'Mars and Venus' in Orbit at the ISO Cultural Show

Author: Khairani Barokka

"You need culture, 'cause you're in the mountains!" emcee Damian Washington '03 said to a packed and cheering McCullough audience at the annual International Students' Organization (ISO) Cultural Show last Friday. If they needed it, they certainly got it — with a twist.
The ISO show brought over two hours of poetry, skits, dances, songs and fashion from traditions around the world to Middlebury. The show's title, "Mars and Venus," gave away the theme of the night: the two sexes. This theme allowed for great diversity in performance style, including everything from a serene Swedish celebration of Santa Lucia to a decidedly, ahem, expressive Nicaraguan fertility dance.
Divided into sections representing each region of the world, the show of 21 performances began with South Asia and a burst of color and movement. Then the Cultural Show transformed into the groove of the Caribbean and lit up the stage with Latin America's lively passion.
The following segment showed North American culture beyond, as Washington said, "cheeseburgers and fat people." After the intermission, performances displayed a potpourri of traditions from Europe and Russia, an energetic African beat and, finally, a representation of both traditional and modern East Asia.
The two solo performers of the show held their own on stage effortlessly, as Spanish Department Teaching Assstant Maria Jose Escudero sang the Spanish "Corazon Congelador" and Natalie Fisher '06 gave a hip poetry reading for the Caribbean section, comparing love to such foods as "mango in the summertime."
Fashions were proudly paraded in the South Asian, European, African and East Asian segments by smiling ISO members. They wore bright saris and kurtas (tunics), showed off European formal wear in long dresses and suits and donned bright African styles and East Asian outfits from kimonos to funky jackets.
The long-standing relationships between Mars and Venus were played out in strikingly similar ways across the continents, with models acting out playful acts on the catwalk, most of which seemed to demonstrate the eternal domination of woman over man.
The skit "Who the Hell is Kim?" performed to the song of the same name, was a fun take on that female-male sense of domination, as Jan'l Hastings-Robinson '03 persistently questioned a hapless Calvin Wallace, Jr. '04 to a Caribbean beat. The other two skits were no less entertaining. The Russian skit incorporated centuries of Russian history. Each character, introduced by Professor of Russian Sergei Davydov, dressed as a figure in Russian culture past and present, including Pushkin, Yuri Gagarin (first astronaut in space), a young Russian clubber and Nabokov's Lolita, all with a dance music backdrop. And the African skit, in which a schoolboy played by David Tswamuno '06 gets revenge on his classroom tormentors, lit up the stage, full of rhythm and dancing.
But what would a cultural show be without dances? Andaleeb Choudhury '03 whirled across the stage in a frenzy of motion. This deliberately contrasted with the languid movements of Kristiaan Joseph '06 in the South Asian opening segment "Manmohini." The animated dance segment "Chunari Chunari" involved lively, constantly moving performers of both sexes, was expressive of the South Asia's male-female interactions and was one of the night's highlights. The Maypole Dance from Nicaragua was the talk of McCullough as the maypole became a symbol of fertility, and the spirited, sexy moves of the dancers certainly emphasized this point. There were also impressive performances of Argentinean tango, North America segment, Asian hip-hop and a Bulgarian folk dance by Micou Apostolov '06 and friends.
Audience member Ignas Brazauskas '05 described the Cultural Show as "beautiful, nice." Performer Annelise Joseph '04 said that it was her second time performing in the show, and that she intends to do so again. "It was great working with the people, I had a lot of fun. They put out a good show." Madiha Tariq '04, who performed in several sections, agreed: "Considering the fact that a lot of the groups put things together at the last minute, it was a pretty good show." She did, however, lament the various technical mishaps that occurred during the show.
The ISO show could certainly have done with some polishing — the musical technicians were at fault more than a few times by speeding up, delaying or pausing songs at unfortunate times, there were a few minor emcee blunders and a microphone problem or two. But otherwise, the ISO proved that global cultures do exist in the mountains of Vermont, and most importantly, that everyone can have fun, whether watching performances of cultural traditions in action or bringing them to the stage.