A flower grows in L.A.
By Daily Bruin Staff
July 15, 2001 9:00 p.m.
Photos by CATHERINE JUN/Daily Bruin Senior Staff Charles
Deboer and Leakana Nhem spend a moment
together in front of the lotus blossoms in Echo Park. Ryan
To waits for his cue to begin the Indonesian Lion dance at
the festival. Bryant Irawan, who forms the second
half of the Indonesian Lion Dance’s lion, awaits his turn on
stage. The Indonesian Lion dance attracted many curious spectators
as it kicked off the Lotus Festival. William Av
decorates around Echo Park Lake with colorful banners for the Lotus
Festival. Jayshree Nensey, right, draws a henna
tattoo on Laura Chau.
By Sophia Whang
Daily Bruin Senior Staff Everyone in Southern California was
invited to celebrate the blossoming of a bed of flowers last
weekend. The City of Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks
held its 24th annual Lotus Festival July 14 and 15 in Echo Park, a
site that has the largest bed of lotus in the United States. The
lotus flower, symbolizing rebirth, purity and life, has great
significance to Asian cultures and gives a fitting name to a
festival designed to promote understanding of the people and
cultures of Asia and the Pacific Islands. “When Asian and
Pacific Islanders are perpetually viewed as foreign it becomes easy
for others to speak for rather than listen to them. So it’s
important that they find venues through which to articulate their
stories for themselves,” said Julie Cho, a UCLA lecturer for
Asian American studies who is teaching the Contemporary Asian
American Communities class this summer. “Festivals (provide)
both a way to preserve (and) to realign culture, and they are
expressions of how particular communities continue to find value
and meaning in cultural practices that would otherwise seem archaic
and perhaps even dead,” Cho said. Even though this
year’s festival theme was “Highlighting the Indonesian
Culture,” it still strove to show the value and meaning of a
variety of cultures. Along with the Indonesian Fashion Show,
modeling traditional Balinese, Javanese and Sudanese apparel,
entertainment at the festival also featured Polynesian dancers,
Chinese folk dancers, classical Indian dancers, UCLA Taiko Drummers
and performances of Tae Kwon Do and Kung Fu, among other
performances. Both days had “Dragon Boat Races” with
all proceeds going to the Lotus Scholarship fund and the night of
July 14th ended with an elaborate fireworks production over the
lake. The eating area had everything from “Hawaiian
lovers” hibiscus drinks to Vietnamese egg rolls,
Domino’s pizza, Thai barbecue, Chinese, Filipino and Korean
food. Japanese doughnuts called “Dangos” were served by
members of USC’s Gamma Epsilon Omega fraternity.
“People don’t know how vast the Asian culture
is,” said Lotus Festival project assistant Irena Seta.
“The actual promotion is to show how much the Asian community
has given to the local community. (This festival is important) not
because I’m Asian, but because it’s nice to share
culture. This is probably the best way to get a taste of how the
East meets the West.” Ethnic boutiques and tents set up
across the park helped to share culture, selling items like Thai
clothing, fans and silk, Asian zodiac T-shirts, gift items from
Nepal and Tibet, henna body art and handmade costume jewelry. One
of the most popular booths featured Chinese hand-cut paper art with
Chinese messages such as “Own both wealth and high
position” written on them. Another crowded boutique
specialized in hand-woven palm figurines made using palm leaves and
traditional Chinese handicraft skills. Many people also waited in
line for the $10, 15-minute traditional foot or body Thai massages.
Although most of the festival’s attractions catered to
adults, there was plenty of action for children to get involved in
as well. There was a “sports zone” area, a
children’s stage area with magic shows and Karaoke and a
mini-carnival, complete with games, rides and cotton candy. A
bridge allowed attendants to cross over to “Flower
Island,” an island in the lake with the theme “Rain
Forests of Indonesia.” The miniature synthetic rain forest
was filled with a variety of orchids, lotus blossoms, Indonesian
sculptures, mist and a 10-foot-high orangutan. Over its two-day
period, the festival successfully reached an estimated 100,000 to
150,000 people with its cultural messages. Following the festival,
attendants had the opportunity to leave the central location of
Echo Park and explore within Chinatown, Little Tokyo, Koreatown and
the Pilipino and other Asian and Pacific Islander communities in
the surrounding area. “The size of how we’ve grown
shows that we’ve done really well,” said Seta, who has
been working on the festival with the Department of Recreation and
Parks for over three years. “It’s a really great
festival and we’ve always heard positive things about
it.” Next year, when the lotus flowers blossom, crowds will
gather again to celebrate culture and the growth of Southern
California communities. “We only have a few neighborhood
festivals every year so this is a big deal for the whole
community,” said Joni Brill, a local resident and spectator
of the festival. “Look at the crowd, the diversity. I
can’t define what I’ve learned because every year I
pick up stuff from the shows, dances and music, but I certainly am
enriched by it.”
