Let Freedom Ring!

Last Friday, the staff at Mercy Maternity Center threw an Independence Day party for the Philippines, United States, Canada, and Switzerland. The Philippines Independence Day was June 12, Canada's is July 1, and the U.S. is obviously July 4th :) And I'm not sure when Switzerland's Independence Day is, but we have one girl from Switzerland here and we didn't want her to feel left out. So, we were instructed to have each country bring food that represented their country, come prepared to sing their national anthem, and whatever else they felt would help represent their country. All I've got to say is that the Filipino's won, hands down!! They totally went all out with their outfits and the skits they performed. For food, they had bread in the shape of a pig, because its customary to have a pig at celebrations. They also had some other Filipino dishes. Here's some pictures/videos of what they did:

The video is them singing the Philippine National Anthem.

The girls perf0rmed a dance for us, it was so good! I believe they are representing the Manobo tribe.

The 3 bottom photos are the guards at MMC . Abs is representing the first flag carrier of the Philippines. Felix is dressed as a tribal person. And then Roamie, if I can remember, is the person who helped bring independence to the Philippines. But I can't remember the name.

The Filipino women performed a native dance for us as well.

Then the Canadian gals gave a presentation on the history of their country. They showed a hockey clip on youtube and then we proceeded to play a little game of hockey as shown:

Then it was our turn to try and demonstrate a U.S. 4th of July celebration. We started off with a parade, complete with a marching band and a cowgirl and horse (it was just a girl riding piggyback). We threw candy and the kids loved it! After that we decided to dance the Virginia Reel (video below), and then turned out the lights and had a fireworks display via the projector. We also had to sing our national anthem and said the Pledge of Allegiance. All in all, it was a great party! We had so much fun! It was so fun to see how excited the Filipinos were for the party, and they put so much effort into it. It was awesome to be able to be with people outside of the birthroom setting.

Megan and I pictured below, although you can't see our whole outftits, we were decked out in red, white, and blue! It made us so excited to get back to the states and celebrate 4th of July! We can't wait!! :)