The International Student Association held its annual Food and Fashion Festival on Saturday at Hillcrest Church of Christ.
ISA is an organization catering to international students, providing a home away from home to help them adapt to their new environment.
The Food and Fashion festival gives students a glimpse of their peers’ homes, with food and fashion as mediums.
Miranda Ramirez, ISA President, found her home with ISA as a freshman and it has became a safe space for her to learn how to navigate in a culturally different world.
“It allows people to embrace their culture and be themselves,” Ramirez, a senior computer science major from Guatemala said. “The festival gives people of the community an experience of traveling around the world and trying new things.”
Due to COVID-19, the 10-year-old festival has not happened in the past two years.
The festival’s primary purpose is to educate the community on its diversity and create conversation over differences.
The colorful theme for this year’s festival was street food and fashion. Thirteen different types of food and fashion were presented at the festival, each from a student’s homeland.
Students and staff worked together to produce sampled portions of the different foods. The students signed up to present a dish from their cultural background.
While consumers enjoyed their worldwide dishes, the fashion show provided entertainment.
Mada Samb, a senior accounting major from North Carolina, was in charge of the fashion show portion.
“Because we haven’t had the fashion show in two years, we wanted the fashion show to be very diverse but inclusive,” said Mada. “The main objective is to spread more awareness when it comes to international students not only here on campus but also within the community.”
The fashion show gives a fun way to demonstrate international culture and different traditions. The models ranged in diversity in age, body type and ethnicity.
Participants showed aspects of their culture in their fashion choices and accessories.
Students inspired by the festival and who want to get involved can reach out to any officers or follow ISA’s social media accounts @acu_isa.
