end of Chinese New Year

Last day of the Spring Festival holiday, but decorations like these will stay up for a while. No idea what any of the characters say- most of the decorations just say '?', which means fortune.

The evening was marked by hundreds of firecrackers and fireworks and a few paper lanterns- the fireworks have to be loud to scare away the evil spirits for the new year, but I'd be lying if I said I was missing them...