wear a tail. There is detailed choreographed motion that goes with the lion’s dance as he approaches a store or house. “When you watch the basic routine, you often see the lion is bowing in three directions,” Fung says. During the whole process “you have to make the lion like he is alive.” And, just as an animal approaches food or, in this case the lettuce cautiously, the lion moves around it to make sure it is “okay to eat”.  He may taste a bit of the lettuce to test it and if so, he swallows it. The people inside the costume throw it to the crowd as good luck. 

There are also different routines. “If one lion meets another lion or there are three, four or five lions – you have to know how they greet each other,” he says.

Once a week, Fung hires someone from the Chinatown clubs to come to the Kingsway office and train his dancers. He then gives tutorials himself during other weekdays. It’s a way of increasing the skill of the team, but also keeping a cultural dance intact that has its roots in Chinese folk lore that goes back 1,500 years.

While the lion dance is known throughout the Chinese culture, China has never been a natural habitat for lions. Various folk tales say the lion is a compilation of other creatures or the reincarnation of a captured lion that is most often seen as a defender of a village or protector of the people from evil spirits.

Chinese lions come in different colours and sizes. The ornate costumes are made in China, and Fung arranged through a relative to have the costumes sent over.

The Royal Pacific Realty lion team has three lion’s costumes – gold, silver and red. Gold and silver are for prosperity while red is good fortune. Fung has ordered three smaller costumes, as those they have are too heavy for the women to carry over a long distance in a parade. While the head only weighs five pounds, Fung says the art in the dance is that the head must be kept moving like a lion on the prowl. (The team’s legs are often bent and the front legs of the unit are also the lion’s front paws that are lifted.) It is a rigorous workout.

“After 10 minutes, I am sweating like I am in a shower,” he says. “But it is good for your health.”

New costumes can not just be worn but must first go through a ceremony where the eye of the lion is painted, giving the creature sight.

Royal Pacific’s senior vice-president Sing LimYeo, who works out of the Oakridge office and is involved in the fund-raising efforts for the lion dance team, says that Royal Pacific is recognized for contributing to community causes and supporting local projects. By having a lion dance team that can participate in events, it becomes a way “to promote the culture, heritage and also contribute to multi-culturalism.”

Last year, the team celebrated the Kingsway realty office’s 15 anniversary.  Yeo, who has been involved with organizing the Chinese New Year festivities in Chinatown, said it is exciting that this year the Royal Pacific Realty lion team will be part of the parade celebration. “We are also doing a demonstration in one of the elementary schools in January,” he said, adding from there the team plans to reach out to the community and do selected demonstrations for free.