The Dragon's Head Blog

The International Center Florida hosted 230 participants for lunch and a tour of the facilities on April 14th. Members of the Dunedin Branch were very busy in preparation for participants from all over the Tampa Bay area coming to Dunedin Thursday morning. Upon arriving, participants walked the grounds outside of the construction fence around buildings A […]

A group of 16 seniors came together in Tauranga, New Zealand on Monday April 4, for the first seniors’ workshop to be held in New Zealand. After the participants worked on the foundations in the morning, with particular emphasis on danyus, the group left the clubrooms for a visit to the historic Elms Gardens the […]

8 April 2016, Rijswijk.  For the third time, the seniors committee in The Netherlands organized an intensive spiced with an afternoon delight of playing traditional Dutch games.  Thirty-six members represented the cities of Helmond, Delft, Rijswijk, Voorschoten, Rotterdam, Dordrecht, Weert, Haarlem, Limburg and Chiltern (Great Britain)! Before the start of the program, one member asked, what […]

To ring in the Year of the Fire Monkey, the Tristate Branch (comprising New York City, New Jersey and Connecticut) held its annual Chinese New Year Banquet, Auction and Raffle on Sunday, March 6. Having outgrown the James Beard House, the historic culinary center where we have held banquets in years past, we ventured farther […]

Members and special guests in Brisbane, Queensland (Australia), celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Brisbane branch at a dinner on March 10, 2016. We were pleased to be joined by special guests Mr. Duncan Pegg MP, member for Stretton and representing the Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk; Councillor Vicki Howard from Central Ward of the City […]

The Ottawa branch hosted its first annual Chili Cook-Off on Saturday, February 27th.  Posters announced the event approximately six weeks beforehand.  A friendly competition developed between the seventeen Ottawa branch locations as the day drew near.  The afternoon went smoothly thanks to members of the branch Seniors’ Committee, who oversaw organizing the cook-off. Upon arriving, each participant […]

Our generous maple trees, fully tapped and connected to a grand evaporator setup, have been giving their precious sap for a couple of days now! Immediate help is needed daily to collect firewood and to process the sap into the delicious syrup we have enjoyed for the past two years. In this beautiful spring weather, […]

The Portland Oregon Branch held its annual Chinese New Year Reception and Banquet on February 27th Approximately 200 participants and guests came together to celebrate and to welcome honored guests, Aide to US Senator Ron Wyden, State Representative Lew Fredrick, and VA Recreational Therapist Nancy McFarland who is helping us make Taoist Tai Chi available to […]

The evening of February 13th, 2016 saw over 60 Surrey, British Columbia participants and their families celebrate the arrival of the Year of the Fire Monkey with a pot-luck dinner. In addition to a wonderful meal, attendees were entertained by singer, magician, clown, and balloon maker extraordinaire Mr. Bubbles (incarnated by a local participant).  They […]

The Western Region celebrated Chinese New Year on the 6th of February at their centre in Newport. The day started with chanting followed by the usual housecleaning and then preparing of food and decorating tables for the evening. This was followed by the practice of Taoist Tai Chi® arts in the afternoon. Members were treated to beef, salmon, […]

On February 5, 2016 the Calgary branch hosted a sold-out crowd of 120 people to celebrate the Chinese New Year of the Monkey. Guests were treated to snacks and beverages as they arrived. A lion dance performed by members of the Kugekai Lion Dance Team welcomed in the new year. A delicious ten-course Chinese banquet […]

The Southern Interior Branch of the Pacific Region is holding our annual Chinese New Year workshop at our Vernon, British Columbia location.  We are planning an Asian themed dinner for Saturday night and we wanted to include spring rolls.  Rather than just make enough for the workshop we decided to make a whole bunch more.  […]

Nos meilleurs vœux de bonheur et de prospérité pour la nouvelle année de la part des participants de la section de l’Estrie, dans la Région de l’Est, au Canada. Sur les 100 portions cuisinées, 20  ont été envoyées aux repas bienfaisants, 66 ont été servies. Les surplus des biscuits – préparés par les participants ont […]

The International Center Florida held its first Senior Trip to the Duncan McClellan Glass Gallery and Hot Shop on January 6, 2016. The Duncan McClellan Gallery, located in St. Petersberg Florida, features rotating exhibitions showcasing nationally and internationally recognized glass artists. With 3,000 square feet of gallery spaces and 5,000 square feet of outdoor courtyards, the […]

Inspired by the Dunedin Center’s dragon bike rack, James Mallory, working on Fenway’s construction, built a Rocking Dragon from wood reused from the Fenway and donated it to the Branch.  This was raffled as a fundraiser at Tai Chi Week in November and won by Steve Shaya of Dunedin.  He shipped it to Santa who […]

At a warm December evening, a week before the Christmas Eve, the door of our society house in Wroclaw were still been open towards the influx of following members. That is just tradition of common celebrate of Christmas at our beautiful centre, which at such moments gives to us special warmth. Everybody has taken the […]

The 8:00 am class took responsibility to plan a holiday party at the Sarasota, FL branch.  Afraid it would be difficult to lure people out of their comfortable homes during the holiday break, the class decided to do something different.  With Branch Council support, and a bit of skepticism – the idea was put into […]

    It started with a good idea. We bought a lot of white socks, started knitting and collected some other things. We then invited the participants of the Haarlem location to come on Thursday afternoons to make a family of snowmen. We had a lot of fun making them while Christmas music was playing […]

Participants from across the Atlantic Region assembled at the regional centre in Halifax on December 5, the weekend scheduled for the holiday season program. We practiced and learned together Taoist Tai Chi® arts throughout the day.  In the evening the participants were joined by their guests to enjoy a wonderful ten-course banquet. Our dynamic emcee […]

On Friday evening at the European Centre in Colchester the weekend’s activities began with chanting the “Ten Thousand Bhuddas” sutra for the Autumn Moon Festival. This was followed on Saturday morning with over a hundred participants taking part in our last intensive of the year. Everyone joined in with the karaoke dan-yus singing “Jingle Bells” […]