On February 8th, I attended the Vietnamese Culture Show which was created by the Vietnamese Student Organization. I attended with my friend and his family who are Vietnamese, so I really enjoyed getting to see different parts of their culture and hear what they thought of the show. The show began with a traditional lion dance, which symbolizes good fortune and wisdom, and is meant to chase away evil spirits and bring happiness. It is often performed at big events such as weddings, festivals, and various holidays. In this case, Chinese New Year had recently happened so they celebrated with the lion dance and the passing around of red envelopes, which typically contain money inside, but in this case they held candy. Next, a group of students performed a traditional fan dance. I was very impressed with how in sync they were and how beautiful the dance was. The next few acts consisted of multiple vocal performances. One duo performed a modern Vietnamese song, but the next few acts all sang traditional Vietnamese songs. One aspect of the show that I really loved were the traditional clothes that the students were wearing. The garment is called an Ao Dai in Vietnamese, and it a consists of a long dress with slits on the side and satin pants underneath, which are often different colors to compliment each other. Many of the outfits were completely breathtaking, and at the end of the show all of the students performed a fashion show to display all of the clothing they had. All of the proceeds of this show went towards an organization called messengers of love, which aims to provide physical, emotional and educational support to underprivileged children living in Vietnam. The funds go towards scholarships, holiday care packages, English classes, workforce preparation, summer school, safe shelter, and clean water programs. Throughout the show, they created their own video to show a portrayal of student who received the support of messengers of love and one who didn’t, and how these students helped one another achieve their goals. I thought the message behind the VSA show and what the stood for was amazing, and I was glad to be able to contribute to such a good cause while watching such a great show at the same time.