This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Aug. 22, 2013 - If you see Anna Crosslin at this weekend’s Festival of Nations, it will very likely be at a food booth. “I, like 80 percent of the people who attend the Festival of Nations, am most excited by the food,” says the executive director of the International Institute of St. Louis.
Yes, the performances are rich and diverse. Yes, the demonstrations share the skills of the world’s crafts people and artists. And yes, you can buy lots of really cool stuff.
“But in the end,” Crosslin says, “people come for the food.”
This year’s festival begins at 10 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 24, at Tower Grove Park, and runs through Sunday evening.
One of the festival’s aims is getting people involved and helping them see all the cultures within St. Louis, says Carmen Dence, a research associate professor of radiology at Washington University’s School of Medicine as well as a member of the festival’s organizing committee and a performer.
Dence, originally from Colombia, has been involved with the festival in its current form since it started in 2000, and before that when the festival was known as the International Folk Festival for a number of years.
Those early festivals had about 10,000 people, she says.
“Now, it’s a mini-city of more than 140,000 people over two days.”
Dence performs with Grupo Atlantico, which shares the culture, dance and music of the Caribbean, including Colombia’s Caribbean coast, where she’s from. Other members are from Puerto Rico, Cuba, Honduras, Nicaragua and even El Salvador, though its coastline is Pacific. Grupo Atlantico performs on the main stage at 4 p.m. Sunday. That same day at 2 p.m. it will offer dance lessons at the Village Green with lots of costumes, color and movement.
This weekend’s festival also includes an international bazaar, craft demonstrations, four stages with performances, as well as a Citizens Corner where newcomers can learn about how the U.S. government operates.
New this year is a collaboration with Interfaith Partnership of Greater St. Louis, which is offering World Religions, a place to learn about faiths practiced around the world.
And, of course, more than 40 ethnic food booths will make decisions difficult.
Dence is looking forward to Caribbean food.
“I have to say I’m biased, but I love the food vendors that are coming from the Caribbean Association,” says Dence. “They make a wonderful jerk chicken; and I love their Jamaican rum cake.”
Those booths offer more than just yummy goodness: The festival draws a huge young audience, and many families and people in St. Louis don’t have the opportunity to travel abroad. But they can come to the festival, Crosslin says, and try a few bites of something from such places as the Ivory Coast, Peru or Vietnam.
“It’s a way that they can immerse themselves in these cultures in a very introductory and enjoyable way,” she says.
About a quarter of the food booths are operated by nonprofits from St. Louis’ ethnic communities. Their sales during the festival, Crosslin says, account for a good portion of their funds for the year.
So the festival (and all those food booths) offers locals a taste of new places, she says, and immigrants the chance to share their cultures while supporting their organizations.
Crosslin, by the way, is looking forward to shish kabobs and rice with raisins from the Iranian American Cultural Society of the Midwest.
The International Institute is offering a free app for iPhones and Androids that can help people find those kabobs or the Caribbean jerk chicken, craft booths and performance times. Admission to the festival is free, and you can find the full schedule here.