moroo avenue in presidio. and i'll wait here with my open arms and giving you a welcome to try my food. (♪♪)celebration). >> nowruz hi, everyone thank you so much for joining the 18 year have come at san francisco city hall.

>> my name is sophia, if any, the founder and ceo of persian women and honored to be at city hall chair for the past 8 years. >> this year in light of the political movement no iran persian men decided for the to have that but celebrating our heritage to display our event we're having right now. march is a month where many things will

elevated you including international women's at a and women's history month and nowruz which is celebrated over 3000 years by over 90 million people around the world. it is so important to have representation. for communities to come total together and showcase their heritage and culture. >> san francisco is a city that welcomes opens it's arms to many underrepresented community and culture we're thankful for working with the mayor of the san francisco and supervisor and supervisor to bring the incredible event together. it is important to recognize that women are behind this program the committee is all women with

you so vendors are women and our all over the are iranian america women and persian women stand with - (clapping.) it is important not to only evaluate but come together as a community tonight together we're stronger for that. and able to do more we're able to uplift our community and showcase this beauty of our culture and heritage. i'm honored today to introduce the mayor of san francisco london breed to the stage. >> (yelling).

>> thank you and thank you to persian women it is so wonderful for here nowruz thank you to all the families and the friends and the people that came to celebrate now we know it is an challenging time in our lives and we know that sadly the death of marsha has created a fear and frustration and this taken place in san francisco where that community stood in solidist to make that clear that the hatred will not be tolerated in any for

this this community came together because of the hurt and pain and we'll be sad that happens to the women and women so many places where we are being challenged on a regular basis and not given the opportunity to decide on the economy of our both sides in the decided about our lives it is so fitting it persian women has hosted this event and fitting it is held during women's history month in city hall. by a woman and mayor to make that clear we send a strong message we talk about the nowruz and renewable and hope and future and starting a new we make that clear that the ability for women to make they're own decisions about their both sides and how they move around the world that we will stand for justice and

fairness and so today is about a hope for renewable hope for a new day, hope for a new year that is starkly the possibility what can a happy we truly come together and work hard and push for fairness and justice for all human beings. (clapping.) so i want to really again, thank you sophie and you'll see people who are volunteering and hosting this over the years and really acknowledge your work and leadership in the tech industry a male dominated destroy for other women to strive thank you, for you work and advocacy and also take the opportunity to

acknowledge our chief the protocol the first woman to serve had in the city and county of san francisco her family do incredible things she's a proud persian woman will be a support of this community thank you to my co-host supervisor and i saw earlier shamann and so many leaders of people in city hall. i of course, that our hearts are heavy but today it truly a celebration to may be make that clear the persian of san francisco has a place here in san francisco at city hall a place that feels save and secure and a place to celebrate the new year and think before hope for the future a place you know, we have your back and here to

support moving forward because our diversity in san francisco is our sprelth e strength the fact we stick together what makes our unique place. so great to see all of you here to celebrate nowruz any time i have an opportunity to celebrate a new year a change for a new beginning i'm happy to do that and acknowledge your state the state of california control the treasurer also joining us today so many wonderful people who care about celebrating the new year and the joy of this occasion city hall will be a place that we continue to do that and i want to ask sophie to come forward as i officially declare monday, march 20th - tuesday, march 21, 2023, in the

city and county of san francisco nowruz day. >> (clapping) thank you so much and at this time, i wanted to introduce my co-host supervisor saving thank you, ma'am mayor give it up for london breed. >> could i is the 18 day 18 year i'm sorry 18 year that we had nowruz celebration at city hall it started think o under governor gavin newsom a group of iranian got together and to recognize a community in many ways to a lot of people they're land use in one group out of that have a way to celebrate our

culture at city hall so from that time going forward we have been having celebrations every year more and more fruitful and more and more event full and a beautiful way to show our culture. um, i want to recognize a few people before i say a few more words thank you, sophie the persian woman for organizing this and others and (clapping.) expanding our culture a showing the music and i want to thank the mayor for hosting this not every community doesn't but had the opportunity to come to city hall. >> (clapping) but i want to i i would be remiss to say we have to recognition what is happening in iran people are putting their lives on the whether or not i think for what we take some

people take for granted on a daily basis the ability to speak feel free and walk down the street to hole hands and simple things and speaking their. as a matter of fact simple things we do on a daily basis are not exchanged by brave brave women and people brave brave young people in fact, are putting their lives on the line (chanting). >> thank you. >> and so i want to say nowruz nowruz and (speaking foreign language) what are the beautiful people in the world can we give it up for persians and thank you

for celebrating our culture. >> thank you good for celebrating coming together as one thank you and i'm going to ask lisa and mohammed to come up please we can recognize the wonderful work you do (clapping.) come on up. >> today a mohammed day (laughter.) >> thank you. (clapping.) and then lastly, i want to call you think persian woman and tech sophie for all you're amazing

work you have done (clapping.) . thank you. >> yeah. one second so then also let's give up for the wonderful happening displays thank you for her amazing work and (clapping.) for again, it is absolutely beautiful and hand it back to severing any. >> thank you, supervisor. and mayor for an incredible speech this today would not be possible without the support of many of our community members and giving the time, and money because it costs something like to lee like this and recognize those who really have been the pillar important for the program and

for the most part the culture family foundation (clapping.) has been supporting this initiative for many, many years we appreciate that. mr. mohammed and christen. >> (clapping). >> i think beyond the community we also need to see around us in the city and they need to step up and also support thankful for amazon crews and san francisco giants in supporting and elevating our community (clapping.) i hope you enjoyed today's tea and the pastries and i want to thank - bakery and the tea

we're serving you. >> providing the - presenting incredible work please support them and couldn't have done it without you the committee that is behind us and unfortunately, we are not having everyone but. >> (calling names.) >> have been part of this and supporting to make sure that our culture is represented our is elevated thank you so much and i'm going to pass it back to supervisor. >> (clapping) want to recognize a few people before we bring up the next person you thank you for the board of education for being here (clapping.) and the record thank you and any

bring up our state treasurer to say a few words please come on up and been a wonderful friends and every step of the way thank you, state treasurer. >> thank you very much. and great to be here in the people's hall slubt the culture and the tradition of the persian community i've been good forensics with sammy others for so many years and used to see call me all the time and now they are elected they no longer call me all the time but i've been here since i served on the board of supervisors in 200220 years so it is so great to be here with all of our beautiful persians and the community members we thank the mayor for

continuing to welcome us and feel included in this great diversity of the state of california we are the fourth largest economy because of all of us so let's celebrate and stand up and rise up to support the people to be the best we can happy nowruz (clapping.) and then lastly last but not least want to bring our our city administrator carmen chu please come up. >> hello, good afternoon afternoon i'm the city conservative and welcome, everyone to city hall a beautiful event it is great represents the spring and new beginnings and also want to say this year we're looking forward to a wonderful year in the celebration with all of you and

especially thank supervisor for bringing this year after year and the mayor to continuing to host and sponsor for those of you who don't know a handful of celebrations in city hall this is one of them and thanks to the leadership and the supervisor and the mayor thank you for your great work and, of course, we have the year ahead (clapping.) . okay. everyone thank you and enjoy the treats and thank you for coming out today

>> it's great to see everyone kind of get together and prove, that you know, building our culture is something that can be reckoned with. >> i am desi, chair of economic development for soma filipinos.

so that -- [ inaudible ] know that soma filipino exists, and it's also our economic platform, so we can start to build filipino businesses so we can start to build the cultural district. >> i studied the bok chase choy heritage, and i discovered this awesome bok choy. working at i-market is amazing. you've got all these amazing people coming out here to share one culture. >> when i heard that there was a market with, like, a lot of

filipino food, it was like oh, wow, that's the closest thing i've got to home, so, like, i'm going to try everything. >> fried rice, and wings, and three different cliefz sliders. i haven't tried the adobe yet, but just smelling it yet brings back home and a ton of memories. >> the binca is made out of different ingredients, including cheese. but here, we put a twist on it. why not have nutella, rocky road, we have blue berry. we're not just limiting it to just the classic with salted egg and cheese.

>> we try to cook food that you don't normally find from filipino food vendors, like the lichon, for example. it's something that it took years to come up with, to perfect, to get the skin just right, the flavor, and it's one of our most popular dishes, and people love it. this, it's kind of me trying to chase a dream that i had for a long time. when i got tired of the corporate world, i decided that i wanted to give it a try and see if people would actually like our food. i think it's a wonderful opportunity for the filipino culture to shine. everybody keeps saying filipino food is the next big thing. i think it's already big, and to have all of us here together, it's just -- it just blows my mind sometimes that there's so many of us

bringing -- bringing filipino food to the city finally. >> i'm alex, the owner of the lumpia company. the food that i create is basically the filipino-american experience. i wasn't a chef to start with, but i literally love lumpia, but my food is my favorite foods i like to eat, put into my favorite filipino foods, put together. it's not based off of recipes i learned from my mom. maybe i learned the rolling technique from my mom, but the different things that i put in are just the different things that i like, and i like to think that i have good taste. well, the very first lumpia that i came out with that really build the lumpia -- it wasn't the poerk and shrimp

shanghai, but my favorite thing after partying is that bakon cheese burger lumpia. there was a time in our generation where we didn't have our own place, our own feed to eat. before, i used to promote filipino gatherings to share the love. now, i'm taking the most exciting filipino appetizer and sharing it with other filipinos. >> it can happen in the san francisco mint, it can happen in a park, it can happen in a street park, it can happen in a

tech campus. it's basically where we bring the hardware, the culture, the operating system. >> so right now, i'm eating something that brings me back to every filipino party from my childhood. it's really cool to be part of the community and reconnect with the neighborhood. >> one of our largest challenges in creating this cultural district when we compare ourselves to chinatown, japantown or little saigon, there's little communities there that act as place makers. when you enter into little philippines, you're like where are the businesses, and that's one of the challenges we're trying to solve.

>> undercover love wouldn't be possible without the help of the mayor and all of our community partnerships out there. it costs approximately $60,000 for every event. undiscovered is a great tool

for the cultural district to bring awareness by bringing the best parts of our culture which is food, music, the arts and being ativism all under one roof, and by seeing it all in this way, what it allows san franciscans to see is the dynamics of the filipino-american culture. i think in san francisco, we've kind of lost track of one of our values that makes san francisco unique with just empathy, love, of being acceptable of different people, the out liers, the crazy ones. we've become so focused onic maing money that we forgot about those that make our city and community unique. when people come to discover, i want them to rediscover the magic of what diversity and

empathy can create. when you're positive and committed to using that energy, [bagpipes playing]