Lunar New Year Celebration

By Pamela Briggs, JKPrep Teacher

Excited chatter and Hanboks of all colors’ as well as traditional Chinese dress decorated the lower and upper junior pods, as children and their parents arrived for our Lunar New Year Celebration.

Many teachers joined in wearing a Hanbok too, being involved in the cultural traditions of this celebration.

Children filled the lower floor of the upper junior pod, absorbing the atmosphere within this space, awaiting the performances. Ms. Frances shared a welcome to all speaking in Chinese, Korean and English, acknowledging the special people here today.

The performances presented some of the traditions within these cultures during this celebration. Our Chinese students performed a skit about the New Years Greeting, passing red envelopes to their loved ones, and making traditional dumplings and foods, special for this occasion.

We were amazed by the display from the Taekwondo students, showing us the patterns of their movements, their control, discipline and strength, as they chopped and kicked their way through slabs of wood.

The Chinese Chopstick dance offered an insight into different types of traditional dances, showing the control, flexibility and nimbleness of this dance. We were amazed by the gracefulness of the Buchaechum fan dancers who performed a dance originating from Korea, performed by female dancers wearing Hanbok, as seen today. The dancers captivated the audience as they created fan movements to the music, creating waves and flowers too. The junior school orchestra also performed two songs for us, one the Lunar New Year Song that we sung along with too.

Thank you to all the people involved in the performances and organization of this celebration, what a lot of time, energy and practice went into these performances, and how lucky we all were to watch them and be apart of this Lunar New Year Celebration.