Festival of Nations (STL) HONEST REVIEW

Fuck ice because Festival of Nations could be so much better if they didn't exist. Also, these fake ass feds and take it from her me because apparently I'm a real fed. Anyway, Festival of Nation 2026 Quick Recap. I went to Festival of Nations this past Sunday and I wanted to do a quick rundown of how it really was because I haven't seen anyone do an actual review of this shit and if they have, they don't do it like me. Y'all know how I get it up. So, couple things before we get into the food. One, I saw some guy walking around in a Batman outfit. The on the base on the way he was walking and how tall he was, I think this guy was definitely bulkin. Had to be Bostonian. Two, something these booths were doing way too much. For example, like there's this Vietnamese like loudspeaker guy coming, and it was just overall doing too much music, yelling over it with this AI sounding voice. It was just, I had enough of that. Three, super expensive. Super expensive. I probably spent about 75 bucks. I don't even think I got half that worth in food value. Like, I probably got realistically like 25 bucks, maybe 30 bucks of like food for 75 bucks. Kind of a waste for what is a free festival. But whatever. Bring back samples. Also, some of y'all need a shower. Some of y'all need to chill on the cologne because I smell the Dior Sauvage demons all over the place. 2026. We gotta stop that. At least get your money up. Also, I saw a couple Moroccan jerseys. That was pretty cool. Also, personally, like for me, when it comes to the food, I want to booths that seemed like they weren't getting much traction or these were things that I have never had before. A lot of the stuff is kind of samey compared to years past. So I'm not trying to hit the same places as I normally would. Also, I'm obviously not going to, you know, get Shawarma or like get Nigerian cuisine just because like I go to those places like all the time or I've been to them all the time. Like if I want Jollof or a Panko or Fufu, I can just go to like House of Jollof or levels or a four palace for a better experience. Okay. So now let's get into the food. First, I went to the Burmese booth. Burmese. I had a beef curry. It was about 20 bucks. The meat tasted like horse ankles. It was so bad. It was basically this much price and then this small amount of beef in the beef curry. Not a fan. This actually looked like it was gonna be good, but it pissed me off and I ended up throwing away the rice because I was just so annoyed. Also got a Coke from them. The next one, I went to the Uzbek booth. Said Central Asia, but based on how everybody looked and just what I saw on the menu, I'm pretty sure they were Uzbek. I just got the manti, which was pretty small, but these were basically like dumplings. And I want to say that they were pretty good. They were worth like the 14 or 15 dollars that I paid for. It was a pretty small box. And honestly, the hot sauce that came with it carried. So overall, not a good start. Third, is where things got a little better. This is when I went to the Filipino booth and I had a jumbo barbecue chicken kebab on a skewer. Uh, this one was interesting because like the first couple bites weren't that great, but then as I kept going, it got better and better. And I mean, hey, chicken on a stick. Like you can't go wrong with that, right? But either way, I would say this was one of the better ones I went to. Fourth place I went to was the Syrian booth. This is when things get fun because I got kibbeh and lemonade. And I'll start with the lemonade. It was just basic ass lemonade. I was thirsty, so I was like, why not? Let me get some lemonade. Now, I had kibbeh and I realized why I'd never had kibbeh before because there's peanuts in them. So I guess I decided to ignore that fact for the purpose of eating this. And I guess I ended up having a very nice allergic reaction. Here it is. Yeah. So after that, I went to the Venezuelan booth, which was the final one, and I'm glad that I saved this one for last because this was the best. Now, this was also the one where I waited the longest, but it was so worth it because the plantains conkese came out piping hot. Like I was playing potato with the little little plate and oh man, that shit was so good. That shit was really, really good. Um, and then right after that, that's when I had my allergic reaction. Couldn't feel my lips, couldn't feel my nose, couldn't feel my ears, even my feet were going numb. Took 50 milligrams of Benadryl and then I was fine. No big deal. And then I met a few of you guys and you guys were pretty cool. Um, except for these two white girls that stared at me and they said, ooh. And just with that, Unk is not doing a review of Katie's pizza anytime soon. So you're out of luck. But anyway, honestly, like I hope that Festival of Nations, like while it's still very popular and I'm glad that it is getting this attention, I do think that they need to switch it up a little bit. I think the performance is were great, but once again, they were pretty similar to what they've been in the past. They need to bring back samples. I think that would really make things better. And honestly, would entice people to maybe even spend more money. And two, I would love to see more of a North African, Central American, Balkan, East Asian, North Asian presence. Because I didn't see any of that. And I know that like with the way that things are and the political climate, maybe that has something to do with it. Maybe there's just not enough space. I don't know, but like we just need to have more. Like I want to see more diversity. I know that's crazy because there's already a lot, but like I want to see more. So hopefully, you guys had a good time and if you saw me, you didn't.