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It is Chinese New Year, also called Spring Festival right now in China. While all the Chinese people are celebrating with their families back home, the Chinese students here at MSU are also having a great time. KSMU’s Xiaowen Tan reports.
Chinese New Year is the longest and most important festivity in the Chinese traditional calendar. Starting on the Eve of Chinese New Year, until the 15th day, people celebrate the whole period. Qiu Xiaomin is a Chinese professor in the William Darr School of Agriculture at MSU. He hosts a lot of meetings for Chinese Christian students. He said it’s important to the Chinese students here to have their own cultural festival. “To celebrate the Chinese New Year on MSU campus is to remind Chinese students of our culture, our heritage, and to remind us that we need to fight against the evil to become prosperous and become blessed”, he said.2011 is the year of the rabbit, one of the 12 animals of the Chinese Zodiac. Professor Qiu said the animal itself doesn’t have particular meaning, although Chinese people sometimes give some meaning to it.“Instead of to remember like 2011, it’s because it’s easy for us to remember this year as rabbit", he said.Chinese student Wang Xue is a Civil Engineer major. She said she celebrated the New Year with all her friends making dumplings, having dinner, and going to the Chinese Church together.“Here all my friends are my family and it’s really interesting. You meet a lot of people, not only the people you know, but a lot of people you don’t know", she said.This coming Thursday is the fifteenth day of the New Year, which is celebrated as Yuan Xiao Festival. This day is also called the Lantern Festival, and families in China usually walk the streets carrying glowing lanterns. Thursday is the very last day of the Chinese New Year celebrations. For KSMU news, I'm Xiaowen Tan.