Silk Road

Last Saturday, Mariana and I visited the 36th annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival, which this year focuses on celebrating the cultures of the Silk Road countries, from Japan to Italy. The festival is fascinating, I wish we had had more time to browse.

There were oceans of people there getting exposed to culture from countries that don’t get much airtime in the west, like Uzbekistan. (How much does the timing of this exhibit have to do with the recent bombing of Afghanistan?)

There was one guy leaving one of the concerts complaining about there not being any “Elvis or blues” music being played at the festival. He was was displaying the same kind of cultural closed-mindedness that leads to tribalism and catastrophes like 9/11.

We also got to see (and hear) Yo Yo Ma!

July 1, 2002 | Archived in Random Notes