LBCC Students and staff celebrated International culture day with food, games, and live performances of cultural art from around the world passed down through tradition at LAC on Nov. 19.
The cultural performances started off with three drummers that brought the beautiful sounds of Africa to LBCC, Kosi Williams, Micheal Knight and Ashutu Johnson.
One of the drummers, Kosi Williams of the Dembrebrah Drum and Dance Ensemble, stopped playing the drum in the middle of the performance to do a West African dance to the beat of the drum.
“Drums were made for the king,” Williams said, and then asked for a volunteer to join him in the dance.
No one in the audience was willing to dance with Williams except one brave LBCC hospitality management student, Ilham Fauzee, who came up in front of the crowd and danced as Williams guided him step by step.
“It was fun, I could feel the energy,” Fauzee said. “It was very inviting, I felt comfortable and the performance was nice for this event.”
They both were in tune with the drum as the dance went on and the crowd applauded for Fauzee when Williams commanded.
“Everyone give him a round of applause, that took a lot of courage,” Wlliams said.
Johnson has been an African drum teacher for 43 years.
Ashutu Johnson plays the African drums on stage at the Intercultural Festival on Nov. 19, 2024 at LBCC’s Liberal Arts Campus.(Tenoa J. Stewart)
“This is how we release ourselves, unity is in the power of the drums that we all play together,” Johnson said.
The African drums that were played are called the “Bata,” “Djembe” and the “Dun Dun.”
Each drum is hand crafted and are a huge part of African culture that dates back to the 12th Century from Guinea West Africa.
“We just came back from Africa and we all took the time to go back to our roots,” Knight said.
A Chinese traditional opera called “Bian Lian” which means “face-changing” was performed by Wei Qi.
Qi would cover his face and quickly change between several colorful masks almost like a magic trick.
Qi also performed a type of called shadow puppetry, where he made a small puppet appear above his shoulder as if it had come out of thin air and had the puppet change his own mask so quickly you would think it was alive.
For his grand exit, Qi ended the show with special effects and the puppet spit a flame from out of its mouth.
A Japanese drum performance by Joann Matsunaga, Miki Jimenez and Katrina Shibata, who all played in synchronization, thrilled the crowd as the beat of the drum changed when they artfully switched around to different drums.
“We have a standard version of Omatsuri but we rearranged it to spice it up,” Jimenez said to the crowd.
Omatsuri is a Japanese word that means “festival.”
The drums’ ferocity sounded like thunderclaps as the performers continued onstage and students pulled out their phones to record the thunderous display.
Miki Jimenez (left) plays the Japanese style drums along with Joann Matsunaga on Tuesday Nov. 19, 2024 at LBCC’s Liberal Arts Campus. (Tenoa J. Stewart)
“‘Miyake’ is the proper name of the performance but ‘Omatsuri’ is our standard version of it,” Matsunuga said.
Aside from the performances, student clubs set up their booths along with organizations such as the Sister Cities of Long Beach to join in on the festivities.
Sister Cities of Long Beach is an city-sponsored non-profit that maintains Long Beach’s connection to various “sister cities” across the globe.
The point of the sister cities program’s aim is to promote global diplomacy, encouraging American cities to create bonds with international cities to celebrate appreciate cultural differences.
Long Beach has six sister cities: Yokkaichi, Japan; Mombasa, Kenya; Qingdao, China; Phnom Penh, Cambodia; Sochi, Russia; and Taoyuan, Taiwan.
“The International culture festival is a chance to educate yourself on the diversity of cultures and traditions,” student Jennifer Cortez said.
Cortez wore a kimono that many students and staff also wore along with some of the performers.
The LBCC Bistro brought a taste of different cultural cuisine to students and staff with
Cambodian chicken and rice porridge, Mexican vegetarian pozole verde, pumpkin ginger soup, French crepes topped with whipped cream and Japanese dango drizzled with caramel.
Jun Wallech and Isis Nolasco, representatives from Sister Cities of Long Beach, came to support the event and had things to say about the cultural cuisine too.
“The porridge is more than good, it was very savory and we are really glad to have this opportunity to showcase international Culture day at LBCC,” Wallech said.
“Pozole is my favorite Mexican dish so it was excellent,” Nolasco added.
The International cultural event gave many student clubs a chance to raise funds by selling things such as baked goods and organizations an opportunity to present the community resources they have to offer.
LBCC students, Situa Eteuati and Esemaiai Lemusu, of the Pacific Island student association (PISA) sold Samoan coconut bread with coconut jam and hot cocoa to raise funds for their student club.
“This is our broke meal, the type of food we grew up eating,” Lemusu said.
The PISA club welcomes all students to join and who are interested in learning about their culture.
“You don’t have to identify as being polynesian to join our club and we are just trying to spread our culture around,” Eteuati said.
Violeta Leones from Pacific Asian Counseling Services of LA passed out pamphlets about an outreach program that provides resources for Cambodians, like mental health stability, help with Immigration status, and workshops in the community.
“We promote stop-hate community workshops and lead people to the right places,” Leones said.