who may not be as capable in under serving come back and give [music] ♪♪[drumming] [music]

[drumming] [music] [drumming

music] miyamoto [drumming] [mus]

... ...

>> good evening. what a spirited lion dance to kickoff tonight. thank you to lion dance me and the high school students. thank you for the chinese association every year. and before the lion dance you might have heard master wong, entering the city hall. is also a beautiful chinese instrument and we are happy to have david wong and line dance to kickoff our celebration. get them a round of applause. now i like to say a few word in

chinese. [speaking chinese] [applause] good evening i'm claudine chang pedestrian heritage foundation the heritage month in may is our priority, throughout the years we always look for know opportunity and special occasions where communities are coming together. and this evening is one of those occasions. at the beginning of this year, we are all so very excited welcome the now year. this january is spchl we have 2 new years to celebrate aside

from the regular january first, lunar new year is early this year. we would be excited 2 bragzs throughout the whole among. however, before long, we found ourselves saddened by one tragic news after another. whether the loss of life from monterey park to half moon bay and more recently in memphis. it did in the matter had the victims were the color of their skins there was loss of life approximate affected all of us. >> we pause during the lunar new year celebrations to pay tribute to the victims to remember all those who lost loved ones. we pause to think about what can we do as a community, as a city,

as a state, as a country; to address all the issues that surfaced in the first 20 days of the new year. and we paused to think about heeling how we can better come together. it irrelevant has been a very sombering 2 weeks. however, we are here tonight and together tonight because i believe all feel we must carry on. we must carry on and celebrate as a community. i remember the first day of lunar now year where we were chinese of chamber's event, and there was the day after the tragedy in monterey park took place. i vivid low remember mayor breed's words reflecting am the tragedy and our mayor said, this is the time the community should get together.

this is i time where we need to treat each other with mercy, with kindness and love. mercy, kindness and love. that is the spirit of this evening's celebration, we thank the mayor and the city officials are bringing us here and without further adue, welcome mayor london breed. [applause]. >> good evening, everyone. i must say, that it feels so good to be here. and it feel it is good to be here because not only do we have a packed house but we have so many people from so many different places around san francisco, around the bay area and around the world. i want to start by thanking

claudine chang for her words and reminding us of challenge this is persist in our country. but also highlighting how we continue to come together. we continue to come together to support andup lift one another in san francisco because we know that although the tragedies have occurred and although we know that there was losdz of life and sadness. we also recognize the significant cans of the resiliencey of the various communities who have been faced with various changes. i applaud our diversity and strength and how we come together and celebrate lieutenant area new year today in city hall. we celebrate black history month on friday in city hall. come together toup lift one another, that is a part of why

san francisco is so spchl i want to thank claudine for her work and bringing a community together and thank my cohosts for the celebration. including people you will hear from later carmen chew. our city attorney daved chui. our public defender. our sheriff paul miyamoto and connie chan, thank you to leaders for being hosts tonight to celebrate ap i heritage in san francisco through lunar new year. [applause] >> now i know upon it is the year of the rabbit, which represents kindness and mercy. and my hope is had as we celebrate the year of the rabbit and for those who are in our vietnamese community the year of the cat, we remember the trait

and how we work together and how we do things here in the city and county of san francisco. when you talk about togetherness i want to take this opportunity to appreciate our chief of protocol mir miriam and the council core people who represent the world including our counsel general from china the philippines, japan and singapore being, indonesia and korea can you stand. thank you for your work and partnership in san francisco. san francisco has amazing sister staechs i want to acknowledge those manila and seoul can you please, stands the chairs of our sister city committees.

mrauz so many amazing people who care about the community located in various parts of san francisco but how they connect to the rest of the world. san francisco and our asian community has a rich history. the so ma with the filipino community. japantown a known japantown. or events we celebrate in china town and especially our lunar new year parade. san francisco brought together the communities and traditions over the years to make sure we never forget the tradition and huwe celebrate and support one another. i want to thank all of you and appreciate the chinese association. the chinese chamber and the various members of our asian communities who show up and to

celebrate and come together during the challenging times. as well as our elected lead and department head and officials. tonight, it it is irrelevant a celebration. and it started with lion dance me. because the challenges of the world what we are not -- what we should not do is allow it to dampen our spirits. to dampen our opportunity to celebrate. to come together. and to uplift. tonight you will see various performances from a number of people. you will have various uplifting speeches. you will see elected officials what it boils down to is the despite our difference, we still come together to celebrate one another and culture and history and togetherness. on behalf of the city and county of san francisco, thank you all for being here and i want to take one quick opportunity

