Cultural expression and resolve savoured at fair
Each moment of cultural custom, colour, cuisine and human connection must be celebrated when the threat of its eradication is front of mind.
Such was the perspective of Palmerston North’s Palestinian and Ukrainian communities at the Festival of Cultures’ food, craft and music fair on Saturday, where emotions were high and heavy.
The opportunity for cultural expression afforded them much more than mere distraction from the humanitarian crises in their homelands.
“This is really important for us, so people can come and chat, and see that we’re human beings,“said Katrina Mitchell-Kouttab as she waited excitedly to watch a group of children perform a traditional Arabic dabka dance.
“... And to be able to say we are Palestinian, we exist. We’re a beautiful people, and we’ll never give up and never give in.”
She said there had been much misinformation and racism toward Arabs in the wake of Hamas’ October 7 attack and the Israeli bombing of Gaza that has ensued.
“Our children have been called terrorists in their schools, so we’ve had some really awful experiences recently.”
Some schools prevented children from wearing badges of the Palestine flag, yet permitted Ukraine ones in recognition of Russia’s invasion, she said, and two women in New Zealand had been attacked in the past fortnight for wearing hijabs.
“When you see a people being completely decimated and they’re being bombed and killed and tortured, and a lot of the western governments aren’t saying a lot about it, they’re giving permission for this to happen.
“And what that does, when you have extremists, then they think it’s OK to treat people like that, and you start seeing it in the community.”
But it was warmth that greeted those who manned the Palestinian tent in Te Marae o Hine/The Square, selling sweet treats and jewellery while raising funds for those suffering in Gaza.
Mitchell-Kouttab, who had lived in New Zealand off and on since 2005, said most of the Palestinian community in Manawatū had lost family and loved ones.
Relatives of hers were trapped in the Holy Family Parish, the same church in Gaza where it was reported a mother and daughter were killed by an Israeli sniper in December.
“They’re surviving on one piece of bread and half a glass of water every two days. And hepatitis is going through the church. They can’t leave to go to the toilet, because if they leave the church building they’re ... shot at.”
She said it was wonderful to have such a large Palestinian community in the region, providing strength in numbers to console each other through the trauma, but it was difficult for them to concentrate on work and daily life when such atrocities were occurring.
Saturday marked the two year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Tetyana Sanders, from the Ukrainian Educational & Support Trust, jovially encouraged passers-by to come closer and experience Ukraine, and to sample traditional pastries and cakes.
“It’s about connection,“she said. ”Anything Ukrainian for us, especially in the last two years, is more significant - to actually show we continue with our culture, whether it’s dance, whether it’s food.“
The anniversary made this year’s involvement with the festival more poignant, though Ukraine had a deep history of repression and attempts to “kill our culture”.
Sanders was handing out booklets on the Holodomor, a Stalin-engineered famine in Soviet Ukraine in 1932-33, that starved to death 10,000 people, which many in the West knew little about.
“It’s been a very tough couple of years, but life continues, we have to learn how to adapt, how to live, how to relate it to everything that’s happening.
“The most important thing - we’re unbreakable.”
Thousands watched performances and sampled dishes and customs at the tent nations throughout the day, with some lured to more conventional fare at nearby food trucks.
The festival commenced on Friday night with live music and a parade of lanterns.
The Festival of Cultures’ food, craft and music fair on Saturday was an event brimming with vibrancy and pride.