Columbia International College

On Monday January 23rd Columbia students celebrated the Lunar New Year with Mayor Bob Bratina and other members of the community at City Hall.

Earlier in the month the Mayor’s staff invited Columbia students to decorate City Hall as well as perform for guests as part of their Lunar New Year's celebration. Columbia students jumped at the opportunity to celebrate with the mayor. Many of them thought it was a special way to ring in their first Lunar New Year away from their families.

Columbia Prefects were responsible for organizing the decorations and the Columbia Choir sang a traditional Chinese Lunar New Year song entitled Tong Yi Shou Ge which roughly translates to “The Same Song” or “The Song for Everybody”.

The Prefects also thought it was important to highlight how different regions of Asia celebrate the Lunar New Year. They selected representatives from; Hong Kong, Taiwan, Indonesia, Vietnam and Korean to briefly speak on their traditions and to give the crowd a quick tutorial on how to say “Happy New Year” in their native language.

Our Choir was warmly received by the crowd, as many audience members joyously clapped along to the song. Dr. Newman and some students were interviewed by CHCH news and the Hamilton Spectator covered the event for two days.

All of the students involved admit that this is a Lunar New Year they will never forget and they look forward to working with City Hall again in the future. We thank City Hall and the Mayor for giving us the chance to celebrate with them!