carmen chu will acknowledge the elected leaders later on today. i wanted congratulate and thank our treasurer fiona ma for the state of california. thank you for your service and the work you do and for joining us tonight. and thank you, everyone for being here to celebrate. [applause]. >> all right. i do have another responsibility today. again i want to thank everyone for being here and at this time to complete the program and introduce our various elected leaders and officials is -- oh . i thought you said introduce carmen chu. >> at this time according to

claudine i am going to ask the members of the councillor corps to come forward so we can take a photo with me and other elected officials part of our host committee. thank you.

>> thank you, mayor breed and members of the councillor core. notice a very special performance for you from the students from gordon jay lou elementary. let's go golden jay lou! [applause]... ...

... [music] [music] ♪♪[applause]

[applause] another round for gordon jlau elementary school!

[applause] i don't know about you, we are sitting there i was next to our city attorney and threatening he will do a routine. a dance routine. i can't wait until he puts on bunny ear and does hopping around. we are waiting for this, david. hello i'm carmen chu and i'm pleased to be here today. seems like the celebration grows skoal many people are here. feels like we are multiplying like rabbits! that will be the only joke i will tell. i do want to a very happy new year to everybody here. it has been a challenging time as many of you know the past few week and seen this in communities. and really the reason why events like this are so important and why i thank our mayor london breed for hosting the heritage event and making sure that she

brings us together is it is know tounlt for us to recognize the diversity in our city and how special that makes san francisco. thank mayor breed and all of the folk who is helped to coordinate this. claudine chang we could not do this without her help. lion dance me and other when is came together for this. i want to say, happy new year to everybody. [speaking chinese] [applause] i will recognize some wonderful guest hos share their time with us today. before i do that i want to invite my cohost to come up, of course we brought our city attorney we want to hear from our sheriff paul miyamoto.

public defend are mano raju and connie chan, please, come on up. >> happy new year, everybody! so, i am the audience i think of that -- san francisco we often have said we are truly the asian-american capitol of our country. this is an event that show cases it as we do every year. i want to thank you for being part of the incredible per of our culture, history and our community of activism. and it it is true during this lunar new year season, this has been a challenging time. but as our mayor said and city add administrator said, in the year of the rabbit this is i

time where we will leap xup stands for peace and prosperity and moving on to hopism thank you for that. the last thing i say is carmen did mention we were ways persian gulf as the performances were happening i want to say, that i heard a recent joke about lounar new year that only in san francisco could the following people walk in a bar. the japanese-american sheriff, the indian public defender. your chinese city attorney and our chinese elected officials because represent the world. i will tell thank you next year mano raju and sheriff are dawn what costumes to dance with the kids. i'm committing that now. if my fellow electives will join he. i will turn it over to

supervisor connie chan wrochl it is grit to be here. i'm honored to be one of the 2 members of the board of supervisors representing the chinese-american and ap i community. i obviously am one sdpt the other is chinese supervisor representing china town, aaron peskin board president. and we are so glad to be be all of you here today and honor to be part of this effect. i must say i had the honor and privilege this last thursday to visit the white house where president biden hosted the pifrpt historic lunar new year celebration at the white house. i'm grateful to represent all of you. to join that event. i have to say, madam mayor you should be very proud.

i say that united states, we, in city hall of san francisco; have a glorious dome, better lion dance and better community gathering in this place and should all be proud about that. better than the white house i'm a witness to that. >> in awe seriousness, i am grateful to see that you know, having our mayor, having our colleagues here together, just bringing everyone together beyond the ap i community bum the communities of color come together to celebrate each other. and to thank our foreign partners from over access the asian communities joining the asian-american communities in san francisco and the bay area to come together at the end of the day, we say that this it is our culture together that we want to celebrate together. thank you for joining us and i'm

honored to be with you here today. thank you and here is our sheriff, paul miyamoto. >> good evening. everyone i'm -- very happy to be here. this is a celebration for the lunar new year, year of the rabbit. i want to point out i was called out to wear rabbit years for next year. every year when we have the parade the lunar new year parade i make it a point to perform and participate with the lion dance team and carry a dragon head i challenge to you come with me on the parade route and take part in our lion dance team. which represents sfpd, sheriff, different law enforcement agencies. i want to take a mobile home when we speak about the lunar new year of the rabbit,

