The Foreign Language Department had a large and fancy banquet to celebrate New Year's Eve and all of the English teachers were invited. The banquet was held off-campus at a restaurant and it was nice to be in a new place and try some different foods. The theme of the evening seemed to be seafood and we dined on jellyfish, turtle, fish, shrimp, mussels, octopus, and eel along with a variety of soups, rices and vegetables. The department gave us 100 RMB in red envelopes as our Christmas gift as it is a tradition to give cash in red envelopes during the Chinese New Year.
On a side note, I have been getting a lot of questions about the Chinese New Year. Although the Chinese celebrate the change from 2009-2010, their biggest holiday is to celebrate the Chinese New Year which is based on the lunar calendar. This year the Chinese New Year or Spring Festival will be celebrated on February 14.
After the dinner the department headed to a nearby KTV to sing karaoke. Karaoke is a hugely popular form of entertainment here and once again it is quite obvious to confirm that we are in a vastly different culture when we see professors and deans getting down on the private dance floor and belting out lyrics to a Chinese love or pop song. Only in China. I can only imagine how the American businessmen feel when they are invited to participate in this.
Singing karaoke is quite different here. Each party has their own private room and ours was pretty fancy this time. There were large sofas, a second floor, a disco ball, a dance floor and a giant screen with a projector to show the lyrics and cheesy accompanying videos for each song. While singing, food is brought to the table and drinks are refilled. We had fruit plates, sweet popcorn, sunflower seeds, tea and beer. Both Peter and Daniel sang songs and there was plenty of dancing to be had. It was a fun evening and probably one of the strangest New Year's Eve I have ever had. Here's hoping 2010 will be as much fun as 2009 has been!
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