00:00Take a live look over Uptown, where the Juneteenth celebrations are set to kick off this weekend.
00:05You can see the countdown clock.
00:06The annual drum circle ceremony will be happening here in Charlotte.
00:09That will be tomorrow night.
00:11Naya Harden in the QC studio right now, talking with some of the organizers of the festivities.
00:15Naya?
00:16Yeah, well now at noon, Juneteenth Festival of the Carolinas President and Board Chair are here.
00:20We have a puppet Ninjai.
00:23Did I say that correctly?
00:25Ninjai.
00:25And then we also have Jay Ferguson as well.
00:28You guys, thank you so much for joining us.
00:30Really exciting because you guys are first starting off with our youth.
00:33So go ahead and tell us about the series of events.
00:36We believe at Juneteenth Festival of the Carolinas that the children are our future.
00:42That's why every year we start with the youth camp.
00:47Right here, it is going on right now and it's going to be great and beautiful.
00:54You guys started at 9 o'clock this morning.
00:56Correct.
00:56So tell us about what is in the next coming days.
00:59We know that the drum circle is a big thing here.
01:03Yep.
01:04Again, we believe that drumming in African culture is a symbol of communication.
01:09And we are starting tomorrow with the opening of the drum circle starting at 5 p.m.
01:16right in front of House of Africa where the festival started 28 years ago.
01:21I was going to say 28 years is a long time.
01:24Tell us what this means to the organization.
01:26Well, as a native of the Charlotte community, it's really exciting that we have this event
01:33that really preceded the official holiday and everything else.
01:37So you're going back 28 years of interaction, of celebration, and all those kinds of things.
01:42So it's just going to be bigger and better than ever this year.
01:46Again, going all the way back to the late 90s.
01:48All right.
01:49So let's go ahead and provide the information so people can know exactly where and when to go.
01:54It will be right here, right there in the heart of the Platza Midwood and is going on from tomorrow
02:03through Sunday with a lot of activities, food, vendors that come from all over the country
02:09and beyond.
02:10It is going to be great.
02:12Come on out and let's celebrate a piece of American history.
02:15We believe that Juneteen is not just an African-American holiday but a piece of American history.
02:21All right.
02:22And we do have that information already on WBTV.com for you as well.
02:26Alex, we're going to go ahead and send it back to you.
