Vancouverites stepped up their Chinese New Year activities on Friday when the Canadian city held its inaugural temple fair in an attempt to make the celebration an annual event.

While the event held at the Chinese Cultural Center in Vancouver's historic Chinatown was much smaller than such famous miao hui (temple fair) as in Beijing's Ditan, it did provide a solid foundation to build on with a host of VIP onlookers in attendance for the launch.

With various stalls serving Chinese specialty foods set up in the courtyard of the cultural center that borders the city's Dr. Sun Yat Sen Classical Chinese Garden, the festivities inside the hall featured a range of products in flowers, steamed dumplings, electronic gadgets, a tourism booth from China's Shandong Province, a federal political party campaigning for support, and even a property developer offering million-dollar houses for sale in oil-rich Alberta province.

Ricky Li Qi, co-organizer of the temple fair, said more than 20 groups were involved in staging the inaugural event, the first of a three-day weekend of activities celebrating the Spring Festival and culminating in the city's annual Chinese New Year parade on Sunday.

Libby Davies, a federal member of parliament representing Vancouver East, an area where Chinatown is in the heart of the riding, said the Chinese New Year celebration had always been very important to her in recognition of the contributions made by the Chinese-Canadian community.

"What I really like is that you get to meet lots of people and you understand how important it is in the Chinese community to celebrate with family, with friends, but with the broader community. So in Vancouver it's a huge event. It's a huge celebration, every year its gets bigger and bigger," she said.

Peter Julian, another member of parliament, impressed those in attendance when he delivered new year greetings in both Mandarin and Cantonese. The federal representative for Burnaby-New Westminster said the Chinese-Canadian community had played an important role in the long-standing ties between Canada and China and their role would ultimately be greater going forward.

"About a third of my riding are of Chinese origin and Chinese-Canadians who contributed incredibly to the growth and development of Canada, so this is a very, very important festival right across the community in (Vancouver's) Lower Mainland," he said.

"We've always had close links with China and I think, undoubtedly, because of the Diaspora, because of Chinese Canadians and because of an increasing interest of non-Chinese Canadians in China, I think the relationship can only get closer. More and more, we are seeing a great desire to further and deepen the links that we have with China."

Kathy Gibler also had strong ties with China from when she lived in Beijing and Shanghai over a period of six years. Now back in Vancouver and working as executive director of Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden, she said the launch of the temple fair was a great idea, which would undoubtedly catch on with a greater population.

"My first introduction (to temple fairs) was when I lived in Beijing. It's always fun there. I used to go to the Ditan miao hui and that was one of the most exciting things that I did. So it is really nice that Chinese New Year, because of our Asian population, has become really, really important," she said.

"I think everybody celebrates Chinese New Year now (in Vancouver). We are a really diverse population of people and we all believe that you can't have too many holidays."

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