August 2, 2009 – The 6th Annual Asian Festival took place in Reston, Virginia on August 1 & 2, 2009. Over 54,000 people attended the two-day festival where 16 Asian countries including Tibet, shared their unique culture, music, food, fashion, and handicraft. The weather was sunny as people mingled around, sampling authentic specialty dishes and visiting booths selling merchandise from all over Asia.
Three different stages highlighted Asian performers and six exhibit booths were showcased by Tibet and the embassies of Thailand, the Philippines and South Korea, as well as Laos, and Cambodia.
The Tibet exhibit was organized by the PTA of the Capital Area Tibetan Association (CATA)’s Tibetan Language School. PTA President Tenzin Lhundup said one of the main reasons for participating was to increase the visibility of Tibet and counter Chinese propaganda trying to show Tibetans as a happy Chinese minority and denying the truth of Tibet as an occupied country.
Although this was their first time participating in the festival, the Tibet exhibit was awarded the “Most Informative” prize. Other prizewinners were the Philippine Embassy for “Most Colorful” and the South Korea Embassy for the “Most Innovative”.
The organizers and visitors to the Tibet exhibit said there was not enough easily accessible information about the real Tibet and they said they learnt a lot about Tibet from this exhibit which they found “fun and enjoyable” because of the one-one interaction with the Tibetan exhibitors.
Using personal items from individual members’ homes, the Tibet exhibit’s centerpiece was an altar with statues, offerings, lamps, as well as Tibetan New Year decorations such as Chemar, flowers, etc. The exhibit also included displays of Tibetan currency, figurines of yaks, people in various regional clothing, and monks in various ritual stances, as well as maps and pictures of Tibet, poster boards with historical facts and figures about Tibet, and information about the Congressional Gold Medal Award to His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Washington, DC in 2007. A table included handouts, free “Free Tibet” bumper stickers and petitions sign-in sheets for the release of Dhondup Wangchen, the Tibetan filmmaker who has suffered severe torture and has been under arrest by the Chinese government for over a year.
In addition to the Tibet exhibit, children and teachers Karma Gyaltsen and Tashi Yangzom from the Tibetan School sang and performed dances on the main stage. Prior to our performances, CATA President Kalden Lodoe gave a brief speech saying that over the last fifty years Tibetan culture and religion is being destroyed in Tibet under a systematic policy so we have a huge responsibility to preserve our cultural in exile. He pointed out that there is a group claiming to be “Tibetan” who are performing heavily Sinicized “Tibetan ” dancing and he believes this group is not Tibetan. He said, we are the sole group that represents Tibet and he called on the other group to stop their false claim to being Tibetans.
