Roundup: Kigali gears up for Chinese Spring Festival

The Rwandan capital Kigali is gearing up for this year's Chinese Spring Festival celebration at Serena Hotel.

The two-day event to run from January 19 to 20 is jointly held by Rwanda's Ministry of Culture and Sports and the Chinese Embassy in Rwanda.

Spring Festival is the most important Chinese festival celebrated at the turn of the traditional lunisolar Chinese calendar. People return home for family gathering.

The first day of the Chinese Lunar New Year 2017 falls on Jan. 28, initiating the year of the Rooster (based on the Chinese Zodiac, a classification scheme that assigns an animal to each year in a repeating 12-year cycle).

In an interview with Rwandan local media, the director of political section at Chinese Embassy in Kigali, Zhang Wenping, said this year's Spring Festival will serve as another occasion for cultural exchange.

Zhang stressed that despite geographic distance, China and Rwanda share a lot in common which presents good opportunity for cooperation in various aspects including culture.

"Rwandan people and Chinese people are like-minded, the event will also be people-to-people interaction," Zhang said.

Visitors to the festival on the first day will include common Rwandan citizens, government officials, foreign diplomats in Kigali, students among others.

While on the second day the event will be specifically for Chinese community in Rwanda.

She said for the second time a Chinese artistic delegation has been invited by the Chinese Embassy in Kigali, expected to put up a spectacular performance.

"Every year artistic delegations from different provinces are invited. Last year, Liaoning Province sent a delegation which gave a performance typically Northeast Style. While this year, the delegation is from Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region which holds a long tradition for dancing and singing," she said.

Hen Yusu, Secretary to Chinese Ambassador to Rwanda told the same local media that since as Xinjiang is in the North-West part of China, where minorities reside, this year's performance will give visitors quite different impression from what they usually have in mind about Chinese people.

This year's Spring Festival celebration covers various art forms such as comic dialogues, dancing, acrobatic show, short plays, pop music, traditional opera and Wushu show.

Urukerereza, the artistic treasure of Rwanda, will also be part of the celebration of the Spring Festival, according to Hen.

Urukerereza, a Rwandan dance troupe shows feature traditional Rwandan songs, drum beats and dance. Endit