Is there a dragon dance?
Dragon dance
During the Han Dynasty, different forms of the dragon dance were described in ancient texts. Rain dance performed at times of drought may involve the use of figures of dragon as Chinese dragon was associated with rain in ancient China, for example the dragon Yinglong was considered a rain deity, and the Shenlong had the power to determine how much wind and rain to bring. According to the Han Dynasty text "Luxuriant Dew of the Spring and Autumn Annals" by Dong Zhongshu, as part of a ritual to appeal for rain, clay figures of the dragons were made and children or adults may then perform a dance. The number of dragons, their length and colour, as well as the performers may vary according to the time of year. Other dances involving dragons may be found in a popular form of entertainment during the Han Dynasty, the "baixi" (百戲) variety shows, where performers called "mime people" (象人) dressed up as various creatures such as beasts, fish and dragons. In his "Lyric Essay on Western Capital" (西京賦) Zhang Heng recorded various performances such as performers who dressed as a green dragon playing a flute, and a fish-dragon act where fish transformed into a dragon. A version of the fish-dragon dance called "fish-dragon extending" (魚龍曼延) was also performed at the Han court to entertain foreign guests – in this dance a mythical beast of Shenli (舍利之獸) transforms into flounder, then to a dragon. These ancient dances however do not resemble modern Dragon Dance in their descriptions, and depictions of dragon dance in Han Dynasty stone relief engravings suggest that the props used may also be cumbersome, unlike modern Dragon Dance where light-weight dragons are manipulated by performers. 
The dragon acts of the Han Dynasty were also mentioned in the Tang and Song Dynasty. Figures similar to the dragon lantern (龍燈) used during Lantern Festival were described in the Song Dynasty work "Dreams of Splendor of the Eastern Capital", where figures of dragon mounted for display were constructed out of grass and cloth and inside which numerous candle lights may be placed. Such dragon lanterns may also be carried and paraded by performers in the street during the Lantern festival at nighttime. A wide variety of dragon dances have developed in various regions in China, for example, the Fenghua Cloth Dragon (奉化布龙) from Zhejiang was made with bamboo frame and covered with cloth, and is said to have been developed in the 1200s. A form of dragon dance from Tongliang County (铜梁龙舞), which originated as snake totem worship, began during the Ming Dynasty and became popular in the Qing Dynasty. In the modern era, the government of People's Republic of China adapted and promoted various traditional folk dances, which contributed to the popularity of the current form of the dragon dance now found widely in China as well as Chinese communities around the world.
Japanese dragon
Japanese dragons (日本の竜 "Nihon no ryū") are diverse legendary creatures in Japanese mythology and folklore. Japanese dragon myths amalgamate native legends with imported stories about dragons from China, Korea and India. The style of the dragon was heavily influenced by the Chinese dragon. Like these other East Asian dragons, most Japanese ones are water deities associated with rainfall and bodies of water, and are typically depicted as large, wingless, serpentine creatures with clawed feet. The modern Japanese language has numerous "dragon" words, including indigenous "Tatsu" from Old Japanese "ta-tu", Sino-Japanese "ryū" or "ryō" from Chinese , "nāga" ナーガ from Sanskrit "nāga", and "doragon" ドラゴン from English "" (the latter being used almost exclusively to refer to the European dragon and derived fictional creatures).