On Saturday, October 25th, 2014 I attended the 34th Annual Asian Festival with Brynne Cowley. The event took place at the Century II Convention Hall, located at 225 W Douglas Ave, Wichita, KS 67202. It started at 5:30 pm and ended at 10:00 pm. The event was sponsored by the Wichita Asian Association. I choose this event in hopes to learn about the Asian culture. I feel this culture gets overlooked in the United States and is a victim of many stereotypes. In order to break down these stereotypes, it becomes important to gain knowledge of the culture. After educating ourselves, we can then pass on the education.
I first heard about the Asian Festival through Wichita’s website, gowichita.com. The festival has its own Facebook page, facebook.com/WichitaAsianFestival, …show more content…
Already I was stepping out of my comfort zone. I expected the majority of the attendees would be a part of the Asian culture. Pleasantly, several cultures were represented. With this many people, lines formed at every booth. I choose to take this time and ask some people why they came and how they heard about the event. When we got up to the booths, I had a few minutes to talk to the people behind them. All regions were represented; China, Vietnam, Philippines, plus many others. The booths that held my attention the most were the art booths. As an artist, educating oneself of different culture’s art can be a very important tool. The other room filled with dances and music of the traditional Asian culture. The group 's performance dances like the Traditional Western Laos Dance and Vietnamese Fan Dance. Most of these performances were full of life. I found it interesting that they kept the audience involved by asking questions and pulling some volunteers on the stage to learn new dances. During the Laos dances, they asked for people to come up and try out one of the dances. Bryan and I participated in one of the dances. Of course, I had to try the food. We went around all the booths sampling different foods from all regions. My favorite had to be the Indian tacos. I wanted to make a learning experience from the food also. If I came across something I …show more content…
There were resources for anyone who wanted to know more about the community; however, I noticed that most did not choose to use it as such. This event has become known for its delicious food. Most people attended the festival for this reason only. Of course, it becomes a good thing for the businesses and the Asian community. The festival brings in a good amount of revenue, but I feel it has solely became just that. Instead, I feel the community should use it as an opportunity to educate others. Some of the booths seemed very stereotypical. For instance, quite a few of the art booths had items for sale, like bags and journals, that one could tell were not made by hand or from the Asian culture. This disappointed me. Also, at many booths the workers rushed you along pretty quickly. Instead, I was hoping that they would engage in conversation with the attendees. This could possibly give people the opportunity to ask questions, and in turn, give the workers an opportunity to express who they are. How they arranged the booths did not contribute to the learning experience. All the information and art booths lined the outer edge of the food booths. Navigating these booths were difficult. The placement of the informational booths made it easy for people to go to all the food booths and not even realized these booths were there. I wished the performances were more interactive. They gave the audience a
I first heard about the Asian Festival through Wichita’s website, gowichita.com. The festival has its own Facebook page, facebook.com/WichitaAsianFestival, …show more content…
Already I was stepping out of my comfort zone. I expected the majority of the attendees would be a part of the Asian culture. Pleasantly, several cultures were represented. With this many people, lines formed at every booth. I choose to take this time and ask some people why they came and how they heard about the event. When we got up to the booths, I had a few minutes to talk to the people behind them. All regions were represented; China, Vietnam, Philippines, plus many others. The booths that held my attention the most were the art booths. As an artist, educating oneself of different culture’s art can be a very important tool. The other room filled with dances and music of the traditional Asian culture. The group 's performance dances like the Traditional Western Laos Dance and Vietnamese Fan Dance. Most of these performances were full of life. I found it interesting that they kept the audience involved by asking questions and pulling some volunteers on the stage to learn new dances. During the Laos dances, they asked for people to come up and try out one of the dances. Bryan and I participated in one of the dances. Of course, I had to try the food. We went around all the booths sampling different foods from all regions. My favorite had to be the Indian tacos. I wanted to make a learning experience from the food also. If I came across something I …show more content…
There were resources for anyone who wanted to know more about the community; however, I noticed that most did not choose to use it as such. This event has become known for its delicious food. Most people attended the festival for this reason only. Of course, it becomes a good thing for the businesses and the Asian community. The festival brings in a good amount of revenue, but I feel it has solely became just that. Instead, I feel the community should use it as an opportunity to educate others. Some of the booths seemed very stereotypical. For instance, quite a few of the art booths had items for sale, like bags and journals, that one could tell were not made by hand or from the Asian culture. This disappointed me. Also, at many booths the workers rushed you along pretty quickly. Instead, I was hoping that they would engage in conversation with the attendees. This could possibly give people the opportunity to ask questions, and in turn, give the workers an opportunity to express who they are. How they arranged the booths did not contribute to the learning experience. All the information and art booths lined the outer edge of the food booths. Navigating these booths were difficult. The placement of the informational booths made it easy for people to go to all the food booths and not even realized these booths were there. I wished the performances were more interactive. They gave the audience a