Celebrating the Year of the Tiger in London

?Chinese New Year is the grandest and most sacred festival in Chinese culture. It is traditionally the time of reunion with family, celebrated by members of the family eating a feast together. For international students it bears even more significance as that separation from family during terms makes this reunion more appreciated. In most years, it is conventional to call each overseas family member from the UK to wish them happy new year, but this year, because it coincides with reading week, a large number of Chinese students have decided to return for the week, to celebrate the festival with family. Due to the large community of Chinese international students at UCL, we organised a Chinese Cultural Day on 5 February, prior to the Chinese New Year, to celebrate it together and at the same time to share our culture and traditions with other members of the UCL community. On this day, we set up stores selling cultural food, red paper cuttings, spring couplets, and other decorations. We enabled students to experience Chinese culture by dressing up in traditional costume and learning to write spring couplets of good wishes using brush and ink, an activity which is done by Chinese people in anticipation of the festival.