In 2025, Year of the Wood Snake is a symbol of transformation, intuition and wisdom, and also stealth and cunningness.
The snake is the sixth of the 12-year cycle of animals in the Chinese zodiac related to the Chinese calendar.
Festivities began on Wednesday this week and will run until February 16.
The Oamaru Chinese Association is doing things "differently" this year.
Instead of their traditional annual pot-luck event, they are hosting a buffet dinner for 50 guests at The Station Yuan restaurant on Saturday.
"We decided to do this in conjunction with The Station Yuan, because they’ve always wanted to help us do something and we thought we’d love to do something with them," association president Janice Burnett said.
People booked for the event were looking forward to the buffet to usher in good luck and prosperity.
"There’ll be fried rice, noodles, sweet and sour pork, and dumplings — all the staple favourites, it’ll be delicious."
Mrs Burnett said they were "very lucky" it was already sold out but the annual pot-luck dinner would be back for the mid-autumn festival in October.
The Station Yuan co-owner Tina Wang said celebrating Chinese culture and history was important to her family and they were keen to be a part of the Chinese New Year.
Ms Wang’s family are from Xi’an in northern China.
Mrs Burnett’s family are originally from Canton in southern China.
