Elena, Year 7, Century Park Campus

Chinese New Year is a very traditional festival in China. It is also called the Spring Festival, or the Lunar New Year. At YCIS, we celebrate Chinese New Year in many ways, including an annual event that the school holds for families to join together to celebrate the holiday.

This year for the annual YCIS Chinese New Year event, the Year 7-9 students prepared activity rooms for families to visit so they could learn about other regions in China. This year's theme was City Scape, and we chose 12 famous cities in China to represent in 12 different activity rooms. We decorated the rooms with posters that introduced the cities, and we also offered snacks, crafts-making, and games native to those cities.

Our class was in charge of Suzhou, and my friend Isabel and I headed the food section. We introduced the traditional foods of Suzhou – snowflake cake and dried tofu. Guests liked the sweetness of the snowflake cake and the delicious taste of the dried tofu.

We also enjoyed seeing the student performances in the gym and the craft vendors in the school’s courtyard. There were clay dolls, zodiac candy making, and many more activities! All the vendors were all very skilled and they fully embodied Chinese traditions.

Everyone had lots of fun during the event, and it was a great way to celebrate Chinese New Year at our school.