大家好！很长时间没有更新了，在这篇博客里我将会为大家说说关于圣诞和新年假期在萨里的一些趣事，虽然已经过去很久了，但还是很希望能够与大家分享关于萨里生活的一切。
Hi everyone, it’s been a long time that I away from blogging, so now I come back and bring you with some of my fascinating experiences and stories about how did I spend my time for both Xmas and New Year holiday. Though it’s been weeks after that, I still want to share with you guys about the colorful life in Surrey and hope that can inspire you.
整体来说，学校的圣诞与新年假期会持续两周多，一般在12月中下旬开始，来年元月10号左右开学。圣诞假期在西方文化中如同中国的春节和中秋，是属于家庭团聚、朋友欢庆的时刻，是一年中最为放松和快乐的日子；紧接着，伴随着人群的欢呼声，开始倒计时，在璀璨的烟花下迎接新年的到来，释放与发泄过去一年中所有的压力和不快，同时也鼓舞和激励自己已在新的一年里有所突破和成就。萨里大学作为一个年轻人聚集的地方，在圣诞与新年假期前后展现了一副截然不同的画面，在放假前由于大家刚完成学期里3/4的作业和考试，所以轻松欢快的气氛充斥在校园里的每一个角落，与之后假期校园“腾空”后的安静与假期归来后准备期末考试的忙碌形成了鲜明的对比。
Generally, the Xmas and New Year holiday together can last 2 more weeks and normally starts since the mid-to-late of December and end up around the 10th of January of next year. Xmas time, like the Spring Festival and Mid-autumn Festival in China, stands for the moment of family reunion and the gathering with friends in western culture, which marks the most relax and joyful time throughout the year. Shortly after that, accompanied by the cheers from the crowd, everyone celebrates, counts down and welcomes the new year amid the splendid firework, people were inspiring themselves to strive more advancements in the new year whilst releasing all the unhappiness and pressures of the last year. When we move our sights to The University of Surrey, you’ll find there’s a sharp contrast before and after the Xmas holiday. Prior to the holiday, most of the students just finished 3/4 of their coursework and exams and then make the relax atmosphere fill out each corner of the uni, which sharply against another scene that people are exceptionally busy dealing with their final exams when they come back.
圣诞节的庆祝活动实际上会持续很长时间，包含一系列不同活动。在吉尔福德，从十一月中旬开始节日氛围就愈加浓厚,圣诞礼品开始在各大商店出售，温馨的装饰点缀在城镇街道的每一个角落。
Xmas celebrations actually last a long time period and contain a set of different events. In Guildford, the warm Xmas ambiance was getting stronger since the middle of November and each store was well-decorated in Xmas style alongside the street.
在11月21日，市中心的高街上点亮了纵贯一条街的圣诞灯，伴随着大街另一端的烟火，熙熙攘攘的人群一起一起欢呼，见证着这一冬日里的温馨时刻。说实话，我从未在吉尔福德这个安静的小城镇见过如此多的人群，因为圣诞点灯仪式把大家聚在了一起。
On the 21st of November, the light switch-on ceremony was initialized at the high street. Suspended Xmas lights were all lighted up and basically filled out the main street, then followed by the fascinating fireworks, which literally cheered the town up through bustling crowd that might contain thousands and hundreds of people that I never have seen before.
西方在圣诞节有个很重要的仪式就是在圣诞聚餐时与亲人、朋友或同事一起交换礼物，名为“圣诞老人的秘密”，当然我的宿舍里连同圣诞节聚餐，也举行了这个有意思的活动。我们使用一种类似于抽签的app来随机决定你要给予礼物的那个人，在预算内购买什么样的礼物由你来决定,但是你不能告诉别人你要把礼物送给谁。同样的，你的送礼人也无从而知，所以这个仪式会被叫做“圣诞老人的秘密”。
There’s a special event in the western culture called ‘Secret Santa’ which simply means the Xmas gift exchange among family members, friends and colleagues. Of course, we had this event during our Xmas time by using a lucky-draw alike app to randomly choose the person that you going to be sending the gift within a certain budget. However, the name of the gift-giver shouldn’t be revealed, that’s why this activity is given the name of ‘Secret Santa’.
值得一提的是，学校的宿舍委员会为了使得圣诞假期更为有趣，促进室友邻里关系，同时宣传垃圾循环利用与可再生资源使用，举办了宿舍圣诞装饰比赛。比赛规定，在一个宿舍区内，以宿舍为单位利用循环再生材料来装饰宿舍的公共区域。我们宿舍应该是响应号召最积极的一个，提前一周就开始准备。在这一周里，大家脑洞大开，集思广益，用自己的动手能力做出了各种可爱又精巧的装饰品。结果毫无悬念，我们宿舍拿到了Surrey Court区内的第一名，而且被奖励了价值70磅的Tesco购物券！真的非常开心！在每天结束学习工作的晚间时刻，在家一起进行手工制作，让每个人都感觉像是在一个家庭一样，通过我们的装饰，让这个家庭变得更加温馨。
It’s also worth mentioning that the accommodation office launched a Xmas decoration campaign for all uni students in order to add more fun for the Xmas time and facilitating friendship among flat members, then promote the idea of using recyclable and sustainable materials. The basic rule of the campaign is, try to use recyclable materials as much as you could find and reshape or reconfigure them into a certain Xmas ‘artwork’, then put them on appropriate position in the public area of the flat such as kitchen. I firmly believe that my flat is the one that most actively participate this competition and even start works one week ahead, during this period, almost everyone who living with me work and gather different innovative ideas together. Therefore, without any doubt, we won the top prize of the campaign and got the 70 pounds worth shopping voucher from Tesco! It’s truly very aspiring and joyful! More importantly, during this process everyone decorating our home together after the whole day’s work or study, making our home warmer via Xmas decoration, which gives a pretty authentic true family-feeling for us.
Tesco70磅的购物券被我们用来采购各种食物材料，在圣诞聚餐前，大家从下午开始就一起制作食物，如Pizza，Lasagna，Brownie等。晚餐前我们进行了礼物交换仪式，充满着愉快甚至些许“恶搞”的气氛，礼物各式各样，而大家都在猜测自己的送礼人是谁。来自意大利，在GSA 学习表演的女孩Georgia即兴给大家来了一段舞蹈和感恩致辞，增加了欢快的氛围。随着晚餐的结束，party开始了，伴随着音乐，一时间，宿舍仿佛如“迪厅”一般，每个人都尽情的享受这一刻的欢乐。对于我们国际留学生来说，这样的聚会还被赋予着更多的含义，在异国他乡不再孤单，而是学会开始融入、体验浓郁的异域文化。
70 pounds Tesco voucher was used to buy loads of food ingredients before our Xmas dinner, and we were together to make a great variety of foods like Pizza, Lasagna, Brownie and so on. The gift exchange was really hilarious and everybody was guessing who is the gift giver for him or her. One of our flatmates, Georgia, who’s currently studying in GSA, presented an improvisational dance and gratitude speech, which gave us a more fun feeling of the dinner. Xmas dinner was followed by a joyful house party, for that moment, everyone feeling like the house is just like ‘a light pub’, everybody just very enjoyed in it and tried to get rid of the tired feeling of the whole year. For international students like us, the Xmas party has been given more meaning that not only you are no longer feel lonely, but more actively get involved, engage and study with a different cultural context.
