CRI听力:SantaCon 2013 - Bringing the Spirit of Christmas to HK

Partygoers on a commuter ferry in Hong Kong. It's the middle of the afternoon and most passengers are wearing red robes and fake white beards. This is SantaCon. It's an event with a simple aim: dress up as Father Christmas with hundreds - sometimes thousands - of others visiting several pubs on the way.

"When I'm not dressed as Rudolf - or a Santa horse, as I've been called - I work in finance."

This gentleman from Wales is dressed as a reindeer, with the name Rudolf written across his chest.

"It's fantastic to be out all day with everyone in a festive mood when everyone's very happy. I think the main attraction of being in fancy dress comes down primarily to the fact everyone loses any sort of pretentiousness or any self-consciousness." Organisers join the partygoers on the tour to make sure no one loses their way.

"My name's Alice, I work for Flight Centre in Hong Kong". Alice is wearing a short green and red dress with green striped stockings and a pointed hat with bells on.

"I think I'm one of Santa's little helpers - or an elf, something like that!"

"I think it's the community, all of the ex-pats getting together and being merry, celebrating Christmas and meeting new people, supporting each other in this crazy world of Hong Kong."

As hundreds of Santas swarm through the centre of Hong Kong, tourists ask for pictures and others are simply bemused. "I was just wondering what's happening. Santa normally brings presents for Christmas, but here I hear they're walking around going to pubs, which is a new thing."

The first stop for this group is a bar in Kowloon. It's here I meet two of the organisers of this year's event Andrew Rizkala and Mike Ronzio.

"SantaCon is... I'd rather talk about what SantaCon is not. It isn't charitable. It doesn't make any sense."

"It's nonsensical, nondenominational."

"It's definitely not denominational."

"It's a great celebration of the season."

"It started in San Francisco; the biggest one in the world is in New York where about 30,000 people participate."

"It levels the playing field. Hong Kong's a very competitive city. "

"It gives a chance for everyone to come together."

"Everyone's having a good time."

"We put the class differences aside, which is what's really important."

"It's the third year we've organised this. It gets better every year. "

"Basically, we just want to go out there and we're happy when people see us and wonder what the hell is going on. But then they laugh and it's all worthwhile. "

For CRI, this is Dominic.