The Lafayette community took a tour around the world at the International Tea event Sunday, where community members from different countries shared their unique teas, snacks and culture.
The Lafayette Public Library, 775 W. Baseline Road, hosted the International Tea event, which served as the kickoff to a week of programming inspired by the día de los niños or Children’s Day event called Día. Sunday’s event and the week of programming is a way for the library to promote literacy of every language and culture, organizers said.
Boulder County community members Sunday represented Bangladesh, Mexico, Thailand, India, Japan, England and Argentina. Through the geographical and cultural differences, everyone was united under tea.
Betsey Yadon, enrichment librarian, said that through Saturday the library will host a variety of events for storytimes where people can share their own cultures.
By exposing kids and the community to the different cultures that are represented around them, people can foster a sense of community despite differences, she said.
“We think it’s important to celebrate all of the cultures and of the people that make up our city,” Yadon said.
She said that the library welcomes all community members and is happy to celebrate everyone’s unique experiences.
Angelique Velasco, bilingual outreach librarian, said that Sunday’s event is a way for people to learn more about their neighbor’s languages, cultures and history.
Velasco said that a simple way to unite people is through tea and food. From mango sticky rice from southeast Asia, biscuits from England, mole from Mexico or rice balls from Japan, attendees got a glimpse of other cultures through the lens of people cooking food from other countries.
Yadon and Velasco said that the joy of people being able to share their culture with the community, as well as the willingness to learn from the attendees, shows that food and tea unites people.
Laura Guida, from Argentina, said that Lafayette and Boulder County are culturally diverse and that when people have opportunities to connect over those cultural differences, it brings them together.
Guida, a self-described proud Argentinian, said everyone has a strong connection to food. Gathering around food is a way people recall old memories and make new ones, she said.
“It’s unavoidable. When you put food together, people will come,” Guida said.
More information about the library’s Week of the Child events is available at tinyurl.com/LafayetteWeekoftheChild.
