Lantern Festival

This year, February 28 marks the end of the 15 day celebration of Chinese New Year. The 15th day is also called Lantern Festival. One small village near our city is famous for its' celebration of Lantern Festival. On the three weekends of CNY, it is packed with nationals and tourists. So, on a weekNIGHT, Esther and I joined 3 other language students (one Japanese and two Americans) and our language teacher, Sabrina, and we headed to the mountains to see the beautiful site.
The two American students only arrived this past week and will only study in our city for one month, so they were quite excited to have a "cultural" experience. First, we stopped at many stores deciding which shape, size, and color lantern we wanted to purchase.
Then, we all took turns drawing pictures or writing short sayings and poems to decorate our lantern.
Then, we went outside with many other people to "light" our lantern and send it into the night time sky.

Then, we set it free.

Up....

Up....

And Up! Until the whole sky was filled with beautiful lights....reminding us at least that we are called to let HIS light shine all over our little island. (Above photo from the weekends when thousands of people send the lanterns into the night sky simultaneously.)