Academy Honors AAPI Heritage Month with Asian Night Market x Soulfest Event

By LOGAN BECKERLE and JILLIAN CHENG

On Saturday, May 4, Exeter students and faculty swarmed Rink A in Love Gym to attend the Night Market x Soulfest event, co-hosted by the Asian Advisory Board (AAB) and the International Student Alliance (ISA). Many Asian affinity clubs hosted an assortment of stands lining the rink, all decorated with colorful posters. People clustered in long lines to grab their favorite Asian snacks, drinks, and dishes. Along with food, the Night Market additionally held student performances, including songs, poems, and dances.

The event was intentionally held in May, the month of appreciation for Asian-American Pacific Islander heritage month, which is recognized annually. Among the many stands were boba tea, Korean shaved ice, ramen, tanghulu, and Asian candies.

Originally, the Night Market and Soulfest were two separate events held by the AAB and ISA respectively, but starting last year the events merged. “It was last year when we began to think of this grand vision of what the night market could be. It included visions of performance, of food, of activities, of different clubs. And this year we were able to make it happen again,” senior Nhan Phan, cohead of Vietnamese Society, AAB, and ISA explained. A student leader of the three event-hosting clubs, Phan was key in the organization process. Phan revealed that the planning of the event started months prior, and “the closer [the day] came, the more work [these clubs] had to do.”

On the day of the Night Market, clubs had to gather their supplies. “The day of, we prepped all of our ingredients. We cold-brewed our tea, we toasted our peanuts. We cut wedges of lime and oranges,” said Phan.

Additionally, the clubs worked to bring life to the otherwise-gray ice rink through decorations. “We began to set up Friday night by hanging lights. We wanted the space to resemble a lantern with those zigzag lines to create the feel of a night market. At the core of this is how can we create something that resembles a market that’s crowded but lively?”

The stands were some of the most thorough and prepared features of the night, scattered tightly around the rink. Asian affinity clubs, including Subcontinent Society, Chinese Student Organization (CSO), and Vietnamese Society, were spotted serving a variety of treats.

Lower Izyaan Burney served a Pakistani dish at the Subcontinent Society’s booth. “We’re right now selling something called Chana Chaat,” he told The Exonian during the event, “which is basically chickpeas with a bunch of toppings. It’s a South Asian delicacy.”

Upper Davido Zhang worked at the booth of CSO, which he is a cohead of. “We came with this new idea: strawberry milk sago,” he shared. “Basically, it has tapioca pearls that are less chewy and they’re translucent. It looks really nice. We put together milk, some strawberry jam, and coconut jellies, and it was great. A lot of people loved it.”

Around 8:30 p.m., the performances began, including a Taiko drumming demonstration by Odaiko New England, student performances, and light-hearted karaoke.

Beat of Asia (BoA), a student-led Korean-pop dance group, danced first before rows of seats. After the performances concluded, lower and BoA club member Olivia Zhang said, “Honestly, [the performance was] not that nerve-wracking. I think we just knew it was pretty casual. These are our people, so we went up there to perform and it was really nice to see everyone supporting each other, yelling our names.”

Overall, while the Night Market was a success, managing such a large event had its difficulties. “The biggest challenge was coordinating many schedules, because there are many moving parts to an event like the Night Market,” explained Asian Student Coordinator Kerrie Tinsley-Stribling.

Zhang shared, “I thought the only [disappointing] thing was that less people came because of all the away games and the fact that there was a theater reading [at the same time]. That was also why some coheads couldn’t show up on time.”

Another difficulty Phan recalled was that it was hard to coordinate with all of the different clubs’ boards. “We have four boards working on [this stand], the new ones and the outgoing ones. Generally with such a big group of people, it’s hard to make sure everyone stays on the same level of accountability, and because we have so much input, we need to be able to filter and process all of the input that we have, combined with the large scale of this project.”

“There are always things that, as event planners, can be improved upon, so it’s important to reflect and tweak annually,” said International Student Coordinator Jennifer Smith. Outside of the basic coordination issues and timing mishaps, the Night Market went off without a hitch, and concluded on a strong note. The market was an amalgamation of many different cultures pieced together with careful preparation by numerous board members of the AAB and ISA — anticipation is high for next year.

Note: The celebrations of AAPI month will also include an affinity garden party on May 11, from 4-6 p.m. in the tent at the meadows, as well as a semi-formal affinity dinner on May 13, from 4-6 p.m. at Grainger dining hall. All Asian-identifying students.