On Monday, February 8, 2016, the Asian Studies and Office of Student Organization hosted the event Chinese New Year Kickoff for the Kean community. It was held in the Miron Student Center (MSC) during college hour, with cultural performances and food that celebrate and embrace the Chinese culture and heritage.
Chinese New Year, which is also known as Spring Festival, is an important festival celebrated at the turn of traditional lunisolar Chinese calendar. Traditionally, this is a festival time to honor deities as well as ancestors with centuries old significance because of several myths and traditions. Before New Year’s Eve, an individual’s family will thoroughly cleanse the house and throw away some old or useless goods, which mean they will say good bye to their old year and throw ill-fortune away. On the contrary, during the New Year holiday, especially for the first day, the traditional Chinese will not do much house cleaning because they think it is time for them to accumulate money and luck but not sweep away.
Chinese New Year is not only celebrated in China, but also other countries and territories with significant Chinese populations, including Singapore, Thailand, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mauritius and the Philippines. It is considered a major holiday for the Chinese and has had influence on the lunar New Year celebrations of its geographic neighbors.
Chinese New Year 2016 is not just another year of this intrinsic tradition, but also the year of the monkey in the Chinese zodiac where the “male or female monkey” makes his or her debut all over the world. The monkey is the ninth animal in a cycle of 12 years, and is regarded as having the traits of being smart and energetic.
This kickoff event was decorated with “Denglong” (lighting firecrackers), couplets, bodhisattva and red paper-cuts with popular themes of good fortune or happiness, wealth and longevity. Asian Studies also organized the activity of giving red paper envelopes, writing Chinese characters for the 12 zodiacs and drawing monkey masks.
Alexandre Desrivieres, senior student majoring in music with a minor in Asian Studies, performed the Chinese transitional song “Red Lantern” by saxophone in the kickoff. He stated, “There are many differences between two musical instruments. The origin[al] instrument for this song is bamboo flute, so it is not easily translate some sound to saxophone. I have to use some techniques to mimic the song making it closer.” He thought this event gave a lot of people a various taste of Chinese traditional food and experience to understand more Chinese culture.
Daniel Gover, a professor in the English department, was interested in Chinese zodiacs. He wrote two Chinese characters of the horse and the dog by using Chinese traditional calligraphy, and made a joke of his marriage about these two zodiac’s symbol. He stated, “I am a year of dog, and my wife is the year of horse. Actually, dog always works for horse, so it is unfair.” Every zodiac has identical meaning or symbol, although sometimes it has stereotypes from critical thinking. It is still an ideal way for giving some expectations of personal life.
Yifang Zheng, a junior exchange student from Wenzhou-Kean University majoring in finance, thought this kickoff was really warm and exciting. It was the first time for him to celebrate the Spring Festival, and this kickoff gave him a sense of family belonging.
Janice Murray-Laury, the Vice President of Student Affairs, stated, “It is a good experience for all WKU and Kean communities to come together in an inspiring and productive way. And we are really on the right path for global engagement.”
As usual, Chinese New Year Kickoff was a phenomenal success this semester. All people left the atrium happy by various Chinese traditional activities and cultural influences, looking forward to the next event of their Chinese kickoff or may travel to China one day.
