Chloe Yokitis
Editor
At the end of January, ACHS’s Chinese Club hosted a Lunar New Year celebration after school in honor of the Year of the Rabbit. Members of the club, which is open to anyone interested in Chinese culture, shared food, music and Chinese traditions during the event.
Chinese Club President Lanya Williams, a junior, said the goal of the event was for “everyone to unite together and experience cultural differences,” as well as learn more about Chinese culture— especially the food.
“We wanted to showcase different foods from China because I think that’s a good way to represent China as a whole,” she said. “I just like to see everybody enjoying the food and conversing and having fun, and [music] videos playing in the background.”
Williams said her favorite part of the event was seeing “everyone together and conversing” and “immersed in the event,” especially people who don’t take Chinese class.
“You don’t have to speak Chinese to join this club, you know, you can come here to learn, and that’s what the club is for,” she said.
Abigail Gerstein, who takes Chinese class and is the Fundraising Chair of the club, helped plan the event and said that she hopes the club and its events help make Chinese culture accessible to everyone.
“It’s important to share aspects of [Chinese] culture, aspects of what we learn in class, with those who maybe don’t take Chinese or didn’t start early enough and now feel like they can’t start now. They can still be a part about learning Chinese and Chinese-American culture— coming, playing mah-jongg, eating Panda Express, all of that,” she said.
Yan Huang, the Chinese teacher and Chinese Club sponsor, said that connecting with students who take other foreign language classes gives students a chance to meet new people and promotes diversity.
“It’s very fun to see students who are interested in learning Chinese culture not only talk about culture differences but also discuss cultural similarities,” she said, “and that really helps everyone have in-depth cultural knowledge and cross-cultural skills as well.”
The club has been expanding this year, said Williams, and it is is the first year the club has put on a Lunar New Year event at this scale.
“This is a huge step up [from previous years],” she said. “We just wanted everyone to unite together and experience cultural differences.”
Huang too said she hopes that the club will continue to host more events like this.
“I hope in the future, we can have more opportunities like this to celebrate holidays and have cultural events, so students from diverse backgrounds can have a better understanding of each other,” she said.
All photos by Chloe Yokitis for Theogony
