By SARA GIBONEY
UNK Communications
KEARNEY – The Chinese Students and Scholars Association (CSSA) at the University of Nebraska at Kearney is hosting its Chinese Spring Festival on Saturday (Feb. 1).
The festival, which is free and open to the public, is in its seventh year and will take place in the Nebraskan Student Union Ponderosa Room at 5:30 p.m.
The event aims to share Chinese culture with the UNK and Kearney communities, according to senior industrial distribution major Peijie Li of China.
“We have a good amount of Chinese students on campus,” Li said. “People from Kearney don’t always get to experience the Chinese culture. We’re planning the festival to let a small town in America experience that.”
There are 111 Chinese students attending UNK.
Chinese students will prepare authentic Chinese food, which is free to attendees. The event also features Chinese music, a piano and violin performance, traditional Chinese dances, modern dances and a comedy act.
A student will also perform on the pipa, a traditional Chinese musical instrument, and a group of elementary school students will sing a Chinese song.
There will also be games and activities.
Li, a member of the Chinese Students and Scholars Association, hopes the celebration helps Chinese students feel like they are at home celebrating the holiday.
“The Spring Festival is always during the school year, so there’s no way students can go home,” Li said. “A lot of students, especially first year students, will get homesick during that time of year. So we’re trying to make them feel at home.”
The Chinese Spring Festival, also known as the Chinese New Year celebration, is the most important of the traditional Chinese holidays and seen as a family event. The holiday is celebrated for 15 days starting from Chinese New Year’s Eve. This year, the Chinese New Year is celebrated on Friday (Jan. 31) in China.
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Source: Peijie Li, 308.240.0277
Writer: Sara Giboney, 308.865.8529, giboneys2@unk.edu
