On Thursday, 30 January, both staff and students alike gathered at the inaugural session of Sutton Grammar’s Hong Kong Society. Celebrating the Lunar New Year, students were treated to various traditional Chinese sweets and snacks, which were kindly provided by volunteer members of staff. Especially popular were the White Rabbit Candies, sticky milk sweets covered in an edible rice paper, and Dr Kwan provided beautiful koi shaped sweet rice cakes (although these were gobbled up too quickly to take a photo).

Many students asked Ms Man to write them wishes for good fortune and good grades on traditional red lucky paper in Cantonese, and are pictured showing them off proudly in the photos above. Some of our native Hong Kong students helped Miss Wu to write some of these as well, seeing as her Cantonese writing skills have gotten a bit rusty!  

Hong Kong society provides a great opportunity for students who have recently come to England from Hong Kong, or even those just with family ties to Hong Kong, to meet and socialise with others with a shared culture and language. Not only this, but all students are welcome, whether they are from Hong Kong or not; it was lovely to see students from all cultures sharing their own new year’s celebrations and finding similarities in their festivities.

Many thanks to the students who came by (even just for the sweets) and we hope to hold a session of Hong Kong Society at least once a month. Many thanks as well to Ms Man, Dr Kwan, Mr Lau, Ms Yuen and Ms Fung, with whose support allowed this session to run so smoothly and successfully.

Wishing everyone a happy and prosperous year of the snake. Kung hei fat choi!