CHINESE STUDENTS HAVE REASON TO CROW: ROOSTER'S REIGN BEGINS

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 22, 1993                   TAG: 9301220267
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-8   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: M.J. DOUGHERTY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG                                LENGTH: Medium
CHINESE STUDENTS HAVE REASON TO CROW: ROOSTER'S REIGN BEGINS
The Year of the Rooster begins Saturday. But the celebration is tonight at the Squires Student Center on the Virginia Tech campus.
To mark the beginning of the Rooster's reign, there will be a New Year's Eve party Chinese style in the Commonwealth Ballroom from 7:30 to midnight.
The party is free and open to all.
Sponsoring the event are three student organizations, the Association of Chinese Students and Scholars, the Chinese-American Student Association and the Hong Kong Club, along with the Cranwell International Center.
"Everyone is waiting for it, seeing the large crowd," said David Wang, president of the Hong Kong Club and a Ph.D. student in statistics.
"Everyone is waiting for the lion dance and to see the other performers. And everyone is especially waiting for the food."
Traditional Chinese New Year's food is one part of the cultural festival.
The menu includes sticky rice cakes, dumplings, doughnuts and steamed stuffed buns.
Entertainment will include a lion dance, a martial arts exhibition, musical performances on Chinese instruments, the traditional Chinese fan dance and piano-playing and singing.
After a break will be the playing of New Year's games. Some involve the riddle-solving; others are similar to games found on carnival midways.
And "Marking the Rooster" is like the well-known American birthday party game Pin the Tail on the Donkey. A person is blindfolded and must try place a mark on the head of the rooster.
"I think it will be a success if a lot of people go out and see what Chinese New Year is all about," said Lindsay Cheng, a Roanoke native, sophomore in engineering science and mechanics and president of the Chinese-American Student Association.
"We'll try to do our part preparing the festival. Hopefully, people will take advantage of it."
More than 500 people are expected to attend the event, which will mark the first time the three groups have held a combined New Year's celebration.
The Full Moon Festival last fall drew more than 400 people.
And this time around, the groups are more organized:
"I think there'll be a lot more people, because we did more publicity," said Shaoli Wang, secretary of the Association of Chinese Students and Scholars and a masters student in educational instruction.
"Also, with the Chinese-American Student Association joining us, we anticipate more American students and more people from the community."
The holiday is based on the Chinese lunar calendar, which was used in China until 1912. It is more commonly celebrated now as the spring festival "Chunjie."
It remains an important day in the life of Chinese all over the world.
The year of the Rooster is Lunar Year 4691. A person born this year is expected to be a seeker of wisdom and truth and have a pioneering spirit.
Virginia Tech has a large Chinese community.
Among its 23,000 students are 240 from the People's Republic of China, 140 from Taiwan, 40 from Hong Kong and an estimated 200 Chinese-American students.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB