2018 Year of Dog Celebrated w/ Yo-Yo(抖空竹过狗年)-儿歌荟萃-万维博客-万维读者网（电脑版）

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		2018 Year of Dog Celebrated w/ Yo-Yo(抖空竹过狗年)	2020-07-08 11:10:39

2018-02-25

【Aiden in English】

Chinese New Year (CNY), what a wonderful time. We relax, eat delicious food, drink fantastic stuff, and sleep in. It's the very biggest holiday of the year everyone deserves a break and feels good to be out of school… wait, we're in the US.

For a country built on immigrants, it's really ironic to see it pretty much grazed over the largest holiday of the largest population in the world. Only one of the few hypocritical attributes held by the US.

Instead of giving an official holiday, the school system celebrates the Year of Dog with General Tso's Chicken and green-brown rice. What is a bite of China? This puts even more stress on the Spring Festival annual gala. If this doesn't go well, most of the local Chinese people will have New Year celebrations destroyed. Since only one public school in the suburb of Philadelphia takes the Lunar New Year off, I'm assuming other than a family dinner, this is as much celebration as people would get. Granted, for performers, stage crew, staff, and organizers, Guanghua Chinese School Gala isn't much of a ‘break’. Instead, it's a busy five hours of scrambling around, getting mentally ready, and trying not to absolutely mess up your role in a large behind-the-scenes machine.

After a series of practices and two slices of pizza later, we performed Yo-Yo as the opener, which went “meh”. Not our best showing by a long shot, but it was bearable. After a few sighs of depression, a group of friends and I left for a far corner of the school to chillax and munch on pocky sticks. It was nice. Finally, a chunk of time where it’s just a simple chat with friends without any desperate project due the next day. Speaking of which, I have an essay due in two days. You better start typing.

Anyway, this brings quite an annoying topic to mind. What determines which holidays in the US are important? If the measurement is by ethnicity and each one’s population, then Chinese New Year should be a huge holiday. Looking at the current holidays outside of national historical moments (i.e. the 4^th of July), there really isn’t a certain rubric that people follow. After some research, I discovered that all national holidays have to go through Congress, but that doesn’t really answer my question. Where does the incentive to make a certain day special arise from? It's not like Congress says Chinese New Year isn't a native holiday. If so, that’s extremely ironic and hypocritical of them, since America isn’t much more than a melting pot of different-tasting cheeses.

I totally understand that making a new holiday isn't at the top of our government's list, but there is more and more argument for making the Spring Festival a holiday. As a large ethnic group in the country, the Lunar New Year is celebrated by many people, not just the Chinese. Yes, the festivity does last 15 days, but just having the first day off is good enough. I mean, if there's a holiday for a groundhog, can't you have a holiday for 3.7 million people in the country? Perhaps I'm being a bit prideful, and there are already enough holidays, but the truth is, I just want another day out of school.

【红霞译文】

中国新年，喜庆的时刻到了！大家放松身心，吃喝玩乐不困不休，正因为它堪称一年当中最为重要的节日，人人都该让自己歇息片刻，好好享受不上学愉快时光……且慢，我们身居美国哟。

对于一个建立于移民基础之上的国度来说，明知它是世上规模最大气氛最浓的新春佳节却并毫无表示，真令人不可思议，这种言行不一的教条行为在美国实属罕见。

既然官方没安排放假，学校隆重推出“左宗棠鸡”翡翠糙米饭来庆祝狗年春节，所谓舌尖上的中国？这就给当地一年一度的春节庆祝活动造成莫大压力，如果搞砸了，势必影响到绝大多数华人过节心情。鉴于费城郊外仅有一个学区专为农历新年放假，我觉得除了阖家共享年夜饭，“山寨春晚“无疑成了玉犬送金鸡最佳方式，这下只好烦劳所有参与光华中文学校联欢会演出的演员、舞台剧务、工作成员、节目策划舍弃很多“休息”时间，五个钟头连轴转，幕后全班人马非但要精神饱满，而且还得保障绝对不能出现任何闪失。

经过反复排练并拿来两片披萨充饥之后，我们作为开场舞演员为联欢会带来了空竹表演，总体水平发挥“一般”，虽然算不上出色，但演技说得过去。缺憾之余，我和一帮朋友躲到楼道尽端拐角处口嚼百奇饼干棒自寻其乐，总算偷得浮生半日闲。末了哥儿们胡吹乱侃大半晌，避而不谈明天烦心课业。说到课业，两天后我要交作文，还是提早动笔为妙。

不管怎么讲，心里总放不下困扰已久的话题，决定美国节日重要性的因素究竟是什么？如果单从种族及其人口数量方面考量，那么春节当之无愧。暂且撇开全国值得纪念的历史时刻（例如七月四号独立节），细数现有其它节假日确实让人找不出特别标准。经过一番研究，我发现所有国家法定节日必须通过国会审批，但这并未真正回答我的问题，是什么契机让某一天成为法定节日？总不会像国会认为中国新年非本土节日那样吧，假如真是如此，岂不既滑稽可笑又虚情假意，好歹美国称得上一个多元文化大熔炉。

我完全理解政府尚未打算新增节日，但要求春节放假的呼声愈来愈高，作为全国一支庞大的少数族裔，很多人欢度农历新年，并非仅仅局限于华夏子弟。没错，节日庆祝活动长达十五天，但只要头一天休息就成。依我看，既然能给土拨鼠过节，怎么就不能给全美370万民众放假呢？也许我带点民族自豪感，本来节假日已经够多的，可说白了，我还想多要一天不用上学的日子。

Today in History(历史上的今天):

2017 Twp Rec Basketball Game-9(2017年乡村娱乐篮球队第九场比赛)

2016: Academic Challenge(学术知识竞赛)

2015: B-D Dinner @ Lai Lai Garden(来来花园生日晚餐)

2012: 生日聚会─溜冰(B-D Skating)