Community Festivals in London
I love London for cultural events. It is not just the big events which are worth going to, though. The smaller, community type of events can also be really good in so many ways. Think the Food 4 All festival, which took place a few days ago in Victoria Park. So, I headed off to spend the afternoon under the glorious sun in Vicky park.
Victoria Park has received £12 million from the Lottery Fund to ensure that the park is well kept and to engage with the people who use it. The aim of this free event was to celebrate cultural cohesion by tasting different foods from a variety of countries around the world. This cultural event is only one of the many that they are running from April through to September.
The food, provided by the cafe in the park, was from some specific countries around the world, such as Thailand, Japan, China, India, Italy, USA and UK. It was so good that it went really quickly. I had some potato balls and other dishes that I had never tried before, as well as some other popular dishes, like the lemmon drizzle cake and small cupcakes below.
As well as the food, the organisation provided two pieces of fun and educational entertainment too. There was a Bollywood dance teacher who’d show everyone the movements first to then practice with real Bollywood music.
I learnt two things. One, that hands are an important aspect in this type of dancing. Two, it can be so much fun and such a good exercise! We were encouraged to use our hips, maintain the posture and to enjoy ourselves.
As you can see, no man dared joining the group.
The second bit was a science demonstration. The guys at Science Nation UK (@ScienceNationUK) showed how liquid nitrogen can be used to make ice cream. Just imagine the faces of the little ones!
They offered ice cream to everyone who wanted to try. Just in case you were wondering, the nitrogen did not add any extra flavour to the ice cream mixture at all.
Science Nation UK is a winning University project from a London University aimed at showing children on secondary school and below how science can be useful and cool at the same time. This comes at a time when science courses are less popular in UK schools.
You should check their short and fun videos. They’ve mentioned to me that the ice cream trick would be on a video very soon.
Thanks for checking my blog post today!
A Londoner from Afar
Great idea to use the park this way. So much fun while introducing each other to each other’s culture. That science bit should get some kids curious about science. Mmmmm…icecream.
Looks like a fabulous day out! I love these pop up festivals!