HAPPY New Year.

Students from Huddersfield University’s Chinese and Vietnamese society celebrated the Spring Festival yesterday.

Fireworks, kung fu and the ancient tradition of a lion dance helped mark the year of the dragon..

The Spring Festival signals the start of the lunar calendar, which still determines holidays for China, Vietnam, Japan and India.

The start of the new year is based on the patterns of the moon and this year it fell on January 23.

President of the Chinese Society Sheng Yue Zeng said: “We wanted to show other students at the university a little bit of our culture and wanted them to share in the Spring Festival experience.

“We have 600 members in the Chinese society and as the university’s rank is increasing so does the amount of international students.

“This is the first year that we have had the celebration with the Vietnamese society and we have a fantastic partnership.

“We had stalls all day, which had food such as dumplings and also sold Chinese knots and lanterns.

“At the society, we work hard to honour our traditions and we also celebrate Chinese Valentines Day, Mid-Autumn Day and the Lantern Festival.”

The society had also organised a talent show, which took place at Huddersfield Town Hall last night.