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Yayoi Hirano was honoured at Vancouver Asian Heritage Month’s (VAHM) Virtual Recognition Awards Ceremony 2020. VAHM’s vision is to recognize and promote the inclusion and social integration of Pan-Asian Canadian communities in Canada. Born and raised in Japan, Hirano moved to Vancouver in 2002 after spending a number of years setting up her theatre company,…
The Tanabata + Flea Market event at the Nikkei National Museum & Cultural Centre celebrates the popular Japanese star festival, Tanabata. The celebration will be held on Sat., July 4, from 11 a.m.–4 p.m. “Tanabata is the tale of two star-crossed lovers, Orihime, the star Vega, and Hikoboshi, the star Altair,” says Yukiko Nishikawa, special…
Created in 1956, the Burnaby Association for Community Inclusion (BACI) offers a range of community services to support the inclusion and belonging of people with disabilities. Co-executive director Richard Faucher, a long-time advocate for human rights and social justice, has been with the non-profit for 30 years. “People with disabilities are still perceived as a…
“When you educate a woman, you educate a whole generation of people,” is the message that motivated Nicole Guzzo as she volunteered and created an NGO across the globe. A fashion designer from Vancouver, Guzzo began Prakasa Co. (pronounced prakasha), a non-registered charitable organization in 2017, that plays different roles in the three different countries…
Interdisciplinary e-journal Ideas and Futures launched in May 2020 with the aim of provoking serious reflection on an uncertain post-COVID world. Founding editors Sadia Abbas and Raza Ahmad Rumi explain that the journal, which evolved out of a COVID-19 working group of scholars, activists, policy analysts, and artists, will serve as a platform for international…
Totem poles are well known as a ubiquitous part of Haida Gwaii artwork, but the traditional wooden sculptures were only reclaimed as part of the island’s culture a half a century ago. “As artists, we are still trying to reconstruct the language we had built and to fully understand it again,” says Christopher Auchter, a…
The Here and There: In-Between Worlds online lecture is part of SFU’s 2020 Conversation Series on Identity and Citizenship and will take place Saturday, June 20 from 1–2 p.m. SFU Scholar-in-Residence and Limited-Term Lecturer Amyn Sajoo started the conversation series in 2018 as a partnership between SFU and the Ismaili Centres Canada. “My onstage guests,…
“[British Columbia’s early European settlers] didn’t have brick and stone, so they built with wood. When they built churches they wanted to give them a sense of permanence and a sense of beauty [found in] their former homeland, so memorial windows and windows that told stories of the Bible were a comfort to people,” explains…
Although social distancing measures are beginning to ease, too many restrictions are still in place to allow celebrations for Shavuot to take place at syniguages (synagogues). “One of the main reasons behind the festival: we celebrate the receiving of Torah from God to Moses on Mount Sinai,” says Rabbi Carey Brown from Temple Sholom in…
A charity for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing and a 3D Printing company seem like an unexpected partnership, but during this pandemic they have come together to tackle community-based issues. Tinkerine Studios, a technology and design company, is working on a surprising new project with The Wavefront Centre for Communication Accessibility, a charitable organization…
The Vancouver Japanese Language School and Japanese Hall (VJLS-JH) has the unique distinction of being the only example of confiscated property, including cars, boats, homes, and businesses, that was returned to the Japanese Canadian community at the end of the Internment period during and after World War II. As one of the only physical links…
Each year on May 9, Armenians from Vancouver and around the world will be recognizing Victory and Peace Day, celebrating the anniversary of Nazi Germany’s defeat in the Second World War. “It’s a celebration of happiness,” says Serge Maranjyan, owner of Lamajoun, an Armenian bakery/cafe in Richmond which he runs with his family. “People are…
Melody Lim, this year’s winner of Coast Capital Savings Venture Prize, was inspired by a local candle maker in Milos, Greece, in 2016. At a small local store, she “fell in love with the process of candle-making.” “It was in Milos where I conceptualized Mala,” she recalls. The experience led her to found Mala the…
