The annual Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival is Harbin’s main tourist highlight. It is the world’s biggest winter festival. The     1     (bitter) cold winters are just right for this festival.

    2     sets the Harbin festival apart is the scale and size of the sculptures and the     3     (beauty) lighting. It is bigger than     4     ones in Sapporo, Norway, and Quebec.

At first, mainly Chinese participated, but in the last decade, it     5     (become) an international festival and     6     (compete). As the festival grows in international participation, and as China’s economy grows, the size of the snow sculptures and ice architecture exhibits keeps     7     (grow). The work going into making those exhibits is astonishing, and their size and beauty is amazing.

The lightning     8     (effect) on the huge ice sculptures in the Ice and Snow World are technologically complex.

Officially the festival     9     (hold) from the end of December through February. Opening dates keep changing, and ending dates partly depends     10     the weather.

The Sun Island Scenic Area will be opened from Dec. 21 to Feb. 28.