Fireworks

It's the Chinese New Year!!!photo borrowed from www.dreamstime.com which is a stock photo website

The Chinese invented fireworks and have spent the past thousand years determining the proper way to demonstrate their love for this invention. They have settled on writing their love across the sky in vibrant yellow, green, pink, red, blue, and white explosions. During the New Year is the best time to do this, but people get excited about the Lunar New Year the same way retailers the US get excited about Christmas and start their celebrations a couple months ahead of time. They build into fury of explosions to celebrate their joy, very similar to the way Americans express their love of the season through advertising campaigns blowing their savings on useless crap.

The effect of this exuberance is that the night sky of all the cities I have visited during the New Year, Tianjin and Beijing, are nearly constantly filled with fireworks. The day time is filled with soon-to-be-swept piles of red firework debris with black craters in the middle.

Upon seeing this amazing display, as an Eagle Scout, my thoughts quickly turn to safety. Thus, I have written up my recommendation of safety guidelines.

Chinese Fireworks Safety Guidelines:

If you are worried about disturbing your neighbors, notify them that you plan to light fireworks by making a gigantic, booming noise and setting off a few car alarms.

Light your fireworks at least 6 feet away from any buildings or power lines, or less if necessary.

Be considerate of others sleeping schedules, and try to leave a 20 minutes gap around dinnertime every 24 hours

Do not let anyone under 3 years of age light any fireworks.

Do not leave a firework packaging debris pile burning unattended for more than 40 minutes before using a broom made of kindling to put it out.

Should your rockets launch into a nearby fruit stand, laugh it off as though having heavy explosives launched at your person and business is no big deal. If that does not work, run.

If you tire of blowing things up and need a nap, leave China because you are not going to get any sleep there.

Try to light your fireworks in an un-crowded area. If you happen to be in China, just give up on this guideline, you’re never more than arms reach from twelve people.