Darling Harbor will be full of kites this weekend

The normally calm waters of Darling Harbor are transformed into a rocky sea as more than 200 dragon boats come to life for this weekend’s annual water race as Sydney continues to celebrate the Lunar New Year.

More than 4000 paddlers will take part in races starting at 8:30am on Saturday in what participants say is the most culturally inclusive event on the Australian calendar.

At an opening ceremony Friday night, traditional land and water owners greeted the land with a welcome salute, which was met by dragon boats entering under the Pyrmont Bridge.

“The cultural foundations of dragon boat racing are about the preservation of life,” said Gavin Mitford, the creative director of the ceremony. “It is indeed a beautiful and powerful meeting of cultures where our traditional owners [meet the dragon boats].”

The Dragon Boat Festival, called Duanwu Jie in Mandarin and Tuen Ng in Cantonese, takes place on the fifth day of the fifth month of the lunar year, which is June this year.

But considering Australia’s varied climatic conditions, the traditional Chinese water sport has established a reputation as a key event in the Lunar New Year celebrations that began last week.

Evidence suggests the activity existed more than 2000 years ago, but not as a sport: a key explanation is that it was a spiritual ritual linked to the appeasement of rain gods (although there are many different origin stories). But China’s Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and ’70s pushed it out of the public spotlight as authorities treated it as an antiquated, pagan festival that had no place in a secular society.

Its return during British rule over Hong Kong marked its transformation into a modern, global sporting phenomenon that carries its proud cultural traditions around the world.