YANKEE INGENUITY Celebrate the Ingenuity in Diversity!

BOX The Keene International Festival Saturday, Sept. 24, 2022 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Keene Recreation Center 312 Washington Street, Keene, NH keeneinternationalfestival.org/ The Keene International Festival is a free and family-friendly event with music, dancing, games, crafts and food offered with heart and love by some of our local residents who hail from places beyond the borders of the United States. &emsp;&emsp;This year will mark the fourth time for the Keene International Festival. Last year, over 1,500 people attended this event. I was one of them. I wandered by myself around the grassy field outside the Recreation Center, taking in the joyous and happy energy of the happening. Two international students wrote my name in Nepali and Arabic in the crafts area. Children of varying ages were nearby, enjoying various games and crafts new to them. In the forefront of the field, Indian music blared from the loudspeakers, and a group of women dressed in saris waited to perform. The smell of curry and kielbasa permeated the sector fronting Washington Street. &emsp;&emsp;"The purpose of the Keene International Festival (KIF) is to make our community more inclusive and celebratory," KIF co-chair Ritu Budakoti explains. &emsp;&emsp;The seed of the idea was planted in 2017. The brainchild of Jennifer Alexander, the community education teacher of the ESL classes, several others soon joined the fledgling group, including Ritu Budakoti, other colleagues from the Keene School District and members of local organizations. &emsp;&emsp;Part of their motivation was concern over the growing climate of polarization that was taking place at the time across the United States. &emsp;&emsp;The idea was to create a multi-cultural, multi-generational event to bring people together in an upbeat and positive way while highlighting the rich cultural diversity of the greater Keene community. &emsp;&emsp;After 14 months of careful planning, the first Keene International Festival was held at the Jonathan Daniel School ground, with more than 500 attending. &emsp;&emsp;The event was such a success that the Human Rights Committee of the City of Keene partnered with the KIF planning group in 2019 when the festival moved to the Keene Recreation Center. This venue was more accessible. More than 1,000 attended that year. In 2020, the festival was not held due to the global pandemic — but in 2021, the festival was back bigger and better than ever. &emsp;&emsp;The KIF planning committee now comprised Keene educators, Keene residents and representatives of various organizations, including the Keene India Association, the Historical Society of Cheshire County, Keene Public Library, the City of Keene Human Rights Committee, and Keene Community Education. It is co-chaired by Ritu Budakoti and Elizabeth Nieuwsma-Dell. &emsp;&emsp;This column is about Yankee Ingenuity — a phrase first coined to describe the workers who built the Erie Canal in northern New York. It has since been used most to describe a practical, hands-on approach to figuring out how to accomplish a concrete task or get something done with limited resources. &emsp;&emsp;The word "ingenuity" alone means clever, original and resourceful. Doesn't this capture the essence of the Keene International Festival? It is an original idea (for our community, at least) brought to life and supported by various groups of people in a clever and resourceful manner. Supported solely by donations, it is people-power and vision-power that makes it happen — fueled by a dream of creating a better world through highlighting the rich tapestry of our human diversities of culture and beliefs, ethnicity and nationality, food and artistic expression. &emsp;&emsp;Ritu Budakoti puts it this way: "The Keene International Festival is about making the world a better place through giving the future generation a bigger lens, a different lens to gain insights of the diverse cultures and experience the global community right here in Keene." &emsp;&emsp;Ultimately, this festival is not about "us" and "them" — foreigners and locals, Yankees and other-than-Yankees. It belongs to all of us. It is about we. And through the experience of joyful celebration and artistry, the Keene International Festival offers the chance to all who attend to experience firsthand what it feels like to be connected to the global community. &emsp;&emsp;This year there will be a surprise or two in store for those who attend. I will be there, trying to figure out how those Bollywood dances go and stamping my feet to the music. Maybe I will see you there.