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The evening will kick off at 5:30 p.m. in the Student Center Ballroom with an opening reception and a dinner featuring African cuisine. HASA will give attendees a taste of West African, East African, Central African, Sub-Saharan African, and Caribbean dishes.

From there, the event will move into Sundin Music Hall for a cultural ensemble featuring dance, performers, spoken word, poetry, and folk story telling. Koome Kirimi, HASA’s treasurer, said “I’m looking forward especially to the folktale, poetry, spoken word. The poetry artist IbÄ, he’s really good.”

The Cultural Ensemble will also feature a video clip of African students discussing their perspectives of Hamline, among other subjects. Local vendors will be present selling African clothes, art, jewelry, and other goods, and a $1 raffle for prizes will take place at the end of the event.

Following the Cultural Ensemble, HASA and company will move back to the Student Center Ballroom for an after-party featuring Tropical Breeze Band and Innocent. Both artists regularly play at the Blue Nile, a restaurant in Minneapolis, and play Caribbean style music.

HASA is expecting 200 people for the dinner and upwards of 350 people for the Cultural Ensemble and after-party. In addition to publicity at Hamline, the event has been publicized throughout the ACTC network, the University of Minnesota, and in local community newsletters and other resources. “It’s an African celebration bringing everyone together in a melting pot sort of here at Hamline,” said Kirimi.

Although HASA technically falls “under the umbrella of MISA,” according to Kirimi, it is just a coincidence that the event falls during World Fest. It is an extension of the events HASA has put in since the end of October, which is African Heritage Month.

Sponsored by HUSC, HEAT, MISA and the Dean’s Office, HASA has committed to making the event entirely free and open to the public. Those who coordinated the event are volunteers who have “rearranged their lives to make the whole event successful,” according to Karimi.

The Pamoja dinner runs from 5:30-7p.m. in the Student Center Ballroom, the Cultural Ensemble will go from 7-9:00 p.m. in Sundin Music Hall, and the after-party will last from 9 p.m.-midnight in the Student Center Ballroom to close the event.

-additional reporting by Phil Brondyke