Ringing In the Rabbit

Little girls in glittery red outfits, shaking their tambourines to the beat of Chinese music, ushered in the Year of the Rabbit at John A. Sutter Junior High School on Saturday morning.

“This will be a big year. The rabbit will deliver the new century,” said Candy Lee, a parent and the master of ceremonies. “So it’s a big celebration.”

Following a lunar calendar, the Year of the Rabbit arrives every 12 years. This year, Chinese New Year begins at sunset Feb. 16. To celebrate, students of the Sun Yat Sen Chinese Institute sang, performed folk dances and gave a kung fu demonstration Saturday. The institute uses the junior high school for its activities and classes on Saturdays.

As part of the Chinese New Year tradition, dozens of “lucky red envelopes” filled with money were handed out to guests at the celebration.

Wearing a silk dress with flowers, Janet Huynh, 13, of West Hills said she recently began taking Cantonese at the institute.

She eagerly awaited her turn to go on stage as part of a fan dance, followed by a Chinese techno music number.

That’s right, techno.

“The principal permitted jazzy hip-hop music,” Janet explained. “It’ll be cool.”

Named for the Chinese statesman and revolutionary leader, the Sun Yat Sen Institute is based in Rosemead.

Its Canoga Park branch is the only Chinese school in the San Fernando Valley that offers different levels of Cantonese, said Eva Tang, who teaches the meditative exercise regimen of tai chi chuan at the institute.

Sun Yat Sen’s 180 students can take classes in Mandarin, art, brush painting and kung fu, she said. High school students enrolled in language classes can earn high school credits, she said.

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“A lot of them don’t want to learn Chinese, but they take art,” Tang said. “We arrange the curriculum so they don’t suffer three hours of Chinese lessons. They can learn what they want.”

Sharon Vuong, 19, a former Sun Yat Sen student who is now at UCLA, said she took three years of Cantonese at the institute.

“I want to go into business, so having a second language comes in handy,” said Vuong, of Porter Ranch. “For kids growing up in America, stuck between two cultures, if you don’t put emphasis on your own culture you lose it.”

Sharon’s sister Karen, 14, is taking Mandarin.

“When I started [in] American schools, I lost fluency. It’s a good refresher course,” Karen said. “It reminds you of who you are.”