Multicultural event planned over homecoming weekend

Typically, the Saturday of homecoming consists of waking up early to catch the parade, tailgating for hours and watching the football game in the afternoon. Everything is over by 5 p.m. and some students may be left wondering, "OK, what now?"

This year's list of homecoming events, however, won't leave students with nothing to do Saturday night. Carpe Diem, an annual multicultural event hosted by Residence Life, will take place from 7-11 p.m. at the Student Recreation Center-North.

"Once the football game is over then it's like, 'What else?'" Residence Life Coordinator for Administrative Operations Gwen Duncan said. "So now we have a 'What else.' We have that night event for them. It's going to have dancing, so students can dance and eat and dress up. It's a really fun end to the day to say, 'Homecoming was really awesome this year.' I'm not saying that people won't go downtown afterwards, but at least for those who don't want to go downtown, they have an opportunity to really carry on the spirit of homecoming."

Duncan, who has helped put Carpe Diem together since its inception in 2010, also thinks having the event on homecoming will give families and alumni who are visiting something free to do that night.

Carpe Diem will feature a live Latin American band, student performances, a fashion show, free food, a caricature artist, henna tattoos, a photo booth, games and raffle prizes. Clave Sol, the Latin American band playing at the event, is based out of St. Louis and will represent the Hispanic population of students on campus.

"We've just never been able to do anything for the Hispanics, so I'm pretty excited about that," Duncan said. "Plus we all either know how to rumba or cha-cha-cha or merengue or whatever the other steps are, even if we don't realize it. We've heard the music enough where we're not intimidated by dancing, so this band is going to play a collection of the different kinds of Hispanic music."

Another big part of Carpe Diem is student performances. At the time of publication, it was confirmed that students of Chinese, Japanese, Nepalese, Bangladeshi and Indian descent would be performing.

Performances can be anything to represent the students' culture such as dances, singing or wearing traditional clothing in the fashion show.

A past performer at Carpe Diem, SinDupa De Silva, is now helping to coordinate the event as the graduate assistant for administrative operations.

"It's definitely interesting being on the other side," De Silva said. "It's almost overwhelming thinking of the responsibilities."

De Silva performed a Sri Lankan dance last year but is not sure he will perform again this year due to his added workload of helping coordinate the event. Once residents were moved into the residence halls, De Silva and the Carpe Diem committee began working to secure contracts.

All of the hard work is worth it in the end, though, when students are given the opportunity to experience several cultures different from their own all in one night, De Silva said.

"One thing from personal experience I can say is this: there's nothing more enjoyable than learning about other people's cultures and sharing something mutual," De Silva said. "It's beyond just small talk about where you're from, what you study -- but when you talk about things that are more personally attached to people and realize these two individuals share something in common, it's something really cool."

Duncan and De Silva stressed that Carpe Diem is an event for both international and domestic students to attend and learn about each other's cultures.

"One day if you plan to go to another country or even if you don't, if you're open to trying different things, which I feel like everyone should do in any way possible, this is one way to do that where you're going to witness musical performances and dances from other countries, which you wouldn't usually see on your day-to-day life," De Silva said. "It's not like it's on your TV and something is going on -- sometimes you do see that -- but this is a live performance and this could be a student who is in your class and is on stage and you find out all about their culture. Something really beautiful about culture and diversity is that, in the smallest base, it connects us all together."