Lancaster University Confucius Institute was invited to be involved in Campus in the City, to provide a taster of Chinese culture to local people.

Campus in the City (CITC) is a five week project, which sees Lancaster University’s world class research brought to life in an informal and accessible setting in St Nicholas Arcades, centrally placed in Lancaster, to be accessible to local people.

The Confucius Institute prepared several fabulous sessions, including a traditional Chinese Tea Ceremony, Paper-cutting, Calligraphy, and Chinese Language tasters, for all visitors to take part in on Thursday 8th March. We were joined by groups from both the International Office, and Lancaster City Council, who both provided their own attractions.

During the day, Professor Bob Liu, our Chinese Director, provided a fascinating introduction to some of the intricacies of Chinese Tea Art. Undoubtedly our most popular attraction, it allowed us to gain interest from people simply hoping to escape the cold weather, and would often end with a great set of conversations between our staff and visitors. People showed interest in everything from Chinese language, the Tea Ceremony, famous attractions in China, places they'd visited or wanted to go, and many other topics.

Additionally, our volunteers offered a Chinese Calligraphy taster lesson for visitors to write their name or some meaningful sentences, such as ‘Happy Mother’s Day’. This is regularly a popular event we can offer, and this day was no exception. Visitors really enjoyed creating their own masterpiece with Chinese brushes. Meanwhile, a set of wonderfully made arts & craft pieces, created by Tiffany Liu, one of our teachers, also received much attention. Even though Tiffany could only make a brief visit during the day, she managed to wow a number of people with her skills creating bracelets, and some brilliantly coloured butterflies, demonstrating some rather intricate designs, created in the same style as traditional Chinese Knots.

We love opportunities like Campus in the City, as it gives us a chance to directly be involved with local people, and explain who we are and what we do- both as the Confucius Institute, and for the wider University. From the responses we received from local people throughout the day, it seems that events like these that directly interact with the community are very popular. Hopefully we can continue to be involved with events such as this in the future.