Flushing this week hosted the big-time festivities for Chinese Lunar New Year, but “Brooklyn’s Chinatown” saw some action, too. On Eighth Avenue last Monday to have a bowl of new-year’s noodles (long noodles=long life), I happened upon a miniature dragon parade Lion Dancers parade, put on by a group of young people associated with the Freemasons. These snakey, multi-legged creatures are a staple of the Lunar New Year’s parades–dragons have a long symbolic history in China, and are considered auspicious. Dragon’s are indeed auspicious, but as Frank pointed out below, these are lion dancers. As always, thanks to readers for keeping SP Chron on the straight and factual.

2010 is the year of the Tiger. If you’re a Tiger (born in 1914, 1926, 1938, 1950, 1962, 1974, 1986, 1998 or 2010) you are kind, given to deep thinking, sympathetic and, apparently, a bit hot-tempered. For those among us not born under the sign of the “dynamic and powerful” big cat, which is usually associated with big changes and social disorder, “2010 is likely to be a turbulent year—on both a global and a personal level,” (this according to Yahoo!, mind you, which also offers tips for navigating this years’ ups and downs).

I hadn’t gone to Eighth Ave expecting to take photos so the images are rather b-grade, but I thought it worth a post regardless. Do you have New Year’s images from around town? Pass them along to sunsetparkchron@gmail.com. For a look at some truly stunning images of China ringing in the New Year, check out the Boston Globe.

For something closer to home, here’s a short video:

I had heard tell of this earlier in the week, but a reader pointed out the coverage this morning. You can below watch the My Fox New York interview with Rittenberry and McGraw. The Post picked it up today as well:

Lance McGraw was on his way to work Thursday when the 23-year-old found a mission to test his mettle: a faint woman fell onto the tracks before an oncoming N-train at the Eighth Avenue station in Sunset Park–McGraw leaped to the rescue.

Waiting for the morning train at 8:30am, Parsons student Rosie Rittenberry began to feel faint. She suddenly fainted and tumbled onto the tracks. McGraw dropped his backpack and jumped in after her, lifting the 18-year-old, still unconscious, back onto the platform.

“It was a life-or-death situation,” Rittenberry told the Post. “This could have turned out much, much worse.”

After the horrific train accident that severed the leg of 16-year-old man earlier this week, it is good to hear a happy ending, and that old-fashioned heroism is not dead.