In one place, on one day, Pakington street comes alive with an abundance of colour, unique costumes, live music, street performers, multicultural food, and traditional dancing in celebration of Geelong’s diverse mix of cultures with people from all walks of life.
Pako Festa is the largest free celebration of cultural diversity in Australia, and deeply reflects Geelong’s uniting community spirit. Set up along Pakington Street, the multicultural heart of Geelong, the festival will host the union of 35 separate ethnic community groups, from Croatian, Irish, Polish, to Thai and Fijian, along with 50 local community groups, including schools, bands and sports clubs, in celebration of diversity.
Proudly hosted by Diversitat, a not-for-profit association, this year the festival celebrates its 35th year with the theme ‘Food of the World’, allowing festival goers to experience the international cuisine and diverse music of this multicultural community.
As part of this, Pako Festa is celebrating Geelong’s diversity by sharing the loved recipes of the festival’s popular community food stalls for the first time, with the support of Energy Safe Victoria. Attendees can collect free recipe cards from the community group stalls featured along Pako’s strip. Think delicious signature dishes from Bosnian, Croatian, Dutch, Filipino, French, Greek, Indonesian, Iranian, Lao Thai, Macedonian, Maori, Polish, Russian, Serbian, Slovenian and Ukrainian cuisines.
There will also be a street parade, community arts, exhibitions and interactive workshops and a range of entertainment, including traditional folk dance groups, school performance groups, community choirs and local musicians, all radiant in colourful traditional costumes.
Diversitat’s arts and events manager, Luisa LaFornara, is proud of the success and recognition Pako Festa has achieved, both state-wide and nationally.
“Pako Festa has been recognised as Victoria’s largest free multicultural celebration, receiving a number of awards in the 2004 Premier’s Award for Harmony in the Community and Victorian Multicultural Awards For Excellence,” Luisa says.
“In 2015, Pako Festa won The Australian Event Awards, Best Community Event Category for the State of Victoria, which is a fantastic achievement for our not-for profit organisation and the event keeps growing every year!”
This year Melbourne based The Black Sistaz are performing and headlining for the first time at Pako Festa, who Luisa says were chosen “to add to the diversity of the day.” The three singers send powerful messages through their music, standing strong for a free West Papua, with vocalist Lea Rumwaropen saying the girls are both excited and honoured to be chosen as the closing act.
“We are so pumped and excited to be performing at this event. I am personally looking forward to seeing all the different cultures that make up Australia in one place at the one time, unified and peacefully sharing a common place,” she says. “We are very honoured to be chosen as the closing act! Our music and songs will speak for themselves but we do have a very important message to share about our people of West Papua, Australia’s closest neighbour.”
As daughters of the late August Rumwaropen of the legendary Black Brothers Band of West Papua, the girls will be bringing their sweet island harmonies to the crowds of the street with their upful, soulful, roots reggae beats, hitting the Diversitat stage at 5.30pm
“Our music tells the story of a musical family living in exile,” she says. “We plan to take you on a journey with our songs from West Papua to Europe then Vanuatu to Australia.”
As such a unique opportunity for people to experience ethnic diversity and harmony, Lea and her sisters are passionate about performing at uniting festivals like Pako Festa. “It’s important because together we are stronger! We are raising awareness about our oppressed people in West Papua through song, you don’t need to understand our language to know that we are singing and crying out on behalf of our entire nation.”
As the festival celebrates its 35th year this month, Lea’s only advice for people attending the festival, is to come and experience the diversity the community has to offer.
“Come with an open mind and allow yourself to try new things and just soak it all up! It’s free so bring everyone you know,” she says. “I am looking forward to the amazing food and all the traditional song and dance.”
Along with The Black Sistaz, 60 groups will be performing across six stages on the day, including the likes of Andrea Robertson and Friends, Geelong Bollywood Dance Group, The Lewis Brothers and Melbourne Burundian Drummers – just to name a few.
What better way to celebrate our multicultural nation than to hold a uniting festival along Pakington Street, and share the sounds, sights and flavours of the world.
When & Where: 9am-5pm on Pakington St, Geelong West – February 25
A full program of events and activities, as well as road closures and parking information is available here.
Written by Talia Rinaldo
