One of these great past practices making their comeback has been the JNU Festival: an activity that disappeared for two years and yet achieved great success. As part of the celebrations, the traditional International Food Festival also took place on the first day, the 21st of September.

Starting at 10 a.m. and closing six hours later, students from Pakistan, Mongolia, Ethiopia, Uzbekistan, and India, among other countries, reunited and shared signature dishes from their cultures in order to foster friendships and improve the sense of community within JNU. The Food Festival was and still is a staple within the International Students community. Thus. this year, attendance went beyond expectation: it was a triumph that proved that this was a sorely missed event.

In order to get a proper understanding of the organization, execution, and outcome of the Festival, The Islander reached out to one of the students in charge of selling food: Felipe Solano, a graduate student from Costa Rica in charge of the Cheese Tortillas booth. He told us that the overall event was wonderful.

He highlighted that a key part of the positive outcome of the Festival was the support received from the Office of International Affairs. Applications started on the 19th of August, so each team had enough time to plan out the food they were going to serve, the team leader, and the needed ingredients.

For the ingredients, a card was given on a selected schedule to each team. This allowed each team to go to the required supermarket and buy ingredients. And banner with names and flags of the countries, as well as materials to print menus according to each team’s design was also given by the OIA.