Different Cultures Coming Together in Tucson Essay

The Tucson Meet Yourself Festival is a great opportunity to familiarize yourself with different cultures, that live right in our city. You get to experience these great cultures that thrive in our community, by sampling the cultures food and watching and listening to their traditional dances and music. There is everything there from Vietnamese, Greek, Mexican, Native American, Chinese, and many more cultures featured at this event. I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to both experience and dance for this festival. I dance for the most well known Hispanic dance company in Tucson, AZ; Viva Performing Arts Center. We have gotten the opportunity to dance at this wonderful festival for the past two years and the audience is always so appreciative to watch what we have to offer, and soak in the culture through our dances. We usually showcase our well known Mexican Folklore dances as wells as our Samba, Mambo, and Salsa. Just by watching the audiences reaction to our dances not only makes me feel like I’m getting my culture out there in a positive way, but proud to be part of the Hispanic culture. After dancing, as a group we go out together into the festival and explore what this event has to offer. We spent most of the day there. It was great to see how well all the cultures adapt together in one setting. Everyone seems to get along so well and it gives the environment such a friendly and happy feel. All the food booths pull you in with the amazing aromas, that make your mouth water. They are set up right next to each other and its like walking through different countries right in Tucson. My favorite foods were the Vietnamese boba slushies and the Greek gyros. I tried to make as much room for all the different foods I wanted to try, but there was just so many it was impossible! This is definitely what keeps me going back every year. The delicious food from the many different cultures.