Come With Me to Hecho in LA
By: Amy Argueta ‘24 (USC Student Life Guest Blogger)
This past Saturday the USC Latine Student Assembly organized Hecho in LA, an event meant to celebrate Latine culture through food, music, and artists. In McCarthy Quad, various Latine owned student and non-student vendors sold art, clothes, jewelry, and more. Various stalls also sold food from all over Latin America from Mexico to Peru to El Salvador.
I arrived when the event began around 6 p.m. and explored the various food vendors. There were tamales and plantains from Chichén Itza, pupusas from Pupusas Delmy, pizza from Piara Pizza, and empanadas from Gourmet Empanadas. I got two chicken and a vegan tamales, along with plantains and a horchata drink from Chichén Itza. The savory tamales paired perfectly with the sweet plantains and horchata.
After getting dinner, I explored the wide variety of amazing LA based vendors selling art and clothes. There was a student owned Intrefied selling a wide variety of beautiful student artwork from paintings to posters to T-shirts. Flying Samaritans at USC, a volunteer organization that provides free healthcare to underserved groups in Tijuana, Mexico, were also selling tote bags to fund the organization's efforts.
Non-student Latine owned businesses were also there to sell clothes and art, which included businesses like Sanctity, The Finest LA, Golden Age Thrift, and Lil40s.
Around 7 p.m., the music performances started with ALAJE, USC Thorton’s Afro-Latin American Jazz Ensemble, which performs Afro-Cuban styles of music led by Aarón Serfaty. People gathered around to watch as the band gave an incredibly beautiful performance. One song was even based off of the Animal Crossing theme and was composed by one of the band members. Later in the evening Banda Las Angelinas, an all-female band, came on to play. Their lively music brought a whole crowd to the front of the stage to dance. It felt like one big party in the middle of McCarthy Quad where everyone was smiling and enjoying themselves. The night ended with a performance from Conexíon Divina, an incredibly talented three person female guitar band who are also performing at Coachella this upcoming week.
At the end of the night, a student organizer gave a closing statement thanking everyone for coming and told everyone to anticipate more events from the USC Latine Student Assembly. The USC Latine Student Assembly puts on amazing events like this throughout the school year so be sure to follow their Instagram page @USCLSA to keep being updated!
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