(Photo/Shao Dan)

Giant Spring Festival couplets, measuring 15 meters in length and two meters in width, were unveiled at the Zhonghua Gate in Nanjing on January 21 in the run-up to the Chinese New Year.

For nine consecutive years, Nanjing has been hosting such celebrations, innovatively integrating the 650-year-old City Wall, a UNESCO heritage site, with traditional elements like calligraphy, couplets and folk customs.

The event is jointly organized by the Publicity Department of the CPC Nanjing Municipal Committee, Xinhua Daily Media Group, Nanjing Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism, and the Jiangsu Branch of the Bank of China.

Since the launch in September 2023, the event received more than 10,000 pairs of rhythmic, auspicious verses over one month. The contributors include overseas Chinese from the United States, Canada, Malaysia and other countries, ranging from an 86-year-old to a post-90 individual who created English couplets.

Six experts and cultural figures collaborated to select the best entries for the City Wall’s 13 gates. They were then penned by 13 invited calligraphy masters.

During the activity to unveil the Spring Festival couplets at the Zhonghua Gate, calligraphers joined international students from countries like Morocco, Pakistan, Myanmar, Kenya and Yemen writing the Chinese character “fu,” which means happiness and good fortune.