The Hmong Heritage Dinner, an annual fundraising event for The Hmong Institute and the Hmong and Southeast Asian community, will take place on Friday, May 3, 5:30-9 p.m. at the Monona Terrace Community and Convention Center. The event comes a couple of days after the kick-off of Asian & Pacific American (AAPI) Heritage Month.
“May is an important month, not just as AAPI month, but also for the Hmong community because May 14 is the start of the diaspora when Hmongs started having to leave their homeland to come to America. So that’s why we always choose May to have our Hmong Heritage Dinner,” Peng Her, CEO of The Hmong Institute, tells Madison365. “We want to recognize all the contributions the Hmong have made and also to recognize the fact that there was that historical piece of the Hmong having to flee their homeland. We may have lost our homeland, but we’ve gained a new home. So this is always an important month for us.”
The Hmong Heritage Dinner provides a space for the Hmong and Southeast Asian community to celebrate and share their culture with an authentic Hmong dinner, silent auction, Hmong-inspired arts and crafts, Hmong musicians and cultural performances, and more, according to a press release announcing the event.
“We provide a place for the Hmong and Southeast Asian community to come together and really celebrate their heritage and culture through performance, music, and food in an event that exposes the Madison mainstream community to our heritage,” Her says. “It’s an opportunity to learn from each other.”
The fundraising event will also be a chance to celebrate Asian Pacific American History Month and learn more about The Hmong Institute.
“We are going to be entertained by our elders. They’re going to perform cultural performances, with instruments, dancing, a fashion show that will be multicultural with all the different ethnicities of our Nepali, Laotian, and Hmong,” says Mai Zong Vue, the COO of The Hmong Institute. “We also have a group of local dancers who will be performing for us …all young girls … lots of costumes.”
This will be the first time the Hmong Heritage Dinner will take place at the Monon Terrace Community and Convention Center. For many people who come to The Hmong Institute, it will be their first experience in the giant convention center on the shores of Lake Monona, originally designed by Wisconsin native Frank Lloyd Wright.
“We wanted to find a place that was fitting to honor the contributions of the Hmong and Southeast Asian community because it’s a beautiful location. Many of our people have never been to Monona Terrace, so it gives them exposure to something new and it gives Monona Terrace exposure to the Hmong and Southeast Asian community,” Her says.
The keynote speaker for the Hmong Heritage Dinner will be Yeng Yang, owner of the bakery Yummee Treats.
“A big highlight of the night will be honoring and recognizing Dane County Executive Joe Parisi for his support for the Hmong elders for many, many years,” Vue says. “He’s retiring and we just want to say ‘thank you’ in our own way of showing our appreciation for him for his leadership and his support for the [Hmong] elders so they have a home away from home that they can come every day.”
Funds raised at the Hmong Heritage Dinner, which will have the theme of “BLOOM” this year, will benefit the Hmong Language and Culture Enrichment Program which creates a safe and supportive learning environment for students to enhance their academic skills, and prepare them for college and their careers through learning about their native language and culture.
“The proceeds of this event support all the youth and women activities that we do on a monthly basis … money for field trips, arts and crafts, birthday celebrations and transportation,” Vue says.
The dinner also helps raise funds to support the work of The Hmong Institute’s Hmoob Kaj Siab program which provides mental health support to Hmong, Cambodian, Lao, Khmer, Tibetan, and Nepali elders. “These are refugees or former refugees of many different backgrounds who have come to call Madison home,” Her says. “Because of that experience they have coming from their home country, they need support that’s culturally responsive and staff that’s bicultural and bilingual in their support. So funds from these events will fund this group.”
The dinner also supports the Hmong Institute’s food distribution program which provides food security to over 450 families.
Tickets are still available for the Hmong Heritage Dinner. For more information, click here.
“What I like the most about the Hmong Heritage Dinner is the bringing together of our community with the mainstream community in one room …. celebrating together, eating together and honoring our elders and our youth,” Vue says.
