Saturday May 25, 2019, it was sunny and warm. The weather is perfect for one of the biggest events in Lexington: Discovery Day. This is also Memorial weekend, which officially marks the beginning of summer.
It is the 40th anniversary of Discovery Day this year. The event moved back to Massachusetts Ave between Waltham Street and Meriam Street. CALex, a local newly established non-profit Chinese American organization joined the event for the first time among over 100 local businesses, civic organizations and municipal participants. CALex has booth 93 which is located in the prime spot just across from the performance stage. We were also very fortunate to be right next to our own State Representative Michelle Ciccolo. Rep. Ciccolo stayed at her booth throughout the event from 10am to 3pm, and kept talking to her constituents almost without break. We are very impressed by her dedication and close to the people.
CALex booth attracted a lot of visitors. The volunteers gave away many small gifts including CALex balloons, Chinese traditional and kid bookmarks, cartoon prints etc. The poster board with many pictures showed the events the organization has hosted. As part of the effort to introduce Chinese culture, many visitors had fun trying on the Han Chinese traditional costumes and taking pictures. There were a number of local politicians and friends stopping by the booth to greet the volunteers.
The volunteers were busy introducing CALex to visitors. As an officially registered 501(c)(3) organization, it has accomplished many things since it was formed including
1) Library donation to celebrate 150 years anniversary, the community donated 4600 dollars to Library foundation.
2) Various community educational seminars.
3) Joined the Patriots Day Parade.
4) Two candidate forums: one is in early June last year for all five candidates running for State Representative of our district, the other is in early February this year for candidates running for Select Board and Planning Board.
5) Two Chinese New Year parties for 2018 and 2019, respectively, each with 300 people. For this year, all three State Senators and Representative of our district joined the party, as well as VIPs from Select Board and School Committee/Administration.
In addition, at the end of last year, CALex hosted an introduction seminar to encourage the community to run for Town Meeting members. As a result, five members came out and ran for one of the most competitive TMM elections in Lexington, three of them were elected.
A lot of Chinese American residents stopped by and praised the work CALex has done; many of them volunteered to offer help at CALex booth. CALex much appreciated the kind words from the community, also thank so many volunteers for contributing the efforts and time to make it happen. CALex also wants to thank Lexington Retailers Association for organizing this great and successful event.
Here is the source of this report.