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MatchWorks Pako Festa

Next Pako Festa Saturday 28th February 2009!

Pako Festa showcases cultural diversity - via a smorgasbord of cultural food, folk dancing, the famous Pako Parade, workshops, art exhibitions, multicultural craft displays and entertainment.

Staged as a free event, it currently attracts the participation of around 30 cultural community groups, up to 70 community groups and a total attendance in excess of 100,000 people.

The Festa presents entertainment on four world music stages, a dedicated Youth Stage, as well as West Town Hall and Channel 7 stages. Crowds also enjoy a host of roving street performers, a smorgasbord of ethnic and local foods, and there is a big range of free activities for children.

Icons Of Culture

The theme for Pako Festa 2008, “Icons of Culture”, invited both participants and spectators to consider the significance and importance of the special symbols of their cultural heritage.
To some an icon of culture was as simple as a traditional costume, song or dance - to others it was a place, object, food, art, person, even a geographical feature or region.

Some icons were shared, others were personal. Some icons were religious, others were cultural. The quality that all icons of culture had in common, however, was that they enhanced our appreciation of our unique place in a diverse world.

Enjoy, celebrate, share and learn. This was our Pako Festa in 2008.

The signature highlight of the day is the Pako Parade comprising a colourful stream of cultural and community floats, groups, entertainers and brass bands that flows through the 1 kilometer festival precinct.

The festival is an opportunity for local and regional cultural groups to promote cultural diversity and educate the broader community of the beauty and enriching capacity of multiculturalism and community arts.

Heading for its 27th consecutive year of operation - Pako Festa continues as a durable and much-loved, community event, and the largest free multicultural festival in Australia. As such, it attracts significant state and regional interest, both media wise and in terms of visitation by corporate and Government representatives.

Pako Festa is traditionally staged on the last Saturday in February.