Women of several ethnic backgrounds and different cultures came together under one roof to celebrate an evening of dance and music at the Ladies Cultural Night 2019 on Saturday, August 24 at the Vodafone Event Centre.
Organised by Woman Care Trust, the event has a history of house full occupancy with most of the crowd dropping in towards the end of the evening and the organisers this year had to regretfully refuse entry to approximately 1500 women due to maximum occupancy of the event centre, which was 2500.
The key element of attraction that brings such a massive crowd of women from different ethnic backgrounds is that ‘it’s a women-only’ event that gives them the freedom to wear their ethnic dresses and dance freely without being conscious of the presence of men around.
“This event has performances from women of all age groups, children as young as six years old to senior citizens who practice for their performances for months perfecting their actions and putting up a stellar show for the audience,” Baljit Dheil, from Woman Care Trust told The Indian Weekender.
Some of the performances included Punjabi dances such as Bhangra, Gidda, Arabian and Tribal Belly Dance, Zumba, Bollywood songs, classical Indian etc.
“We had people from all cultures such as Punjabi, Gujarati, South Indian, Islanders, Kiwi-Pakeha, Chinese, Russian, Brazilian, etc.” Ms Dheil added.
The idea to bring the show was to create a platform for local crowd to showcase their dance and entertaining talents on an all-women crowd and give a night of absolute entertainment, dance and music- a night free of any worries and just entertainment.
Most of the performers were students from Woman Care Trust who collaborated in organising this big event for the community.
“Through this event, we encourage girls in our and other communities to come together under one roof as one family and show their cultural diversity through dance and music.
“This event also keeps the new generation of Kiwi Indians to know more about their culture, their heritage, music and history and brings them closer to their motherland, India.
“It promotes cultural diversity, inclusiveness and cohesiveness between different cultures,” Ms Dheil said.
Besides entertainment, the event also used it as a platform to present a cheque of $1000 from the sponsor DDL Homes in memory of Dishy Dheil towards the flood victims in Punjab, India.
“A cheque of $1000.00 from DDL homes to Mrs Sohanjeet Kaur of Mata Gujri Sahara Trust (Patiala in India) was presented at the event,” Ms Dheil concluded.