Chinese New Year brings community together

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Members of the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association helped ring in the new year on Saturday with an annual celebration for the Chinese community and the public at large.

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This article was published 19/02/2018 (2228 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Members of the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association helped ring in the new year on Saturday with an annual celebration for the Chinese community and the public at large.

More than 150 people came out to the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium to commemorate the Chinese New Year.

Brandonites of all stripes helped mark the occasion with a communal dinner of fried rice, scallion pie, spring rolls and more, and a slate of a dozen performances later in the evening.

Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun
Dancers celebrate the Chinese New Year with a performance at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium Saturday night.
Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun Dancers celebrate the Chinese New Year with a performance at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium Saturday night.

From its earliest days, the yearly tradition has always served as a means of bringing the Chinese community together for a day that would normally be spent with family back home.

“For the international students here, they don’t have family here,” said Luqi Wang, president of the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association.

Wang, who is a second-year music student and clarinet player from Dalian, said many new students feel lonely when they first move to Brandon, and not just around the Chinese New Year.

“Our community is kind of family for them,” he said.

Chinese New Year, also known as the Spring Festival, is regarded in China as one of its most important celebrations.

Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun
Molly Mu holds a pose during a tai chi demonstration Saturday night at the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association's New Year's celebration at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium.
Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun Molly Mu holds a pose during a tai chi demonstration Saturday night at the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association's New Year's celebration at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium.

The start of the new lunar calendar was officially on Friday and marks the end of the Year of the Rooster and the beginning of the Year of the Dog.

The Chinese zodiac rotates on a 12-year cycle and is believed to give people born in those years certain personality traits. Those born in the Year of the Dog, for example, are often described as honest and loyal.

The celebration at the WMCA was capped off by a set of 12 shows performed by more than 30 dancers, singers and musicians.

The performances included a traditional Tibetan dance, tai chi demonstration, hip hop duo, and a clarinet concerto.

Catching it all on video was Yuan Yuan Sun, who moved to Canada just a month ago.

Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun
Three-year-old girls Mingyi Wang, left, and Nina Bao stop for a photo during Chinese New Year celebrations at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium.
Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun Three-year-old girls Mingyi Wang, left, and Nina Bao stop for a photo during Chinese New Year celebrations at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium.

Sun chose Brandon after hearing about the city through some of her friends and said she wanted to experience a different lifestyle compared to the one she had in her home of Chongqing, a city with a population of more than 30 million people. “Brandon is, to me, a little city,” she said.

Sun is learning English at Brandon University and hopes to study business in the future.

For her first Chinese New Year in the Wheat City, Sun agreed to help record the evening’s performances on video and she told The Brandon Sun that she was surprised to see people from both the Chinese community and non-Chinese Canadians together.

The night also proved to be a first for Assiniboine Community College instructor Yolanda Quiring.

Quiring said she has a lot of Chinese students in her English as a Second Language class, but had not made it out to the new year’s celebration before.

Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun
Several women perform a Tibetan dance Saturday night at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium as part of a New Year's celebration hosted by the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association.
Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun Several women perform a Tibetan dance Saturday night at the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium as part of a New Year's celebration hosted by the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association.

She happened to run into one of her students, Miao Yan Huang, who came to Canada from Guangdong province, at the dinner and the two ended up spending the evening together.

“It’s wonderful to have such a nice gathering place … because obviously it’s a huge holiday for Chinese people,” Quiring said.

“It’s really great that Chinese Brandonites can come to celebrate.”

» mlee@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @mtaylorlee

Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun
Assiniboine Community College instructor Yolanda Quiring, left, and one of her English as a Second Language students, Miao Yan Huang, at the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association's New Year's celebration Saturday night.
Michael Lee/The Brandon Sun Assiniboine Community College instructor Yolanda Quiring, left, and one of her English as a Second Language students, Miao Yan Huang, at the Brandon University Chinese Students and Scholars Association's New Year's celebration Saturday night.
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