The Panamanian Association hosted the Panamanian Carnival in the Business and Engineering Center Thursday. 

The carnival included food, empanadas, tamales, rice and beef, as well as games and music. The event also included the rivalry between the two queens of University Center West, dressed in blue, and University Center East, dressed in red. Attendees were given hats and leis to celebrate the event.

PANAS hosts the Panamanian Carnival annually during SpringFest to celebrate the university and Panamanian culture.

According to Carnivaland, the Panamanian Carnival is “Panama’s biggest party” and takes place each year during February in Panama. The Panamanian Carnival includes costumes, music, food and two queens who represent different parts of the town and compete. Those in the city celebrating the carnival split into two groups, each choosing a queen.

“This is one of the biggest celebrations that we have in Panama,” said Yoel Alvarez sophomore psychology major and president of PANAS. “For us, it’s just an honor to pass something similar, because it could never be the same, because it’s not in Panama.”

Alvarez said the carnival is celebrated longer in Panama than the event held on campus. 

“We have a party for almost a week, but here it is just one afternoon, but we really enjoy the process of making the dresses, decorations, the music, the food, all this kind of stuff,” Alvarez said. “We just wanted this event to be a big party.”

Alvarez said PANAS wanted students to enjoy the carnival before finals begin. 

“The purpose of these events will simply be just to have a little representation of a real carnival that we have in Panama,” Alvarez said. 

Alvarez said planning the carnival was a lot of work for PANAS. 

“The planning process is a lot of work,” Alvarez said. “We have to start planning this event for almost a year in advance because we need to know where to get all the ribbons, the balloons and the sponsors, where to get the food, we had to make dresses by hand, so everything is a process, and it’s a really exhausting process.”

Miguel Pinto, sophomore electrical engineering major, said PANAS spends a lot of time organizing the Panamanian Carnival.

“We spend a lot of time with the organizing the event and the food, choosing the best food we want to serve to the people so we can represent our Panamanian culture here in USI,” Pinto said.

Pinto said it was not easy to plan the food for the event, but he hopes students liked it. He also said the Panamanian Carnival was a “big event.” He said as an engineering student, he stays busy.

“Being busy with this club and with the school is sometimes stressful, but for the love of the culture for our Panama, we managed to do a great job,” Pinto said.

“We have maybe five, six events a year,” Pinto said. “But we save all our energies to this one, the last one, because this shows our culture.”

Alvarez said seeing attendees having a good time was a reward for the hard work put into planning the event.

“Whenever I see somebody smiling here, and they begin on just dancing, for me it’s just a success because I know that the whole process, all that sweat, is like a reward from that,” Alvarez said.

Alvarez said it felt good to host the Panamanian Carnival. He said as the new president of PANAS, he wanted the 2023 Panamanian Carnival to “have little tweaks” and be a little different from the 2022 Panamanian Carnival.

“All this stress that you have for being the president, especially for an organization like this, is a whole process, but I really enjoy it because you’ll see that my people is enjoying it, and when my people enjoy, I enjoy,” Alvarez said.

Matea Rodovic, senior biochemistry major and the queen representing UC East, said it is interesting to learn and experience it. She said the queens have a rivalry with each other, but the support between the two queens is still there. 

“It’s interesting because I’m obviously not a Latina, but I get to represent the Red Queen, so it’s pretty exciting,” Rodovic said.

Lendy Domínguez, freshman biochemistry major and the queen representing UC West, said she is excited to share her traditions with international students and other students on campus. 

Domínquez said the carnival event on campus is held to involve the university. 

“In Panama, it’s exciting,” Domínquez said.

Domínquez said when the carnival takes place in Panama in February, it is summer there. She said she was excited for the Panamanian Carnival on campus because of the spring weather here. 

Domínquez said she enjoyed celebrating the Panamanian Carnival on campus since we do not celebrate the event in the United States.

“Here we don’t have this kind of event, so this is amazing to kind of have that event here,” Domínquez said.

“We just wanted to make this a big party,” Alvarez said. “So people in the U.S. can just enjoy, especially this time of the year when finals are coming up, and they need to get rid of stress.”