For more than 30 years Utah Tibetan Association has been participating in the annual Living Tradition Festival in Utah. This is a 3 day event of nonprofit groups and member clubs representing many cultures, nationalities, and ethnicities sell delicious fare at the Food Market; there are more than 20 vendors each year. The event’s hallmark, however, is the selection of performing artists. More than 70 performances are presented on the festival’s three stages. Living Traditions Festival is held on the lawns of Washington Square at the Salt Lake City & County Building (450 S. 200 East).
Every year the Utah Tibetan community comes together to participate by preparing Momo’s, Spicy potato, Noodles and Chicken Curry to be sold at the festival. Several thousand Momo’s are made during the 3 day event and to accomplish this mammoth task the community comes together led by the elected executive members who organize and plan.
As every year we had incredible community members volunteer their time. Few members even took time time off work to help with the event. Many brought cooking grills, patio umbrellas, and even rolling pins from home. Several members used their own vehicles to help with the logistics, going back and forth transporting food between the festival and the community center. The young helped at the front end selling the food, performing yak and cultural dance and the elders helped at the community center to make the momo’s and other delicious entree’s.
After 3 days of little sleep and non-stop work, we achieved something unexpected. In our over 30 year history participating in this 3 day event, we had broken our own food sales record. Overall, it feels great to be able to raise a big amount for our community on our own. It’s wonderful to see so many of our members come together to share art, food and culture with the larger Utah community.