signifying kindness, patience and responsibility is our responsibility in law enforcement to keep people safe. and as mentioned by the mayor and others, we stand here in celebration during a time with mixed emotions as we celebrate together and truly together we do this. there have been instances which affect us together. hate and instances of transgender deal and i want to make sure we reassure everyone, public safety the police department and sheriff's office; we are as frustrated with the behaviors we have seen. i want to reassure all of you in the communities that we are one here with everyone. our responsibility to protect people and defend people against dang and harm. our responsibility this is we don't take lightly and hope to hold and perform with high standardses of integrity and he

honor. have you that come myself, chief scott and awful us in law enforcement in san francisco and stand with you in sharing the pain we saw together. we stands with you in keeping us all safe in celebration as we move forward tonight and the days to come and protect everyone in san francisco. thank you. [applause] one of our partners in the justice system and public safety and public defender mano raju. >> thank you. sheriff, happy new year. you know as a defense attorney the thing i think about is often timeless the best defense is good offense when we whispered the city attorney you got called out by our city add administrator and of course hearing that, city attorney got here first and called us out

observe we got a chance to responded. you know -- my first legal internship in san francisco was at the asian caucus in the civil right's division we worked on bringing together communities and rounds tables to facilitate collective understanding. last weekend, i was at the beautiful event in the bayview y, which was celebrating lunar new year and african-american history month. and black history month. when is caused me to think about even though i know with the events a lot of communities are going through trauma and a lot of the trauma is upon generational, we also in this country and the city have a tremendous amount of inter~ generational resilience. events like this and last saturday are that kind of

demonstrate that. every time i come to city events like this and see that i'm reminded of the resilience and the beauty in the city and excited celebrate this new year with all of you so thank you so much. [applause]. thank you very much to everyone. i will ask them to stay up i like to invite all of our elected officials to come up and i will say your name come up. as i mention you. our treasurer of the state fiona ma. >> bill ching. jose cisneros. brook jenkins. nancy pelosi. gavin newsome and supervisor aaron pes pechls supervisor mandelman. supervisor walton. supervisor engardio.

supervisor dorse. gent lamb, a lita fisher. lisa weissman ward. have i got everybody? recorder joaquin torres. now college trustees come on up. now you are probably wondering my goodness are all of the folks going to say something. what can they say? but we are not going to do that we will do a big group picture and group chant. okay. all of you electives up here say, our greetings can you say [speak chinese] that was not good enough, louder. [speaking chinese]. carmen is the best.

kidding happy new year, everybody! [applause] [applause] >> now a very special treat for you.

our dancer from indonesia, it will be a special treat. [music] [music]

>> let's give i round of applause. thank you for this performance. every year we are trying to feature different performance. if you are interested to participate next year let us know. >> and now -- um -- we have a couple of community speakers with us. representatives from the chinese consolidated organization and representatives from the chinese chamber of commerce. please, join me.

together they are over 2 huh human years old the longest standing organizations in san francisco china town. and we like to invite the presiding president of the chinese benest lan association president to give you new year greetings. [speaking chinese]. [applause] [speaking chinese].

thank you and next we have the president of chinese chamber of commerce. [speak chinese]

>> thank you. [speak chinese] madam mayor. thank you for hosting this event. every year. every year is better and bigger. congratulations. and member representatives of asian-american from asia, thank you for being her to celebrate lounar new year with us. greetings. emyear of the rabbit or cat for you many blessings. at the chinese chamber of commerce set brills now year we reminded of the tragedy in monterey park and i'm sorry. in half moon bay. asian communities throughout the state. again condolences to the victim

families, may they be comforted and find peace. i will go back to history of the choin ease new year parade in the 1860s chinese american started lunar new year to show case our traditional and our people and the culture against a challenging back drop. fast forward it today we as a community are facing challenges. most reasonable antiasian hate and the challenges recovering from the pandemic. from this humble beginning the parade is the largest event in the region and the biggest chinese new year parade outside of asia. it is part of upon also part of the asian-american community parade. it is part of the fabric of the

city. and asian-american in san francisco pride. this celebration is the most significant economic evenly for china town bringing a third of the annual ref now to china town. also to the surrounding neighborhoods. with the opening the central subway we are hopeful that more people will attend the parade through the new subway stations and more individualors throughout the year. this year i'm happy to announce that -- coming saturday this weekend we have in the street fair 100 vendors and in the parade we have over 120 units 26 of them will be sold. 5 will be community and this year we have more community than ever before.

