Spring Break
Students hold festival to celebrate moon
Kate Shea
Issue date: 10/3/07 Section: Arts & Lifestyle
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The Chinese Moon Festival is celebrated throughout China in the month of September. According to legend the Moon Princess can be seen dancing on the moon the night of the festival.
CSSA member Yingzhou Zhu, also known as Joe, explained what the Moon Festival means to the Chinese today.
"For us it's a celebration of family gathered together," Zhu said.
This is the first year the CSSA of Whitewater held a moon festival with about 40 attendees ranging from adults to young children.
Co-president of the CSSA, XianPing Zhang, spoke of the joy it gave him to be able to celebrate the Chinese Moon Festival in Whitewater.
"We're here to celebrate a new dream in Whitewater," Zhang said.
The dream is driven by the fact that this year UW-Whitewater has the most Chinese students in attendance since Sep. 11.
More over, Chinese students are being given a chance to share their culture through foreign language classes. Colleges like UW- Whitewater are encouraging students to teach Chinese as a foreign language since China is now America's third largest trading partner.
The Whitewater Chinese Moon Festival started at 5:30 p.m. and lasted until past 9 p.m. Students, alumni, and professors attended, and some alumni traveled from as far as Chicago in order to attend. Many of the adults brought along their children, who played
in the park.
One of the highlights of the night was eating mooncakes. Mooncakes are a tradition of the Moon Festival, and they are a doughy pastry filled with a sweet paste. The CSSA provided several kinds to sample.
The moon was also a beautiful part of the evening. Once the sun set it slowly rose over Cravath Lake and reflected on the water.
The guests ate food provided by the CSSA, including rice, barbequed chicken, pork and hamburgers.
After eating, the guests shared a little bit about themselves under Zhang's instruction.
"We will hear your stories so we can remember it," Zhang said.
Talking and learning about one anther was a big part of the festival.
The CSSA also formed a parade to introduce themselves. It started with the board members, two of them carried a red banner that said "UWW CSSA." As a reference to the legend, the girls that followed were called moon princesses and were organized in rows of four. The parade ended with the men who were called ambassadors.
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