Many Moons Festival debuts in Sebastopol this Saturday
This pan-Asian celebration of food, music, dance and culture will be held at Ives Park
The first-ever Many Moons Festival, a pan-Asian celebration produced by the Asian American Pacific Islander Coalition of the North Bay (AAPIC), is coming to Ives Park this Saturday, Oct. 4, from 11 am to 7 pm.
“We want to celebrate our cultures, take pride in them, highlight them, and share them with the broader community,” said Laurie Fong, the director of AAPIC.
“It’s called Many Moons Festival, because almost every Asian culture has a harvest celebration, and it’s full moon about that time,” Fong said. “We just decided not to call it a harvest festival because here in wine country that’s a very used word. So we went with Many Moons because many cultures in Asia have a harvest festival during the Harvest Moon.”
Fong said that multiple Asian cultures will be celebrated at the event: “It’s pan-Asian—so Fijian, Hawaiian, Chinese, Japanese, Laotian, Cambodian, Vietnamese, Filipino —lots and lots of different heritages.”
Their schedule of events bears this out. There will be a mix of music and dance performances and workshops from many different cultures throughout the day. (Seriously, check out the full lineup at the bottom of this article. It definitely made me want to go.)
“We have a children’s booth run by our youth group,” Fong said. “We have interactive demonstrations. We are going to be demonstrating origami and the making of mooncakes. We’re going to have a couple of chef demos for different kinds of Asian food. So you can eat, you can take a class. There’s also a mahjong booth where you can learn how to play mahjong.”
Fong said there will be over 85 vendors, offering Asian arts and crafts, food and drinks. Several nonprofit groups who want to reach out to the Asian community will also be there. Magician, juggler and acrobat Calvin Kai Ku is the emcee for the festival, and there will also be a raffle at 3:30 pm with $50 gift certificates to Pacific Market, Bachan’s BBQ sauce, unique art posters, and more.
Fong said that Asians make up just 5% of the population of Sonoma County, and 60% of those, roughly 25,000 people, are foreign-born.
“AAPIC was started in the wake of COVID anti-Asian hate,” Fong said. “We have since branched out to support Asian American and Pacific Islander people who live in the North Bay, primarily Sonoma County, who are feeling isolated or don’t have access to resources, or due to cultural norms, they don’t trust outside agencies or government.”
Speaking of those first-generation immigrants, she said, “Many of them are really working under a lot of intergenerational trauma—war, refugee status, that kind of thing—and so we’re diving in to help them with immigrant rights, with mental health. We’re helping with youth development, and we’re celebrating them so that they can not hide and stay home. We want them to be part of our greater community.”
Fong said the Many Moons Festival is an opportunity to build pride and solidarity between the various Asian communities, but she said they are also hoping the broader community will show up to enjoy this exciting new cultural event in Sebastopol.
Sebastopol’s Katheryn Fong, who is volunteering for the event, noted that children 12 and under are free. “We really want a lot of families to attend,” she said.
The Many Moons Festival is Saturday, Oct. 4, 11 am – 7 pm, in Ives Park, 7400 Willow St., Sebastopol. Admission: $10 in advance/$15 at the gate. (Tickets online have $1.63 service charge. At the gate, there is a charge of $1 for credit cards.) Ages 12 and under free! Learn more about the festival and get tickets here.
Performances and workshops at the festival
PERFORMANCES
11:10am – 11:30am A Vietnamese Lion Dance Parade opens the festival
11:50am – 12:30pm Traditional and contemporary Hawaiian male and hula
12:40pm – 12:50pm Fijian traditional meke (dance) and Fijian gospel action songs
1:00pm – 1:25pm JunJun Li Dances with Ink—Large-scale calligraphy
1:35pm – 2:00pm Sonoma County Taiko drumming
2:00pm – 2:30pm A fashion show featuring traditional clothing/costumes
2:45pm – 3:05pm Traditional Hawaiian chant and dance
3:50pm – 4:20pm Magic, juggling, acrobatics from Calvin Kai Ku
4:20pm – 4:40pm Ajna Kenning dances Nishikawa and Kamigata mai styles.
4:45pm – 4:50pm RECA* Dragon Dancers kick off a cavalcade of Chinese events
4:50pm – 4:55pm RECA cultural dancers will perform a traditional fan dance.
4:55pm – 5:00pm 13-year-old Sophia Ga on the Guzheng stringed instrument
4:55pm – 5:05pm Traditional Chinese Ribbon Dance by Danica Liu
5:05pm – 5:15pm Kung Fu demonstration & traditional weapons
5:30pm -5:45pm Traditional Chinese Lion Dancers
5:45pm – 7:00pm Funky Sound Experience party band
*Redwood Empire Chinese Association
WORKSHOPS
11:00 – 11:30am Tai Chi class with Golden DragonTai Chi Chuan Master David Chung
11:45am Culinary Arts instructor at Analy High, Mei Ibach, will do a chef demo, making Mushrooms and Arugula Salad.
12:30 Sachiko Knappman will teach you how to wrap gifts using Furoshiki in this wrapping cloth workshop.
1:00pm Fiji Indigenous People Foundation will do Ka Fijian Traditional Kava ceremony and song.
1:30pm Origami workshop by Kiyomi Hall
2:00pm See a demo of Kalingafornia Laga: a weaving circle that practices an indigenous backstrap form of weaving from a mountain province in the Philippines.
3:00pm Sake making demonstration by Bruce Shimizu
3:15pm Mai Nguyen will teach you how to make Mooncakes.
4:00pm Lani Chan of Big Spoon Sauce Company will do a chef demo on how to make Pork & Mushroom Wontons.
5:00pm Brush Painting/ Calligraphy Collaboration with Amber MacLean and Fumiyo Yoshikawa
See the full line-up with links to the performers and teachers on the festival website.