finally, mayor, i am and law enforcement chief -- sheriff, thank you for very encouraging word about additional security for the upcoming winninged parade. thank you, mayor, thank you. [applause]. >> we are not following this we are getting out of the script a bill madam mayor would you like to join us we have a special presentation and like to invite the volunteers that have participate al perez the produces the show. and commissioner al perez. thomas li. and kevin chan, please, join us. mayor. new year -- [inaudible].

[applause] make surety city is

blessed with good fortunes the know grand final welcome back sing here for us before. floora will sing 2 songs to sends us off and here she is. [applause]. hi. everyone. how is everyone doing? doing good? i like to wish everyone happy

new year. i'm grateful to be here at the mayor's lounar new year celebration. it is my honor to sing for you tonight. because it is the new year i want to share with you a chinese song called [speaking chinese] music, please. [music] [singing] clap your

hands. there we go! [music] [singing] thank you.

everyone having a good night? time to have a dance move am here are you ready to dance! yea. i would love for you all to stand if you may. and let's get this dance party started. this it is i want to dance with somebody. here we go.

of [music] [singing] [music]

[singing] thank you.

everyone. happy chinese new year. thank you so much! thank you for coming i hope you have the best time on your way out pick up your own fortune cookie! happy new year, thank you, everyone!

>> i am iris long. we are a family business that started in san francisco chinatown by my parents who started the business in the mid 1980s. today we follow the same

footsteps of my parents. we source the teas by the harvest season and style of crafting and the specific variety. we specialize in premium tea. today i still visit many of the farms we work with multigenerational farms that produce premium teas with its own natural flavors. it is very much like grapes for wine. what we do is more specialized, but it is more natural. growing up in san francisco i used to come and help my parents after school whether in middle school or high school and throughout college. i went to san francisco state university. i did stay home and i helped my parents work throughout the summers to learn what it is that makes our community so special.

after graduating i worked for an investment bank in hong kong for a few years before returning when my dad said he was retiring. he passed away a few years ago. after taking over the business we made this a little more accessible for visitors as well as residents of san francisco to visit. many of our teas were traditionally labeled only in chinese for the older generation. today of our tea drinkkers are quite young. it is easy to look on the website to view all of our products and fun to come in and look at the different varieties. they are able to explore what we source, premium teas from the

providence and the delicious flavors. san francisco is a beautiful city to me as well as many of the residents and businesses here in chinatown. it is great for tourists to visit apsee how our community thrived through the years. this retail location is open daily. we have minimal hours because of our small team during covid. we do welcome visitors to come in and browse through our products. also, visit us online. we have minimal hours. it is nice to set up viewings of these products it.

>> shop & dine in the 49 promotes local businesses and challenges resident to do their shop & dine in the 49 within the 49 square miles of san francisco by supporting local services in the neighborhood we help san francisco remain unique successful and vibrant so we're will you shop & dine in the 49 chinatown has to be one the best

unique shopping areas in san francisco that is color fulfill and safe each vegetation and seafood and find everything in chinatown the walk shop in chinatown welcome to jason dessert i'm the fifth generation of candy in san francisco still that serves 2000 district in the chinatown in the past it was the tradition and my family was the royal chef in the pot pals that's why we learned this stuff and moved from here to have dragon candy i want people to know that is art we will explain a walk and they can't walk in and out it is different techniques from stir

frying to smoking to steaming and they do show of. >> beer a royalty for the age berry up to now not people know that especially the toughest they think this is - i really appreciate they love this art. >> from the cantonese to the hypomania and we have hot pots we have all of the cuisines of china in our chinatown you don't have to go far. >> small business is important to our neighborhood because if we really make a lot of people lives better more people get a job here not just a big firm. >> you don't have to go anywhere else we have pocketed of great neighborhoods haul have all have their own uniqueness. >> san francisco has to all

>> welcome everyone. thank you so much for joining me today. the round table discussion. i actually have background in youth work. worked in china town before