The national cultural event for 2026 themed “Our Festival, the Lantern Festival” was recently held in Qingdao as a demonstration event in Shandong Province. A vivid picture of celebrations for the Year of the Horse was unfolded amid the hustle and bustle.

The demonstration event featured the co-existence of the sense of reunion in the traditional Lantern Festival, cultural heritage in Shandong Province and the century-old folk fair on candied hawthorns in Qingdao.

The Qingdao Hai Yun An Square, the main venue of the event, bustled with people. Children sat on their parent’s shoulders, savoring every mouthful of sweet candied hawthorns. Among the throng, quite a lot young people launched live video streaming on their mobile phones, and invited a continuous wave of such online comments as “New Year vibes in Qingdao are so strong”. Sweet dumplings of all flavors were highly popular. Sweet dumplings filled with seafood, Majiagou celery, Jiaozhou cabbage and calcium milk biscuit were so eye-catching that a great many citizens and tourists stopped to have a taste. The interaction and experience area was set up for the first time in the intangible heritage and handicraft division. Representative inheritors of intangible cultural heritage instructed how to do rubbing of the Chinese character “Fu” (happiness), paint with sugar and make dough modelling.

In Shinan District, a special Lantern Festival event was held, where many residents came to guess lantern riddles and make lanterns. In Laoshan District, a dazzling array of folk art performances were staged one after another, getting citizens immersed in strong festive atmosphere. (Yu Ruixin）

Foreign students studying in China see first-hand Chinese folk customs. By Wang Shan