Fawkner Festa
Head onto the streets and community centres of Fawkner this week to help celebrate the Fawkner Festa. The festival is organised by Moreland City Council to bring arts and culture and entertainment to the streets.
The festival runs from Monday 29 October and culminates with the Festa on Bonwick street next Saturday 3 November from 11.30am to 2.30pm.
Events of particular note include:
- two gardening workshops presented by Moreland Open Space Design and Development in collaboration with Fawkner Community House on Wednesday evening: ‘Herbalicious’ Herb Gardening and Sustainability Garden Design.
- On Thursday join Colleen from Sustainable Fawkner and others to start a Yarn bombing of the Fawkner Community House in conjunction with a Community Market and Swap Party to be held at the house from 10.00am to 12.30pm.
Free lunchtime entertainment Major Rd and Bonwick St shops
From Tuesday to Friday there is entertainment organised at both the Major Rd and Bonwick Street shops at lunchtime. Check the program for the artists and groups performing.
Other events through the week include
- Women’s inter-faith Eid-ul-Adha Festivalon Monday
- Fawkner photographic display in the Fawkner Librarythroughout the week, and activities throughout the week including a Family fun afternoon, Festa storytime and a craft afternoon, Multicultural New Book Morning and Book Chat.
- The Fawkner Leisure Centreis also organising activities thoughout the week including a Woman’s ONLY Body Pump session on Tuesday, Mums and Bubs session on Wednesday, Super Cycle class and a lunchtime BBQ on Thursday
- Moreland Youth Services and the YMCA is hosting the North Western Skate and BMX Series Competition from 11.00am to 5.00pm on Saturday November 3 at the Fawkner Skate Park
Bonwick Street Festa on Saturday
The Bonwick Street Festa on Saturday will feature free face painting, juggling ball making workshop, pedal powered juke box, Bindaas interactive Bollywood dance experience, the Heart and Soul Singers, Melbourne School of Tarantella and Afro Mandinko.
Community Stalls at the Festa will include:
- Fawkner Community House
- Sustainable Fawkner (that’s us)
- Merri Creek Management Committee
- Moreland Energy Foundation
- Hume Toastmasters, and
- Bronwyn Halfpenny (MP) Member for Thomastown.
Come along to the Bonwick & Jukes Precinct with your hats and sunscreen and enjoy the party.
The full program is on the Moreland City Council website, and can also be downloaded as a PDF document.
Organising the Festa not all clear sailing
While the Festa has been in planning for months with local groups volunteering activities, it wasn’t all clear sailing. When Sustainable Fawkner had a meeting on October 20, no promotional material or advertising had been circulated with no list of events on the council website and just 9 days to go before the festival started. One of our members lodged a complaint via Council’s website.
A response from a staff member on Monday indicated that there had been delays, but no details were provided. The festival program was updated on the Council website that Monday, 22 October.
One hopes that Council staff will undertake a review of processes to avoid whatever caused the delays to distributing promotional material and advertising this year.
Sustainable Fawkner 