Love Like a Warrior:ESU Global Week Kicks Off with 5K Run and ISO Spring Festival

Students join hands around the giant globe in celebration of their heritage. Photo Credit / Madison Petro Students join hands around the giant globe in celebration of their heritage. Photo Credit / Madison Petro
Students join hands around the giant globe in celebration of their heritage. Photo Credit / Madison Petro
Students join hands around the giant globe in celebration of their heritage.
Photo Credit / Madison Petro

Madison Petro
Staff Writer

East Stroudsburg University’s first ever Global Week is this week.

It aims to create conversations about international forms of diversity, including ethnicity, nationality, athletics, history, sexual orientation, art, food, service and religion.

Under the theme of “Love Like a Warrior,” Global Week includes events that celebrate a variety of cultures and traditions.

Students colorfully painted the windows of the Union with the word “Warriors” in different languages to support the theme.

Fernando Alcantar, associate director of student engagement at ESU, organized Global Week with the help of over 30 other organizations on campus.

“We live in an international community,” says Alcantar. “If we cannot take the Warriors to the world, we will bring the world to the Warriors.”

Global Week kicked off with a 5K run Saturday morning and continued with the International Student Organization’s Spring Festival at 4 p.m.

The festival included poetry readings, a dance-off, a boxing demonstration, a cultural fashion show, Irish dancing and international cuisine.

“I think seeing all the different cultures is great because I don’t see this when I’m at home,” says junior Chris Haddad. “We have nothing like this.”

The World Fair, yesterday,was similar to the Spring Festival with its food and performances. Clubs set up booths with games and the ESU Step Team, University Band and cheerleading team performed. Students and visitors rode a camel around University Circle, as well.

Three interactive museums are included in Global Week, too.

A Field of Flags ceremony took place Monday at Stroudhenge.

Each flag represents 5,000 Holocaust victims and each of the seven colors represents the seven different groups that were targeted by the Nazis.

The flags will be displayed for the rest of the week.

Another interactive museum, The Journey of a Congolese Child, took place yesterday. This event was a simulation of a typical Congolese child’s sufferings, with narration throughout.

The Tunnel of Oppression will take place today from 2 to 4 p.m. in Shawnee Hall’s basement.

Scenes of oppression will be acted out in the different rooms for participants to gain an understanding of contemporary oppression.

Global Week ends tomorrow with the Holi: Festival of Colors and the Tribal Closing: Block Party.

“We want to represent what happens in other places,” says Alcantar.

“Holi is a famous Indian tradition to celebrate the beginning of spring. Everyone comes different, but leaves the same, covered in colors.”

Holi: Festival of Colors will take place tomorrow from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. on the Linden Quad.

Tribal Closing: Block Party will include a photo booth, a stilt walker, dancing and music performed by the World Town Band. The World Town Band includes group members from Jamaica, Nigeria, Brazil and the United States.

The Block Party will take place tomorrow from 6 to 8 p.m. in Laurel’s parking lot.

Participants of Global Week receive a raffle ticket at each event they attend with the chance to win one of hundreds of dollars’ worth of prizes at the end of the week.

For more information on Global Week and its events or for a list of involved organizations, visit esu.edu/globalweek.

Email Madison at:
mpetro3@live.esu.edu