Heritage and Culture Fair
The school that my 6 year old daughter E goes to was holding a heritage and culture fair. It was an interesting event where multiple countries would be represented and they had volunteers to prepare facts and different types of food for the event. E was so excited that she couldn’t sleep the night before and also woke up super early to start the day.
I was worried that she would be tired and irritable, but that wasn’t the case all day. She had a long day of school and swim lessons afterwards. I had to hustle and get her showered up along with her 4 year old brother C so they could hurry home to eat dinner. E ends up changing into some cultural clothes to try and participate in the fashion show at the fair. We crammed the food in our mouths and made it to the event.
When we got there and went to the auditorium, there was a lot going on. It seemed like the fashion show had started already and E was disappointed. The music and speakers were also turned up uncomfortably high and it was a case of sensory overload for her. She wanted to leave and go somewhere else, so we went out in the hallway so we could walk to the back of the auditorium where it was quieter.
We watched a few more minutes of the show and then they asked for kids to go up and dance. I figured E would rush up because she loved dancing, but she ended up walking halfway to the stage and then turning around to come back to me and C in the back of the auditorium. It was too loud for her and she felt sad.
I told her it was ok to stay back and there were other parts of the fair to visit. She also saw her really good friend from school as the show wrapped up, so that made her feel a lot better. We all ended up going into the gym where the booths were set up.
There were dozens of countries represented and I was surprised by the amount of effort that everyone put in. There were tons of treats and even some food that you could piece together for a solid dinner. At first, I tried to keep E and C in sight. They were so curious that they kept wondering around to each booth. C kept going back to the India booth because there were friendly people and he loved the crackers there. He went back 4 or 5 times and had tons of crackers.
E was wandering around with her friend and ended up collecting food in her box she had. She also completed this passport challenge and got a globe and goodie bag. It looked like she had so much fun trying all the food and treats. C had fun too and got a little Pikachu made for him at the pregame table. We ended up taking some silly pictures in the face cutouts for different countries and headed out to walk home.
I ended up getting stuck outside at the playground because E and C had extra energy. I didn’t want to interrupt them too much because after asking them to walk with me to go home, they just wanted to play. I thought to myself to let them soak up the moment and just be kids having fun - so I let them stay a while longer. After they were tired, they walked to me and we trekked back home.
My wife wasn’t too happy that I let the kids stay out late. They were still too energized from the event to fall asleep quickly. I get that the kids should ideally sleep earlier, but they have to live a little too. Staying out and delaying bedtime by 30-40 minutes should be fine once in a while and I was also secretly hoping that they would be so tired the next day they would let me sleep in. That didn’t happen, but one can hope!
