2012 UCO International Festival

As part of our Blogging for Journalists class, Dr. Clark asked us to attend the 2012 University of Central Oklahoma International Festival.

When I first walked in, I was very surprised to be overwhelmed with a since of minority. Not in a negative way in any regards, but as a seemingly-white person (I am actually a fourth Lebanese), I could have definitely been categorized as a minority in that ballroom. It was almost exhilarating really. It was like the ballroom doors were actually a portal to completely foreign land. There were a handful of different languages flying around the lavishly decorated ballroom. It was definitely a cool experience.

The Iranian Student Association, Pakistani Student Association, and the Saudi Arabian Student Association combined into one booth with the theme, "Alice in Arabland."As you can see in the pictures above, students served several dishes from their collective cultures (pictured left) while they were dressed up as characters from Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland (pictured right).

Members of the Indian Student Association served food brought in food from Gopuram Taste of India, a local Indian restaurant (pictured above).


On a more personal level, I was very excited about this because one of my dearest friends, Joshua Shaun Wu Lim, plays a huge role in anything and everything to do with the international community on our campus. So, I knew he would be there. And as usual, I was right. (haha).

UCO students that were involved in putting on this year's festival pose for a group picture. From L to R: Brandon Lehman, Sahil Patel, Joshua Shaun Wu Lim, Nela Mrchkovska, Ines Manojlovska, Victor Silva, Mani Inayat, Ashley SueLyn, Mayu Yasuda, Jime Sechinbaatar, Alvin Teh & Tracy Tindle. Courtesy of UCO International Services Facebook page.

Josh is an international student from Klang, Malaysia, who came to study Public Relations at UCO in 2009. Since then, he has continued to be involved on campus in numerous organizations, such as UCO's Asian American Student Association (AASA), Broncho Buddies, and UCO International Services. Josh now holds the position of International Programming Assistant at UCO Centre for Global Competency.

He was also recently featured on the front page of The Oklahoman in an article about the state seeing an increase in foreign students.

I met Josh within the first few months of him moving here, and I am honored to call him one of the most special people in my life. We have been through ups and downs and loops and whatever else you can imagine.

As we have started creating our adult lives over the past three (almost four) years, we don't really get to see each other much, an awful symptom of "growing up." Despite the distance, I love this man so very much. He has been my rock through thick and thin. Although I have tried to describe how much Josh means to be, I cannot even scratch the surface.

I didn't really mean to take this post to a mushy, gushy place, but it ended up there. Oh, well. All that to say, I don't have a lot of friends, but the ones I do have, I cherish dearly. I LOVE YOU, JOSH!