The Chinese American Student Union and Vietnamese Student Association hosted a joint Lunar New Year festival this Friday in Old Union Hall. The evening had great food, interesting activities and a fun performance to top everything off.

Lam Tran, one of VSA’s social chairs, explained the significance of the celebration.

“Tonight is essentially an event where students at Binghamton could celebrate the Lunar New Year with us,” Tran, a sophomore majoring in biology, said. “We have different games and different cultural traditions that Chinese people and also Vietnamese people do when we celebrate Lunar New Year since we both share similar traditions. At this event, students can play games to win prizes, and they can also get different snacks from both cultures. You can also see the decorations of the room where we are trying to imitate the culture as much as possible.”

Students had plenty of opportunities to engage in both hands-on activities and games, each offering a different glimpse into Vietnamese and Chinese culture.

After grabbing a drink and a goodie bag, they could head over to the activity tables. Crafts like making paper lanterns and Chinese hand fans allowed participants to create their own decorations. The activity tables showed off card and board games like Tien Len and Chinese poker, giving players a chance to test their card skills while earning tickets for winning games, which could then be redeemed for prizes at the prize table.

The spinning station allowed eventgoers to bet their tickets and win extra by doing what the wheel landed on, like a cartwheel. The event also included interactive challenges like the lucky spinner, Jianzi — a shuttlecock and hacky-sack game and Bầu Cua Tôm Cá, another betting game. They also had a chopstick race table, an activity where participants would race to place as many mancala half-marbles into a jar compared to the person next to them.

The festival also featured two food stations serving Chè Thái, a Vietnamese fruit and jelly dessert, and scallion oil noodles, a traditional Chinese food.

Around the midpoint of the festival, the Rutgers Vietnamese Cultural Dance Crew took the center of the room for a traditional dragon dance performance featuring two multicolored dragons weaving through the tables. The dragon dance, a staple Lunar New Year celebration, symbolizes prosperity and good fortune for the year ahead.

Annie Liang, one of CASU’s cultural chairs, described what she wanted attendees to take away from the festival.

“The big thing I really wanted people to take away from this event was a home away from home,” Liang, a junior majoring in economics, said. “Because a lot of people that do go to [Binghamton] are students living away from home, and for something like Lunar New Year, which is so important to Asian cultures in general, it’s a really important holiday to celebrate, which kind of feels lonely when you’re not able to go home or things just don’t line up in [that] way because we don’t have the day off or anything.”

“It’s a great way for people to be able to celebrate with people in the community and sort of get that home away from home feeling amongst fellow students,” she added.