India comes to Lincoln in October

By Alice Waugh

Lincoln will get a three-day taste of India next month during the inaugural Discover India! Lincoln Cultural Festival, which will include movie screenings, a food festival, folk and classical dance performances, an art exhibit and contemporary art lecture, a cooking class and many children’s activities.

The festival, which takes place at several locations in town on October 18, 19 and 20, is spearheaded by Lincoln resident Moha Patel and sponsored by the Desai Foundation as well as numerous local organizations the Bemis Trustees, the Lincoln branch of the Cambridge Trust Co., the Council on Aging, the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, the Lincoln Family Association, the Lincoln Public Library, the Lincoln School Foundation, the Lincoln PTO, St. Anne’s-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church and Goodwin Procter LLP.

In organizing the festival, Patel said she aimed to showcase local and Massachusetts performers and community partners. For details on events, times and locations, see the Discover India! website.

Patel grew up in Lincoln and is a trustee with the Desai Foundation, which supports community development initiatives in India and the United States and funds festivals and events to promote Indian cultural education and enrichment. When she was a child, Patel’s mother organized a half-day Indian cultural festival at the Lincoln Public Library; more recently, Patel herself has worked on a similar recurring event at the Peabody-Essex Museum called Sensational India.

“I just had a dream that I wanted to do it in Lincoln,” Patel said. When she began reaching out to local groups to gauge interest in a Lincoln event, “I was overwhelmed with the positive responses I received,” she said.

Events like this are educational for Americans with little knowledge of India as well as for first- and second-generation Indians who have an opportunity to learn more about their own heritage. The events also provide exposure for children to a part of the world that schools might not have the curricular time and resources to offer.

“In this day and age, globalization is a reality,” Patel said. “If we don’t have an appreciation and knowledge of other cultures, our kids are going to suffer in the long run.” In future years, Patel hopes to stage festivals showcasing other parts of the world in their modern and historical aspects, including Greece and Egypt.

Patel, who is the mother of an infant and a kindergartener in the Lincoln School, came to America with her parents in 1981 from the Indian state of Gujarat and graduated from Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School in 1992. She returned to Lincoln partly so her children would have the experience of growing up close to their grandparents (as a child, seeing her own grandparents involved a 24-hour plane flight for summer-long visits). Patel is currently on leave from her career in health care management.

For more information or to get more involved, email Patel at moha@thedesaifoundation.org or see the Discover India! website.