Cultural festival comes back bigger

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 23/03/2023 (1110 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Neville Hamilton’s mark of success is the need for a bigger tent.

For the second year a winter cultural festival will bring performances, art and music back to Steinbach in a big way.

The IRAL Winter Fest will be bringing Indo-Carribbean entertainment to the community with a goal of outdoing their inaugural year in 2022.

“Every year we want to go a little bit bigger,” said Hamilton, CEO of IRAL Music & Arts Festival.

After a positive reaction to last year’s festival, which Hamilton planned as a way to keep cultural festivities going between events IRAL hosts each summer and festival season in general, the organizer wanted to bring it back, but better.

A bigger tent and a new location will be able to host more people for the three-day festival, Hamilton said, while a maker’s market will be on ahead of formal events, which begin Friday.

The popularity of the event came, in part, because of immigrants settling in the southeast part of the province, the founder said, but also affords the public an opportunity to immerse themselves in cultures not of their own.

“It’s getting, like, super diverse,” Hamilton said of the city, which is now comprised of 2,890 immigrants according to 2021 census numbers.

“People who come here, they’re coming here with a purpose, which is for family and they can contribute to themselves and the community at large.”

Fire and hoop dancers, DJs and youth groups will perform at the three-day fest while food vendors and artists will fill up the rest of the tent, located at the vacant lot along Highway 12 next to Clearview Co-op — an upgrade from their former spot in the Solomon’s Furniture parking lot on Main Street.

Hamilton also sees the festival as an opportunity to keep young people connected with their culture before their identity is tied up elsewhere.

“Have a positive impact on their life, so that we don’t have to fix them later.”

Plus, the event generates more business for Hamilton, the owner of the city’s only sit-down Jamaican restaurant. He also sees it as helpful to the Steinbach economy at large by bringing out-of-towners to the automobile city.

“If we do our job properly, then we can be contributing to the community at large that way too,” he said.

The maker’s market will run from March 22 – 26 while performances and events will take place March 24-26. Tickets are pay-what-you-can at the door, with donations encouraged to support future cultural arts events.