With Eid being a world-wide celebration for all the Muslims, George Mason University’s Pakistani Student Association decided to make this Eid memorable for the Northern Virginia Community.
GMU PSA hosted an Eid Festival on Sunday, Sept. 26 from 3-11 p.m. at Dewberry Hall. The festival featured food, clothing and jewelry vendors, local singers, dance performances, and fashion shows. Not only did this celebration display Pakistani culture, but GMU PSA invited other organizations such as the Afghan Student Union (ASU), Saudi Student Association (SSA), and the Arab Student Association (ASA) to show off their culture as well.

“Thank you to all the organizations for coming and supporting PSA! It was awesome to see that
this PSA event could serve as a platform to blend about four cultures together,” said Israr Mirza, GMU
PSA President.

The Eid Festival featured a multiple of different attractions. Not only could the community check out the latest fashions of Pakistani clothing and jewelry by renowned designers, women could also get henna designs on their hands. There were also food vendors selling traditional Pakistani food while GMU PSA sold snow cones, cotton candy, and drinks at their stand. The stage was decorated extravagantly by DJ Romeo of Dharma Events.

The show was hosted by President and Vice President of PSA, Israr Mirza and Usman Chaudhri. It commenced with the Qur’an recitation of Surah Yasin by Mohammad Abdusalaam, the MSA Representative of PSA. The performances started at 5 pm and included dances and fashion shows from the Afghans, Saudis and the Arabs. GMU PSA also prepared and presented a fashion show featuring 10 models displaying latest clothing from the company Needlez. After the performance of a few local singers, the final local performance was saved for Atif Munir from a local band called Juzz. The Eid festival ended with the dance floor being open for all to enjoy with DJ Lucky playing the music.

“The biggest purpose of this event was to celebrate Eid and to unite all the Muslims on campus. The event was a huge success because of the tremendous and generous response of Mason students and our local community,” said Usman Chaudhri, GMU PSA Vice President.

With George Mason being one of the most diverse universities in the nation, it is remarkable to see that so many cultural organizations can convene and display themselves on the same stage.
This motivates GMU PSA to do similar cultural events in the future. GMU PSA encourages everyone to add themselves to their facebook page or simply keep a look out for their future events on www.gmupsa.com.

Photography by Tarek Ahmed
Article by Maha Tanveer