Lantern Festival: an ancient Chinese tradition

February 19 ended the New Year "vacation", which lasts 15 days in China. It is on this day, according to the custom, which is more than two thousand years old, the Chinese everywhere have lit millions of luminous lanterns. Therefore, this day is called Lantern Festival. It is widely believed that the souls of deceased ancestors descend to the earth on the New Year in order to celebrate the holiday with their loved ones. And at the end of the New Year holidays, they return back to the sky, and millions of luminous lanterns light their way home. Modern Chinese firmly believe that the lights, like stars in the sky, illuminate all roads, give people hope for a long and happy life.

The Lantern Festival at the invitation of the Confucius Institute on this day came to celebrate not only students of our university who are learning Chinese, but also many high school students, high-school students and schoolchildren of our city who show a sustained interest in the language and culture of the Middle Kingdom.

In the foyer of the assembly hall, viewers who came to the festival could familiarize themselves with the traditional New Year pictures of Nianhua, mastery of writing hieroglyphs, practice cutting patterns on colored paper, knotting of multicolored threads, which were demonstrated by Chinese teachers Wang Gaozun, Tan Lin, Wang Xiaolun .

... On the stage of the assembly hall, decorated with bright red lanterns, the leading students of the concert program are philologists - girls in Chinese dresses and young men in Chinese costumes, who briefly told the story and described the symbolism of the Lantern Festival. And the holiday, undoubtedly, turned out, because the teacher of Chinese Wang Gaoqsun immediately created a wonderful festive mood, performing the charming Chinese melody on the ancient stringed instrument guzheng. The young whalers from the regional lyceum, gymnasiums No. 10, 56 and 71, from secondary schools No. 44 and 72 did not leave indifferent the audience; in Chinese, the children read poems and sang songs, played funny scenes. The philology students Polina Zavtrikova and Anastasia Sharnikova were pleased with the performance of popular songs. The performance of young athletes was accepted with enthusiasm - members of the Gomel team on Ears, whose coach is Valery Golda, who attends classes in Chinese. The concert program was completed with an excellent performance of the dance group “Inside” from secondary school No. 19.

At the end of the festive evening, all of its participants (among them only gymnasium students and schoolchildren were about 90 people!) Went on the stage not only to bow, but also to take a photo, to keep in memory the wonderful atmosphere of the Lantern Festival.

IN AND. Koval, Deputy Director of the Confucius Institute

Photo by Vladimir Chistov