The University of Florida Chinese Students and Scholars Association celebrated Chinese New Year during their Spring Festival by inviting students to participate in a variety of traditional Chinese activities and share food on the second floor of the J. Wayne Reitz Union on Sunday, Jan. 29. UF students from various backgrounds gathered to celebrate the start of the Year of the Rabbit and learn about Chinese culture.
Jingxi Weng (left) and Xiaoyi Tian (right), two third-year Ph.D. students from China, practice calligraphy of the Chinese character “福,” which means blessing and happiness, at the Spring Festival Celebration hosted by the UF Chinese Students and Scholars Association at the Reitz Union in Gainesville, Florida. They both moved to the United States in 2018 to pursue their Ph.D.s, and since then, they have not celebrated Chinese New Year with their families back home. (Xinyue Li/WUFT News)Michael Knauf (left) and Nadia Barua (right), two freshman at the University of Florida, learn to practice calligraphy at the Spring Festival Celebration. (Xinyue Li/WUFT News)Susan Zheng (right) instructs her friends to practice calligraphy at the Spring Festival Celebration. “I learned about this event from Instagram. I invited my friends to come with me, and they liked it,” said Susan. (Xinyue Li/WUFT News)Weiyu Peng (right), who recently gained his master’s degree in Industrial and Systems Engineering at University of Florida, introduces Annabelle Faurot (left), a freshman majoring in Chinese and Finance, to a Chinese tradition at the Spring Festival Celebration. “She asked me, ‘Why do Chinese people often display the character “Fu” upside down?’ And I explained to her that it is because ‘upside-down Fu’ sounds like ‘luck-arriving’ in Chinese,” says Peng. (Xinyue Li/WUFT News)Clinton Mitchelle, a 62-year-old custodial worker at the Reitz Union, learns to hold a Chinese calligraphy brush with the help of two volunteers from the UF Chinese Students and Scholars Association. “I started working here about 30 years ago, and this is the third Chinese New Year celebration at Reitz I’m attending, and I loved it a lot,” said Mitchell. (Xinyue Li/WUFT News)He Wang, a first-year graduate student in Entrepreneurship at the University of Florida, presents a pair of Spring Festival couplets to her friend at the Spring Festival Celebration. Wang came to UF in August 2021, and this was her very first Chinese New Year not spent with her family. “It was difficult to adjust to the difference, but this event truly made me feel at home,” said Wang. The words on the couplets mean “As long as you keep on trying, there are always more solutions than problems.” (Xinyue Li/WUFT News)A University of Florida student presents how to write the Chinese character “福,” which means blessing and happiness, in calligraphy at the Spring Festival Celebration. (Xinyue Li/WUFT News）Xuening Song (left), a fifth-year chemistry Ph.D. student, practices calligraphy with her father (right) during the Spring Festival Celebration. Because Song had not been able to travel back to China in the past five years, her father flew from Anhui Province, China, to spend the Chinese New Year with her. (Xinyue Li/WUFT News)
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