On Thursday the 5th, FHS hosted its annual Culture Fest – in the past, it was known as Mini-Juneteenth Day. This time, we celebrated just about every culture there is. Around the main commons you could find different varieties of food and cultural traditions. I had the opportunity of volunteering to man the Japanese booth. With the help of a few of my fellow Japanese classmates we were able to set up a pretty decent booth towards the front of the room. We brought in traditional Japanese onigiri, which are rice balls with soy sauce and some seasonings. Sometimes they contain what are pickled plums inside, but these ones did not. Visitors could have the option of wrapping nori seaweed around the onigiri, but they weren’t required to. Or, they could just have the seaweed on its own. Unfortunately I didn’t have the opportunity to taste test these delicacies because they were for visitors of our stand.
We also brought traditional Japanese clothes from class, which were the kimono and yukata. We didn’t wear the kimono because there were too many different pieces and there is a certain traditional way of putting on these clothes. Kids could come by as well and play with the kendama, which is the Japanese version of the cup game. Basically, a ball is attached to the wooden part by a string, and you need to flick the ball to get it on a small point. It’s more frustrating than it sounds, trust me. But it was a good way to keep people entertained.
I had the opportunity to ask a fellow volunteer and friend, Nadia Estrada(who was working on the Bolivia stand near me with her sister Jiana) about her experiences and thoughts about the Culture Fest. Bolded are my questions, and italicized are Nadia’s responses.
Overall what did you think of the event?
I was really surprised by how many people attended and was really pleased with how legitimately interested they seemed about all the cultures presented. It was really cool to see everyone come together to create an event that brought students and the community together.
Is there anything you’d want different for next year?
I would want to somehow make the passports for the kids so that they actually had to listen to the presentations instead of just a stamp and go, because then they aren’t learning anything.
What was your favorite part?
My favorite part was the dancing performances, Senor Mac’s friend’s guitar performance, and the fashion show was groovy too.
Can you describe some of the things you did volunteering?
So I helped in the planning and organization of the event (I mean so did almost everyone else) by giving my input on possible ideas and how we would run them and possible solutions to issues we would encounter. I also ran the Bolivia booth with Jiana where we had a poster board that had a bunch of information about Bolivia (the indigenous culture, music, etc) and brought artifacts that we had from our relatives in Bolivia. We also brought some Bolivian food – alfajores (like a shortbread cookie with caramel cream in the middle (cajeta)) and cocads (a coconut candy with sweetened condensed milk).
Any thing else you would like to add?
It was really nice to see all the hard work that everyone, especially Mrs. DeClark, put into the event and how much it paid off for everything there because of how well it turned out. I was super impressed and I hope we can make it even better for next year.
I’d like to thank all of the volunteers who came along with me and everyone who came to attend our Culture Fest! Also a big thanks for Nadia once again for the interview! I’m looking forward to coming next year as an alumni.