Year of the Ox
The Ox is the sign of the virtue of fortitude. Men and women born in the year of the Ox tend to be logical, intelligent and patient. They are positive and caring people, who believe that hard work is the righteous path to make one’s way through life, and are rarely driven by greed.
This should have nothing to do with OTB.
But, every twelve years, this year included, they become inextricably linked, inseparable. Today began the first of fifteen days of celebration for the Chinese New Year. And the Chinese love to gamble.
This isn’t racist. Well, maybe it is, but it’s not Michael Richards racist. The customers of OTB come from every race, and maybe there’s just a lot of Chinese because there’s a lot of Chinese people in general. A good chunk of the workforce, my co-workers, are Chinese-American as well. So when the New Year rings in, OTB likes to party. It’s arguably the biggest holiday of our calendar, beating out Christmas and rivaling only the Triple Crown races. They go all out in some branches—the ones in Chinatown, obviously, but a few others in Brooklyn and Queens where the Asian population is strong. Decorations and lights on the walls, oranges and candy in each window for good luck. The company even sets aside a little money to give to customers and employees, in the traditional red envelopes, so the new year starts right. (Apparently I’m worth two-dollars of luck, I didn’t earn a fifty-dollar envelope. I think I can’t make the luck last ‘til at least August, though, if I’m careful.) It kind of feels like a bar-mitzvah, with any chair-lifting being purely coincidental.
Today I was fortunate enough to work in Chatham Square, the heart of Chinatown and the center of OTB’s celebration. I was part of a bonus staff to handle the surplus of customers. The mood was very upbeat, even among most of the customers (both their surplus and smiles probably had a little to do with the red envelopes.) Even the racing programs were free. We had gourmet Chinese food in the back which I’m afraid to admit I wasn’t brave enough to eat. I did chow down way too many little Chinese candies, though, some fruity-butterscotchy things, that ended up setting some firecrackers of their own off in my stomach.
We had plenty of guests going in and out all day, too. Retired employees, workers from other branches, executives from uptown, even some little kids and grandkids. The JBC even dressed up in a snazzy shirt and vest, which, while looking great in it, probably regretted the decision once he got down to scrubbing the urinals.
It’s the closest an OTB branch comes to being an official community center— I noticed some people weren’t even there to bet, they were just there to share in the fun. By far, the highlight of the day were the dragon visits. You’ve all seen them, the paper-mache or whatever dragons with oversized heads and being controlled by one or a few or several people under them. Throughout the day they’d veer off the parade path and come right into the branch, making laps and then dancing to live drumbeats in the middle of the room, between the TVs and the odds charts and the customers—usually, a dangerous place to be. No one seemed to care, though. For once, the races weren’t top priority. They were co-top priority. Customers joined in with some managers and some of us clerks in rubbing the dragons’ heads for good luck. I wanted to post some cell phone video I took but I’m an idiot and I have zero clue how to get anything on my computer. Bluetooth, maybe? That’s a thing, right? Am I saying that right? Bluetooth?
A great celebration, sure, but not a miracle. Many parts of the day were exactly the same as any other. Machines broke. Some customers were still dicks. Others were completely oblivious to there even being a holiday, seemingly indifferent to the giant multicolored dragon cutting in front of the line. (In their defense, on any given day, there could be a lot weirder shit going down.) But for the most part, it was a momentary break from the mundane and downright misery of working a real job and not a dream job to pay the bills. It’s refreshing and even a little jarring to see an OTB branch become a positive, joyous room. OTB employees will enjoy every minute of New Year’s they can, because the rest of the year—whether it’s Ox or Tiger or Boar or Rat—is probably going to suck.
