What Volunteering for the Hmong New Year Taught Me About Community Responsibility
- Hailey Yang
- Nov 22
- 3 min read
Last weekend I volunteered for the Green Bay Hmong New Year (HNY) celebration held at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay’s Kress Events Center. This year’s celebration also marked the 50th anniversary of Hmong resettlement in the United States.
Aside from its historical value, this HNY was personally special to me because my dad, Roger Yang, interim president of the Hmong Center of Green Bay, had a hand in planning the event as a coalition member of Peb Yog Hmoob Collective (PYHC). As a volunteer, I moved around to fill the gaps wherever I was needed.
The event featured many attractions as a comeback to the community’s first 2-day HNY celebration in nearly a decade. One of the most anticipated features was the basketball and volleyball tournaments. The community’s response to the sports tournaments reflected competitiveness and appreciation. While popular among the community, sports are not a typical element of Hmong New Year celebrations in Wisconsin.
“I think it’s important to draw in the youth for these events,” Yang said. “It’s typically the younger generations who care more about the sports. We want to pass on tradition and the celebration of our culture, and historically, these events don’t capture the younger crowd.”
It certainly did capture a crowd as the gym was packed with spectators and players for both tournaments. The gym was alive with energy, everyone was excited to be a part of a relatively unique HNY experience. Many community members expressed their excitement for the sports tournaments during and leading up to the weekend.
Between volunteer duties, I was able to enjoy the event — grab food from vendors, browse items for sale, learn about community organizations at their tables and join the activities in the main arena.
My usual role in attending HNY was transformed through the role of a volunteer. As an attendee, I engage with my culture and community, but as a volunteer, I have an active role in facilitating my community’s engagement.
When I attended community events in the past, it was easy to take them for granted and miss their symbolism. Without seeing the effort that is poured into them, it’s almost instinctual to think of them as nothing more than the part everyone else experiences.
My involvement in such a meaningful event to welcome the new year and celebrate 50 years of resettlement in the U.S. was a humbling experience. I learned that community responsibility comes from your individual responsibility to give back to the community that has shaped you and your experiences.
Seeing my dad work so hard during the planning process laid the foundation for this lesson. His leadership and event coordination have inspired me to continue putting forth my own efforts to facilitate cultural engagement and keep our practices alive.
The HNY is more than a collection of good food and entertainment. Historically it is a celebration of harvest and tradition, but amidst the background of resettlement in the U.S., it adopts a deeper symbolism.
HNY is a commemoration of the Hmong diasporic journey and its rich history. It serves as a reminder of our survival, our resilience and our identity in a place that was not originally ours but has become our home. It is a reclamation of space where our language, clothing, food and history can exist without apology. It honors the generation who fled war, rebuilt their life from nothing and still had the courage to hold onto who they are.
It reminds us that joy itself can be an act of resistance — that gathering together and passing our customs to the next generation is how we continue the story that our elders began. Hmong New Year is not simply an event, it is a declaration that we are here, that we belong and that the legacy of our people will live on through each of us.
As a third generation Hmong American, it is my responsibility to my community to pay this legacy forward and honor its lessons.
Happy Hmong New Year — Nyob Zoo Xyoo Tshiab!
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