As the sounds of Bad Bunny, Enrique Iglesias and Shakira flowed throughout the MLK room, dozens of students, teachers and parents came together to celebrate Latino heritage and culture during the Latinx Club’s Latinx Fiesta on Friday, Dec. 6 from 5-8 p.m.
Guests entering the room were immediately greeted by decorations adorning the ceiling and the aroma of empanadas, tortilla de patatas, tacos and various other foods and desserts. El Peñol, a Boston-based restaurant that specializes in Colombian food, catered food for the event, and attendees each brought culturally-significant dishes.
Senior Calla Paragiri, who serves as the club’s co-president alongside junior Nico Liteplo and senior Micaela Phelan, said she was proud of the dedication and collaboration club members demonstrated in planning and executing the event.
“Everything we put into the [Hispanic Heritage] assembly and our events really comes through, and then whoever comes gets to experience the beauty of the club and community,” Paragiri said. “You can taste our hard work in the food, you can see it in the dancing. Everyone in the club just works so well together.”
Junior and club member Adriana Oviedo said the event is the highlight of her school year and noted how the celebration fills the gaps in addressing her heritage left by the curriculum.
“I’ve helped plan three fiestas since ninth grade, and even as I’ve gone from ninth grade to eleventh grade, I still look forward to them more than anything else because they are celebrations of who I am,” Oviedo said. “We talk occasionally about Latin history across the world and in America, but the fiesta makes me feel proud of being Latina and always reminds me that I am lucky to be Colombian and Spanish.”
Around 6 p.m., Paragiri and club adviser and Spanish teacher Pedro Méndez addressed the attendees, thanking them for coming and emphasizing the significance of the event for the school community and Latino population in Brookline.
Paragiri, who was born in the United States but spent most of her life in Columbia, said the event made her reflect on the importance of maintaining her Latina heritage and reminded her of her time in Columbia.
“When you’re in a Latin country, you take a lot of things for granted, and you don’t really look around and appreciate everything because it seems so ordinary,” Paragiri said. “But when you come [to the U.S.], you want to go to a Latin party, experience your culture, eat your food. And that’s what makes the fiesta so nice.”
Paragiri’s and Méndez’s speech was followed by bachata and salsa dancing, as well as the annual limbo competition, which was won by sophomore Candela Vicario-Ocana. Concluding the event was a musical chairs competition, won by junior Jaydah Gonzalves.
Liteplo said the fiesta has always reminded him of the importance of community and is an opportunity to foster inclusion among Latinos and allies at the high school.
“Freshman year, I was new to the school and didn’t know many people, and one of the first things that I came to was this party that we hosted two years ago. I was able to meet lots of people, including the presidents [of the club] at the time, and I really found a special sense of community that I hadn’t had before,” Liteplo said. “I now want to foster that same type of environment and help people find that community and space that I found freshman year.”
