34. Multicultural Festival at Isaac's High School

April 2, 2016

West African face paint at Green Hills Multicultural Festival

Isaac prepared pancakes, syrup and home-baked tortilla chips as his contribution to the Multicultural Festival at Green Hills Academy. It was bigger than I expected with the large gymnasium housing about 10 different countries, including the large Rwanda "area", which included three grass huts and a line of about 10 djembe drums. Spilling out on the the grassy hillside outside the gymnasium were more countries - India, Australia/New Zealand, Kenya, West Africa, Uganda. It had a bit of an "ice cream social" feel, as you had to buy tokens which in turn are used for food.

Poster for the Multicultural Festival

There were such delicious options for food! The France group had everything: croissants, baguettes, many quiches and an entire creperie set-up by the Kimi Gourmand restaurant. The Germany group had authentic pastries and breads from the La Gallette bakery in town -- Americaner, Berliner, Apfelkuchen, Dunkelbrot and real whole-grain Broetchen! Not surprisingly, we were very attracted to this one and spent a fair amount of time as family there. Well -- minus Isaac. Isaac seemed to dissolve into the woodwork soon after Ruth Ann brought him at 10am. He dropped off the things he had made and started tossing the football with some friends inside the gym, and then he disappeared. The Polish booth was interesting, too. They had a fascinating story about a Polish man who biked the length of the African continent in the 1930's and even had photos of him meeting the last Rwandan king.

With Naomi's friend, Aisha, and Eric, a master's student from Ruth Ann's project.

But what was truly fun for us was the fact that the constellation of countries represented was so different than what one would see in the US. Burundi and Congo had substantial booths. Sudan, Ethiopia and Somalia had a joint-booth with great food, authentic clothing, photos, crafts. Kenya, Uganda and India had very large and elaborate booths. It felt much more like I was learning something and seeing new things than I usually feel at these types of events.

The finale of the program was the Rwandan dancing. The large troupe of young people had obviously trained well. The enthusiasm and energy of the large audience of parents and siblings watching the dancing, singing and drumming was what really got the excitement level high. In terms of music, it was also treat to hear the Green Hills band play Michael Jackson's "Thriller"!  John and I were the only ones in our group who could really appreciate that one! Didn't get that one taped, unfortunately. The video below is a snippet of their rendition of "When the Saints Go Marching In." One of the few American tunes that probably has been enjoyed more than "Thriller"!