On May 20th, Abington Senior High School’s Asian Student Association (ASA) held our school’s first Asian Festival. As any foreign language or art student was welcome to attend, I eagerly signed up and had high expectations for the event. The Asian Festival is an authentic way for students to learn about various cultures and respect the diverse backgrounds of our Abington students, and I hope to see it become an annual event for our school.

Upon first entering the LGI (where the event was held), I could see the dedication put in by all of the club members through the strings of handcrafted paper cranes hanging from the ceiling. Each of the booths was also decorated to showcase cultural aspects of its activity.

This year, the festival featured the following booths: mask-making, origami, Chinese lanterns, dalgona, pookalam, ddakji, wish shrine, calligraphy, chopsticks activity, Kahoot!, and food. Out of these, my personal favorite was the Chinese Lanterns Booth because I enjoyed decorating my own paper lantern and admiring other people’s artistic designs. Some of my other favorite booths were the Ddakji Booth and Chopsticks Activity Booth because the games allowed you to compete with your friends while also understanding more about Asian traditions.

I was also pleased with the food served at the event as it included a variety of dishes that originated from different parts of Asia, such as egg rolls from China, samosas from India, mochi donuts from Japan, dalgona from South Korea, and fresh spring rolls from Vietnam. It was impressive to see that some of the foods were prepared by volunteers themselves.

Although I was unable to attend every booth, a booth I wish I could have also visited was the Origami Booth. Walking around the festival, I saw many people proudly sharing their creations with those around them.

The only issue was the initial overcrowding in the LGI, which made it difficult to walk around and access different booths; however, after some time, the line at each booth subsided so that other students could participate. The idea of handing out stamp sheets that were stamped at each booth was a creative idea that allowed visitors to keep track of which booths they already visited so that every student could have a chance.

Overall, I enjoyed learning about and participating in various Asian activities, and I hope that the Asian Festival becomes a major annual event at Abington that all students are allowed to participate in!