by Marcela Ganea

BUCHAREST, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- Music, dancing, kung-fu and exhibitions of photography, were hosted by the International School of Bucharest (ISB) to celebrate the Chinese Lunar New Year on Wednesday.

The event was meant to joyfully reunite the 100 Chinese children enrolled with the ISB and their local and foreign schoolmates with members of the families and officials from the Chinese embassy.

The Year of Dog begins on Feb. 16, according to the Chinese lunar calendar.

A parade of the children of different nationalities in Chinese traditional clothes, holding red lanterns and small Chinese flags, was followed by a lion dance team composed of Romanian youth, and accompanied by loud drum music, a delight for the hundreds of children sitting around the perimeter of the hall who reached out their small hands to touch the colorful lions and their blinking lit eyes.

Fang Shuang, a Chinese artist who is well-known for singing Romanian music, sang three songs.

"We celebrate the Chinese New Year every year because we are an international school but this year's event is bigger because we had contributions from Confucius Institutes in Bucharest and Sibiu, from the Shanghai Martial Arts Association and we also brought Fang Shuang," said Sinana Kosak, the director of the International School of Bucharest where study children from some 40 countries.

"Chinese traditional food was provided by the 68 families who have 100 children enrolled here," said Alina Stanescu, Romanian representative of this Chinese community.

She also explained, "This year's event is the biggest ever organized here because it's 2018, and 8 is a mystical lucky figure in the Chinese culture."