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Cultural Explosion: celebrating diversity through competition

Cultural Explosion is a yearly event organized by the Council for Cultural Activities during International Education Week.| Aly Ashry/The Cougar

Students and faculty gathered at UH last week for Cultural Explosion, an event that featured seven student organizations competing against one another in various traditional performances. 

Cultural Explosion is a yearly event organized by the Council for Cultural Activities during International Education Week. The organizations represented different cultures and ethnicities and competed for the top three spots and monetary prizes.

Regina Aquino is a senior studying global hospitality. She is also the cultural director for the Filipino Student Association, which won second place this year. 

“FSA is the largest organization on campus, and we have about 900 members.” Aquino said, “ We promote Filipino culture through different types of dances. We also do a lot of fundraisers to help our community.”

The FSA has been performing at every Cultural Explosion for the past several years. Last year, they won first place.

“We have about 35 performers, and we practice twice a week,” Aquino said. “We have very long, tedious practices, so our performers are the most enthusiastic people you have ever met.”

This statement was echoed by Bikash Panthi, a Ph.D. student studying physics at UH and a performer for the Nepalese Student Association. The NSA’s performance went on to win the people’s choice award.  

“We are very grateful for everyone who came to support us and voted for us,” Panthi said. “And We are very glad to show our cultures in front of people from different nationalities.”

Most of the performers in the NSA are graduate students, and finding a time to practice that suits everyone was a real challenge, according to Panthi. 

“I think today is the first day every performer was able to gather together,” Panthi said.”We practiced in groups in our own time. I guess we managed it somehow.”

Other than FSA and NSA, the Hallyu Club won first place, and Wushu Kung Fu won third place.

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