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Sunday, January 25, 2009 03:45 AM

Opinion250 invited Ning Ma, a Chinese student studying English at UNBC, to write a weekly article for us. We thought this would be helpful to Ning as he strives to improve his English skills, and helpful to us as we can see how others view Prince George, B.C. and Canada. This is Ning's last article as his studies are becoming more intense. We wish to thank him for sharing his impressions of Canada with us and for teaching us about Chinese Culture. We wish him well.

-Elaine Macdonald

Chinese New Year—the spring festival

January 26^th is the most important festival-- Chinese New Year.

Today I want to introduce some things about Chinese New Year.

Chinese New Year will be celebrated for about sixteen days.

China has an old calendar, so the New Year depends on the old Chinese calendar. The first day, the second day and the last day are the most important.

In my family, the first day of New Year everyone will wake up very early. We clean the house together and hang the Chinese lanterns in front of our door. At noon my parents and I will go to grandparents’ home and make dumplings. We will eat dumplings at lunch. At night we will have a big dinner and usually will have noodles at the end. After that, at eight o'clock, all of the family will watch the TV about the Spring Festival Gala Evening at CCTV. Everyone will have a vigil to the New Year.

On the second day, even though I go to sleep very late, I still need to wake up early. I must pay a New Year call to my neighbors and wish them happiness. My grandparents don’t need to do this because they are old and young neighbors will come to wish them happy New Year. This day is the easiest day in New Year’s time. Everyone stays at home and rests with their family.

After a few days it will very busy because we will have many family gatherings and all the relatives will come together. Some times we will have more than sixty people, adults will drink and children will play together.

The last day is the noisiest day because over that day all things will become common and people cannot explode the firecrackers anymore, so this day will be quiet after many days of noise. Every family will eat sweet soup balls and watch TV.

This is what I would do when I was in China. In China many places have little different customs for Chinese New Year but almost all are the same.

Finally I would to thank people for reading my articles. I am sad because I must stop writing for a while. This semester I have a very good, but hard teacher and every day I spend many hours studying. My family depends on me so I must do my study first and best. I would like to say thank you to Ben and Elaine for giving me this chance and I hope I can come back soon.

中国的新年——春节

今年的一月二十六日就是中国人最重要的节日春节了。所以在此我想向大家介绍一下中国的春节。

春节一般为期十六天，从中国历法的十二月的最后一天到一月的第十五天。其中第一天，第二天和最后一天最为重要。

在我的家，第一天全家会起得很早，然后一起打扫屋子，在门口贴春联，挂灯笼。中午我会和父母到祖父母家去，和祖父母一起包饺子，在中午我们会全家一起吃饺子，到了晚上我们要有一个丰盛的晚餐，然后全家在八点会一起看“春节联欢晚会”，然后守夜到12点。在这期间，会有很多人放炮还有放花。

第二天，尽管睡得很晚但是还要起得很早，然后我会去邻居家拜年，去祝贺迎来了新的一年，但是爷爷奶奶不用去，因为他们是长辈，邻居的年轻人会来给他们拜年。然后这一天将是在新年中最清闲的一天。大家都呆在自己家中和自己家人享受清闲。

然后几天，就又会变得很忙碌，因为所有的亲戚都会聚会。有时可能有六七十口人，然后大人在一起喝酒，小孩子一起玩耍。

最后一天，是放炮最激烈的一天，大家都要把家中所有的炮全都放了。因为过了这一天所有的城市都不可以放炮了，所以在那一天会听见不间断的爆炸声。然后在晚上一家人在一起看电视节目，吃汤圆。

这就是我在中国过的新年的情况。中国不同的地区有不同的风俗所以庆祝新年也有一些不同的方式, 但是总体情况是这样的。

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