University Pines Hosts Inaugural Lantern Festival

By JIM RASBERRY/Staff Writer, BARBARA MARTIN MORO/Staff Writer and BRYNNA WILLIAMSON/Vice Editor-in-Chief

Red spherical lanterns, red tablecloths, a red dragon and brochures decorated in red.

University Pines hosted its first-ever Lantern Festival last Thursday. It was organized through a collaboration between University Pines and the Asian Student Association (ASA).

In many Asian cultures, this festival marks the beginning of the New Lunar Year. During this event, most of the activities are oriented toward participants’ hopes for good fortune.

The idea for the Lantern Festival was proposed by Sebastian Russell, a RA for University Pines, who worked closely with the Asian Student Association to ensure the cultural sensitivity of the event.

“We have close ties to the ASA, so we thought the festival would be different and introduce people to the festivities,” said Russell.

Working with the ASA, University Pines put together traditional activities for these festivities, including painting Chinese lanterns, fans and couplets, or “the wishing tree.”

University Pines hopes to host this and other events throughout the semester and make them annual. Ryan Felbar, who is the assistant director of Residence Life, and University Pines hope to do about 50 events per semester.

Events in the roster range from “small passive” events like mental health kits to educational events.

Though University Pines and Residence Life put forth the initiative to host events, all proposed, planned and eventually hosted events are handled by the RAs of the housing.

“The ‘U’ Pines is known for throwing the haunted house in the fall semester, but we wanted something that we could do in the spring semester as well, hopefully a tradition the way the haunted house is, and so we all got together and thought that the Chinese Lantern Festival would be a good idea,” said Russell.