The breeze blows delicious scents by you, a mix of herbs and spicy notes blended with sweet whiffs, intensifying your hunger. Beautiful music plays in the background, punctuated by laughter and joyful voices. Cars rumbling down Cypress Street announce new crowd-members arriving as you purchase your raffle tickets.
You must be at the International Food and Music Festival. The 17th-annual festival is scheduled for September 28, 2019, 11am-6pm.
This event draws crowds each year to enjoy the wide variety of foods, listen to world music, watch the performances, and participate in raffles.
For 2019, festival foods include Mexican, German, Irish, Filipino, Guatemalan, Honduran, American, Ecuadorian, Salvadoran, various desserts, and more.
For children, entertainment includes not only the dancers and musicians but a variety of games and inflatables.
The festival takes place in and around J. Ashley Wall Towne Square, Wendell, North Carolina (Wake County). The Towne Square is located at the junction of W Third Street and W Cypress Street.
For more information about the festival, visit www.thefoodfestival.com.
St. Eugene’s Catholic Church in Wendell organizes this event each year. According to the event history page:
The seeds of the International Food and Music Festival were first planted in 2002 with the arrival of a missionary pastoral team from Missionhurst CICM. To bring us together and ignite a new spark of life in our church community, Father Charles Phukuta Khonde suggested a festival based on the food of our parishioners’ diverse backgrounds. And since we wanted a fun atmosphere, we complemented the food booths with games, cultural dances, music and a raffle. The location chosen for the event was ambitious – downtown Wendell at the J. Ashley Wall Towne Square. What a leap of faith to organize such a large event right in the middle of town. We were either going to succeed or fail in spectacular fashion, right in front of everybody!
The first International Food Festival was held in September 2003, after months of planning, preparation and hundreds of volunteer hours. God blessed us with a sunny day and a great crowd. More importantly, our church came together, grew stronger and made a great impact on the town of Wendell and the surrounding area.
