With the Spring Festival holiday having now ended, we look at the unique ways overseas students have found to spend the festival in their own way.

A senior student studying interactive arts at NYU Shanghai has celebrated the Chinese New Year three times in China. Coming from Pakistan, she has found the warmth of home in China. “The most important thing for the Chinese people in the New Year is reunion, which is very similar to the Pakistani tradition.”

(Foreign students spend the Lunar New Year’s Eve in Xintiandi.)

As she told us, the first time she celebrated the Spring Festival, she went to Beijing and climbed the Great Wall, like many tourists. The second time, she spent the festival in a Chinese friend’s home and enjoyed a table of delicious food. This year, she went to Shanghai’s Xintiandi where she did some sightseeing, shopping and dining with her friends. She thought the streets would be empty during the Chinese New Year, but to her surprise, she saw many families hanging out. Decorated with lanterns and Spring Festival couplets, the streets are lively.

Many universities in Shanghai have arranged cheerful activities for students coming from abroad. As the spring semester exchange program between Purdue University and Shanghai Jiao Tong University is soon to begin, students from the American university have come to Shanghai in advance, so as to experience Chinese culture during the traditional Spring Festival.

At the New Year’s dinner hosted by Shanghai Jiao Tong University, for the first time ever the American students experienced traditional folk customs like guessing lantern riddles and sugar-figure blowing. They made dumplings with Chinese teachers and students and performed kung fu and the Chinese folk song “Jasmine Flower” at the campus Spring Festival gala.

Though coming from different countries, the foreign students are not complete strangers to Spring Festival customs. A student named John told us he once spent his first Chinese New Year in Hong Kong at eight years old. “I remember that year was also the Year of the Pig.”

Now, as a sophomore at NYU Shanghai, he is in China enjoying the Lunar New Year again. He is quite familiar with the customs: “Before the Spring Festival, you should clean the house. Don’t do any sweeping during the festival, or you will sweep out the good luck. And don’t get your hair cut during the festival time [or you’re cutting off good luck].”

(Students from Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine take part in an orientation run to celebrate the Spring Festival.)

Apart from the traditional ways, international students also had the opportunity to experience the festivity in a fun new way. Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine organized an orientation run for its students. From the Bund and Lujiazui to Yu Garden and the City God Temple, the youngsters ran past iconic city landmarks in Shanghai to find the most festive atmospheres.

As a participant, a student from Thailand loved the game and said, “We saw colorful zodiac animal lanterns and hung our New Year wishes on the wish tree. More importantly, we appreciated the different scenery of Shanghai's tradition and modernity and experienced different Chinese New Year customs.”