The fourth Eggroll Festival on November 4 was kicked off at 11 am on the University Common and Poster Street smoothly, thanks to the good weather that day. Dr. Flora Chang was invited to open the ceremony, who did not cut ribbons like most ceremonies of this nature. Instead, there were many eggroll shaped building blocks that Dr. Chang had to remove so as to signal the official opening of the festival. Dr. Chang was impressed by this creative idea as well as the rockets launching competition that was arranged right after the ceremony. All the rockets were assembled by students themselves, and the secret of the best launch lies not so much with the design, but the angle of the launch, according to the participants from the Department of Electrical Engineering.

Another feature of this year’s festival was its Japanesque overtone. For example, all the staff working on the festival wore Japanese-style clothing and the decorations as well most food sold at the fun fair were all Japanese. Specifically, there was a Shinto-style shrine installed on one corner of the venue, with one wall for students to hang their wishes. What students needed to do was to go to the “shrine”, ring a bell, make a wish, and then draw a prize from a big bag. In this way, they would get a present and the opportunity to make a wish. Who knows, the wish may come true. This proved to be an excellent idea as at the end of the day, as over a thousand wishes written in colorful paper were hung on the wall. Since it was near the mid-term exam, one can imagine that most wishes would be for good grades at the test.

The mascot of the festival—little Eggie (Dan-dan), paraded up and down the Poster Street for at least three times and yet some people still could not get enough of it. They all wanted to have photographs taken with it and small kids were all over it. Another thing that people seemed could not get enough of was the colorful balloons, believe it or not.

With the nice weather, the Student Association organized an ice-cream vendor with a traditional horn that was popular 20 years ago to beckon students with its delicious offerings. The long waiting line and the sound of the horn makes you feel that summer is back again. (~ Ying-hsueh Hu )