Clarkston is billed as the most ethnically diverse square mile in America being a small town where numerous refugees from around the globe have made their home over the past thirty years. Originally a sleepy southern railroad town, it now hosts numerous shops and restaurants of Nepali, Bosnian, Somali, and Burmese origin to name a few.
Having arrived as a refugee, a good friend of mine went on to pursue the American dream by opening one of many ethnic stores in the city, in this case full of Burmese food and clothing.
At play on the equipment of Milam Park
Before the owner’s retirement, Clarkston’s Thriftown Market was the perfect example of the blend of the community and the reinvigorating power of immigrants–a failing old supermarket that reinvented itself to carry traditional American grocery store as well as ethnic specialties from around the globe that the community could not get elsewhere.
Clarkston’s International Festival has become an annual tradition to showcase its diversity of cultures like some Nepali youth from Bhutan performing a traditional dance
Visit Clarkston`s community gardens and you will find food plants you`ve never heard of growing in abundance.