Geelong’s multicultural heritage is being celebrated at the Pako Festa.
Established in 1983 the event is Victoria’s largest free multicultural street festival and presents the diversity of food, dance and music throughout the day on Pakington Street, where a street parade took off at 11:00am.
The Pako Festa regularly attracts over 100,000 people according to Cultura CEO Joy Leggo, a co-organiser of the event.
“The event brings multicultural community groups together and offers a safe environment in which to share their culture with the broader community while fostering a spectacular cultural experience full of music, colour, food, costumes, dance and movement,” she said.
“Cultura delivers the event in partnership with our local multicultural communities and is working closely with over 40 diverse groups to ensure we can continue to raise the awareness of established and new and emerging communities and most importantly invite Pako Festa audiences to make all communities feel welcomed.”
This years event will be particularly poignant for the regions large Ukrainian diaspora, as it coincides with the second anniversary of Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine.
