Nicaragua: Traditional dress, traditional dance

Harlem Gutierrez and her 12-year-old daughter, Kimberly Ruiz, wore brightly colored dresses to celebrate their Nicaraguan culture.

Gutierrez’s featured images of flowers, maracas and a woman dancing in a traditional Nicaraguan dress. During the parade, they twirled their skirts and showed off the icons stitched to the fabric.

Now 38, Gutierrez came to America when she was a younger woman, she said.

“Here, I have more opportunity,” she said, for work and education.

She said she used to work with animals in the country, and now is a cosmetologist.

This was the first time that Gutierrez and Kimberly attended the International Folk Festival. They were glad to be in the parade, “to show Nicaragua is here, we join together our cultures here.”