As a last hurrah before the end of the semester, the Asian Student Alliance at Quinnipiac University decided to celebrate the holidays in a rather unique way.
On December 6, the small group of nine traveled to the Westfield Mall in Trumbull, Conn. for a Secret Santa extravaganza, as they call it. The idea is to grab a name of a group member out of the hat, keep it a secret and find a gift for them within an hour. After shopping, they met up in the food court to exchange the gifts they found for one another.
The group consists of people of various races including Indian, Chinese, Vietnamese, Mongolian and even Caucasians. Although the majority are from the United States, one of the members, Jiguur Ariunbold is an international student from Mongolia.
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
“This is actually the first time I’ve done anything like this,” said Ariunbold as he scoffed down some Asian cuisine from Sarku Japan, a fast-food restaurant in the mall. “I’ve never celebrated Christmas. No one really does in Mongolia.”
President Neha Malhotra, a junior at QU organized the event for a fun bonding experience before finals. This is the second year the group has done the gift exchange and she hopes to make it a tradition.
“The Secret Santa extravaganza is meant to bring everyone together and to have fun by giving fun gifts to each other,” said Malhotra. “It doesn’t matter what religion we are or what holiday we celebrate, it’s just nice to appreciate each other and our culture.”
As they should. According to the Quinnipiac website, only 3 percent of Quinnipiac students are of Asian descent and international students only make up 1 percent.
“ASA is a way for us to share our culture with the Quinnipiac community,” said freshman Jessica Malhotra. “There aren’t many of us at QU so it’s nice to unify and organize events.”
Members of the Asian Student Alliance at their Dragonfest event last spring.
The price range for the Secret Santa was 5 to 10 dollars and gifts they got each other included phone cases, clothes, scarves and more.
“It was fun,” said Ariunbold. “The decorations are really cool and it’s so different here.”
The Asian Student Alliance will reconvene in the spring semester and start planning for their next events which include Sumo for Kumo and Dragonfest.
Visit infogr.am to see the number of foreign students from Asia who study in the United States.
Sources for infogr.am information: http://mongolia.usembassy.gov/pr_111113.html
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304868404579190062164404756
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