What a view. If you asked me if I'd ever take my daughter to the park dressed in her Afghan clothes, I would have said- are you kidding? But here's the evidence. I did. [Thanks to last week's Eid celebration where we got the kids outfitted for the holiday.] So here we are this weekend, at the Plano International Festival at Haggard Park, dressed to represent their Mother's origin. Other locals dressed up their kids from their native clothes and students from area schools performed live dances in the gazebo.
Plano is soaked with diverse cultures, and it was nice seeing the global faces enjoying the great weather and music. Children were running around with "passports" and having vendors stamp their national seals. Polish hot dogs, gyros, and homemade ice-cream had everyone picnicking on the lawn. Noah didn't like the hummus, but he tried it anyway.
It was packed and hopping. Mom got stopped by an event coordinator and asked if Ava could do their fashion show next year... Delighted, my Mom accepted on her behalf. The afternoon was fun - but my most favorite moment was watching Ava play on the playground... with another Afghan girl nearby...
and I could only wonder... if this is what our life would be like... if things were different in Afghanistan 30 years ago... and we never left...
After we were finished at the festival and on our way home we were already brainstorming about how we could have made it better...
ReplyDeletemaps?
a more detailed program?
more diversity from the participants?
cooler weather? :)
It was a neat idea for sure! The kids did have fun listening to the music and running around taking in all the sights. Noah was bound and determined to make it up onto the performance stage while the Native Americans performed the 'Friendship Dance'. I had to be the bad guy and remove him from the stage (all 6 times) before he actually made it to the dancers... but he was having a blast.
On second thought, maybe the dance was working and he was just looking for a new friend. There was a cute little girl that was probably about 1 1/2 years old up there that he might have had his eyes on.
Sorry buddy... maybe in another 16 years or so.