Israel has been my home away from home for two years, so I basically missed Lunar New Year with my family twice. However, I could always recreate it anywhere I went. For more explanations about Lunar New year in Vietnam, aka Tet, please visit: https://www.tripsavvy.com/what-is-tet-1458357

Our Lunar New Years were always epic. We had to wake up early and were allowed to skip classes because we had to cook Vietnamese food for 2,000 students in the green village where our high school is located. We were so stressed to finish the vegetarian pho and the Vietnamese dessert “che” to serve them on time. Our dishes was probably not that good since we had to find alternatives for Vietnamese tropical ingredients, but at least our friends have a general idea of Vietnamese gastronomy. Not only did we feed our guests, we also entertained them. We spent a few white nights to choreograph shadow dancing by using left-over art material and borrowing a lamp from our friend. As shadow dancing is quite exotic to Israeli audience, our show turned out much more successful than we expected:

We, the Vietnamese, did not prepare our Tet alone. We received help from our international friends. My Israeli friend spent two weeks to study a whole song in Vietnamese to sing a duet with me. Though he never learnt Vietnamese before, his Vietnamese singing was impeccable on the day of our performance, so we received a standing ovation from the whole village: