Manitoba Filipino Street Festival underway in Winnipeg

Members of Winnipeg's Filipino community are braving the rain as they celebrate their culture at the Manitoba Filipino Street Festival today.

The festival kicked off at 9 a.m. Saturday with a parade along McPhillips Street from Northgate Shopping Centre to Garden City Shopping Centre.

"[To] be able to celebrate our culture and traditions here is a wonderful blessing," said organizer Aida Champagne.

"The street festival is showing off the best culture, the best dance, the best music of the Filipino people,"she added. We do this as a matter of community volunteerism."

Thousands of people lined the parade route to watch the parade, which featured floats, musicand costumed performers.

Outside the Garden City mall,tents have been set up with food, livemusic, clothing and more.

"I want to support our Filipino heritage," said Nida Crisostomo, who visited the festival on Saturday morning.

"It's so nice. We met a lot of people, different organizations, and we show all different traditions here."

Now in its third year, the Manitoba Filipino Street FestivalcelebratesWinnipeg's Filipino community, which is about 70,000 people strong. However,the event is open to everyone.

The festival runs until 9 p.m., and CBC has a tent set up on site.