This past Thursday, Colorado College’s Asian Student Union displayed performances from a variety of countries from all across Asia and the Pacific, ranging from mainland China to the Pacific Islands of Hawaii and Indonesia as part of their annual Asian Culture Night.
“Our idea is to share our culture with the other students on campus as well as community members,” said junior Connie Zheng, president of the Asian Student Union. “[Asian Culture Night] for us is to celebrate the diversity within Asian students and Asian American students on campus.”
Asian Culture Night is the largest ASU event of the year and was accomplished in close collaboration with other clubs around campus, particularly the Korean American Student Association, or KASA. This helped with one of the goals of the event, which was to show the distinct cultures within the broader classification of Asian culture.
“It’s very common for people to clump Asia and Asians together,” said Zheng. “In reality, there are so many countries and different cultures that [Asia] is really diverse.”
The diversity was apparent in the programming of this event. A fashion show modeled the traditional garb of many countries for the audience. There were also several dance performances put on by CC students and visiting performers.
A traditional Chinese dance was performed, as well as other distinct dances from Cambodia and Bali. There was even a musical piece showcased by sophomore Michael Wu on the erhu, a two-stringed instrument that originated in Central China.
CC students weren’t the only ones performing at Asian Culture Night, however. The Asian Student Union also brought down performers from Denver. The University of Colorado in Denver’s Hawaii Club of Auraria came down to do a performance of Hawaiian dancing.
“This year we tried to bring off-campus performers to show new things,” said Zheng.
ASU also spoke with the Colorado Asian Cultural Heritage Center, who sent dancers to perform the Lion and Dragon dances.
The Lion Dance involves two dancers entering a traditional lion’s costume so that only their legs showed. Both dancers moved in unison to mimic the movements of a four-legged lion, accompanied by a rousing beat on drums and cymbals. The lions interacted with and involved the crowd throughout the dance, even taking selfies with CC students.
In the Dragon Dance, performers with poles attached to a large paper dragon moved in intricate patterns to make the dragon seem alive and flying through the air, chasing the symbolic “Pearl of Wisdom” (held by another dancer).
Both dances required great precision and complex choreography to accomplish.
“We felt like it’s something that not a lot of students outside the Asian community have experienced,” said Zheng. “We wanted to bring that to campus.”
Overall, Zheng felt that the whole event had a great turnout, with plenty of participants within and outside of CC. In addition to KASA, the Chinese Student Association also helped provide performers for the dances, as well as models for the fashion show. Members from Asian clubs at UCCS and the Air Force Academy were also in attendance.
“We hope that everyone enjoyed the show as much as we did,” said Zheng.