On February 26 ICLP celebrated Yuanxiaojie (元宵節), or Lantern Festival, with seasonal food and games.  Yuanxiaojie marks the end of the two weeks of festivities ringing in the lunar new year.

　　In addition to the paper lanterns that are its namesake, Lantern Festival is celebrated by eating tangyuan (湯圓), rice dumplings stuffed with sweet sesame or peanut past, and cracking riddles.  Students, teachers and staff gathered at noon to enjoy both.

　　Lantern riddles, or dengmi (燈謎) challenge one to guess a Chinese character from a series of clues.  The complexity of characters and ingenuity of riddle-makers make for endless new puzzles.  For instance, what is green on one side and red on the other, hates rain on one side and loves it on the other?  The answer, “autumn” makes no sense to someone not familiar with Chinese characters.  秋, autumn, is composed of the radicals 禾 and 火, meaning grain and fire respectively.  Thanks to the hard work of the activity planners teachers Xu Zhi-cheng (徐志成), Wang Yi-quan (王怡權), and  Lin Zi-jun (林姿君), and other teachers ICLP students practiced characters while enjoying this new year tradition.

　　Many teachers and staff readily recounted fond childhood memories of Yuanxiaojie. Teacher Chen Li-yuan (陳立元) recalls buying paper lanterns at a stationary store as a girl and decorating them as a child.  Teacher Fann Meei-yuan remembers making lanterns out of tin cans and using them cook vegetables.  (Don’t try this at home!)

　　Teacher Xu Zhen-feng, who is Hakka, pointed out a slight difference in his family’s traditions.  Hakka tangyuan and not filled.  Rather, the emphasis is on a more flavorful broth.