August 15, 2011 – Last weekend (Aug 13 & 14), CCIP students participated in the annual Dragon Boat Festival held at the Flushing Meadows Corona Park in Flushing, Queens in New York City.

The weather on Saturday at the event was wonderful. Students were able to fully enjoy everything the festival had to offer. Sunday's weather was much less pleasant. However, when Sunday's teams were asked if they wanted to stay home, they insisted on attending, regardless of the rain.

CCIP students fielded teams of paddlers and pitted themselves against professional racers each day of the festival. While they raced competitively, the students did not pull out a victory. However, the weekend was still a resounding success for all of the student-racers and student-volunteers, as well as the CCIP program as a whole. The entire weekend was a great experience for them and offered many team-building opportunities.

"We really are all in the same boat and have done a great job! We overcame the challenges of the bad weather and the experienced competitors and successfully showed the passion and the team spirit of a bunch of Asian students. I was deeply touched by their courage and determination. We are really proud of our 17 dragon boat team members," said Terence Chen (Team manager) of the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Ronald Lai (Team Captain) of the University of Hong Kong.

Other CCIP participants volunteered at the event, working at the VIP tents. Some of the students attracted quite a crowd, teaching and painting with children at the festival. The most popular design was Dragon Boats painted on to fans handed out to attendees.

The festival brought out some important people, such as Assemblywoman Grace Meng, who is also a host company in CCIP, Councilman Daniel J. Halloran Ⅲ, Councilman James Gennaro, New York State Senator Toby Ann Stavisky, etc.

Councilman Gennaro enjoyed the custom t-shirts CCIP students were wearing and was lucky enough to go home with one of his own. Councilman Gennaro and Assemblywoman Meng were kind enough to pose for a photo with the students, as did State Senator Toby Stavisky, who sent also congratulated CCIP students on another successful year with a formal letter to CCIP students.

CCIP would like to thank all of the students who participated throughout the weekend for their dedication. Your hard work and time were very much appreciated and the day could not have been as fun or successful without you:

Volunteers: Ryan Cheuk Ming Cheung, Sam Lou Kuok, Hoi Ying Mak, Yiou Zhu

Manager: Ke Chen

Captain and Co-Captains: Chuk Man Lai, Yun Shi, Kai Yan

Paddlers: Pindan Hao, Jingyuan Liu, Siu Wang Chong, Dan Hu, Hanzhang Yin, Fengjun Zhang, Kai Song, Amy Li, King Wai Shing, Chiu Chun Li, Ho Yan Chu, To Cheong Mok, Ruiyang Tang, Mingzhe Li