The Lexington community celebrated Hispanic heritage and culture at the city’s annual Festival Latino de Lexington.
The festival took place after its cancellation in September due to severe weather from Hurricane Helene. The normally three-day-long festival in downtown Lexington was condensed down to one day on Saturday, Nov. 9 at the Masterson Station Park Fairgrounds.
At the entrance to the festival were 11 tables decorated to represent different countries. Crystal Felima, assistant professor of anthropology and African American and Africana studies at UK, represented Haiti at the event.
“It (the festival) brings a really cultural dimension to this city,” Felima said.
Felima had multiple books, photos from her fieldwork and art from Haiti on display. She said she decided to table for the festival after attending it previously in 2023 and meeting one of her sorority sisters there.
Felima said she thought the event would help make people curious about other cultures and make them interested in visiting new countries, learning new languages and supporting cultural organizations.
“I think when you are exposed to other cultures you have a greater respect for them and you may want to learn more,” Felima said. “If we are in our own cultural or socio-economic bubble, we won’t be exposed to other people unless we go seek it. This is an opportunity to go seek it.”
Felima also had on display information on a talk about anti-Haitianism after the U.S. election. She said multiple scholars and activists would speak during the talk on Nov. 12.
Maria Ramirez attended the festival with her son, Lexington police officer Dylan Sharp. Ramirez said she went to the event every year, and it was her son’s first Latino festival since becoming an officer.
“At that time (when Sharp was born), the Latino festival was either nonexistent or really, really small. Every year it gets a little bit bigger, the city has been embracing the Hispanic community more throughout the years,” Ramirez said.
Ramirez said she was looking forward to the musical performances and liked seeing the tables representing different countries,
Sharp said he was looking forward to the food and music, and that he thought the festival was an important showcase of culture.
“It’s a good opportunity for young kids to see that there are Hispanic police officers,” Sharp said. “I think it’s important for Lexington to embrace our growing ecosystem of cultures, so if we show support for one we need to show support for all of them.”
The live music, dance, arts, food vendors and the health fair were all carried over into the one-day festival according to Yamel Patterson-Muñoz, treasurer of the Foundation of Latin American Culture and Arts (FLACA).
FLACA has organized and held the event with the help of Lexington Parks and Recreation for the past 22 years aside from 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Patterson-Muñoz said FLACA worked with Lexington Parks and Recreation after the event was canceled to find a new time and location for the festival. She wasn’t sure if the festival would be able to be rescheduled and was happy about getting to hold the event, even if it was shorter than it usually was.
“Everything that we do months in advance we had to do in a month or less,” Patterson-Muñoz said. “I was worried because Hispanics don’t tend to like the cold season that much … but the weather is just perfect.”
Patterson-Muñoz said the event featured multiple school cultural presentations from Cardinal Valley Elementary School, Liberty Elementary School and Bryan Station High School.
The festival’s health fair, according to Patterson-Muñoz, normally took place on the third day of the festival after the cultural presentations and other events to inform attendees about medical, financial and educational resources available to them.
This year’s health fair took place at the same time as the other events. Multiple groups and organizations like law firms, banks, universities, addiction resource centers and healthcare providers tabled at the health fair to offer information and free services like vaccinations.
Jalima Green and Maria Penalber work for the Bluegrass Community Health Center, a group that provides healthcare to underserved communities throughout Kentucky.
Penalber said they were tabling at the health fair to provide health information and offering flu shots, blood pressure screenings, HIV tests and glucose tests.
“I think it’s important that we reach out to communities that face health disparities,” Green said. “With the Latino community, there’s a lot of language barriers and inaccessibility to care because they don’t know where to get care. A lot of times they are uninsured … so being at festivals like this, we’re able to get our names out to the community.”
Green said she was happy that the festival was able to reschedule so that they could still offer health services.
“This is a day of celebration for the Hispanic community, I hope they identify with what we’re doing … and they can spend a day with family,” Patterson-Muñoz said.
