July 30, 2019
BERKELEY, Calif. — One park, dozens of tent stores, hundreds of kites and tens of thousands. This city’s annual kite festival is built from all of those elements — and more.
“There are a lot of people; the weather is good. So I will probably recommend it,” Sindhuri Kampli, a mother who came with her family to the festival from Fremont, said. She spotted the event on Facebook and said her daughter, Jasmine, 7, had been a fan of kites for a long time.
Kampli said she loved this opportunity and decided to take her family out to relax and see all the beautiful kites — many of them oversized and others dancing in a synchronized fashion to music.
Walker Brown, a photographer from Richmond, said he makes the drive every year. “I can often get good photos here, both of objects and people,” he said.
All the tent stands aren’t just for food, though. Some businesses were selling hand-sewn fabric.
And others were encouraging people to register to vote.
What makes the festival different from kite-flying in the park? There are multiple shapes and patterns, including hearts, circles, ovals, lines — and many more. Some groups were competing to see who could fly kites as seamlessly as possible.
(Link to video to check out a sample of the kite performance: https://youtu.be/bWUToOIqgUo)
