Kwanzaa, the African-American cultural holiday that aims to apply traditional African values to modern-day challenges, doesn't begin until the end of December.

So you might say that yesterday's Kwanzaa celebration, held at the Kiley Youth Center on Main Street in Peekskill, ushered in the "Kwanzaa season."

The holiday season, after all, is well under way, judging from the lights and decorations already strung across every downtown.

"The main thing we want the kids to take away is that we need to unite and come together as a community," said Cassandra Reed, who organized the event for the Nu Psi Zeta chapter of the Zeta Phi Beta sorority, which has sponsored a Kwanzaa celebration for the city's youth for several years. "It's a message that we should get out right away."

At least 75 people, mostly in their teens or younger, came to hear singers and rappers, have hot dogs and chips and learn the fundamentals of Kwanzaa, which was created in 1966 by Maulana Karenga, a black studies professor at California State University, Long Beach.

Kwanzaa runs annually from Dec. 26 to Jan. 1 and centers on seven principles: unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity and faith.

Yesterday's event focused on the first principle, unity.

Reed told those who came out that the black community needed to be unified in times of struggle, and she cited the recent cross burning in front of a black family's home in Cortlandt.

"Those who do good for others are actually doing good for themselves," she said. "They are truly building up in the world they live in and want to live in."

The 15 children who made up the Peekskill Community Steppers showed the power of unity, working in sync to create their own percussion with their feet and their hands. They received a particularly enthusiastic response from their elders.

Rapper Andre "Noodle" Rainey, Peekskill's own, urged the young people to set goals and to commit themselves to getting where they want to be.

"Whatever you want to be, you have to work hard at it, you have to believe in your heart," he said. "I don't care if you want to be an astronaut or a rapper."

This article was provided by: The Journal News
Written by: Gary Stern