On the road with Gord Kurenoff

Talking trash, diversity part of a busy weekend
Ken Herar, The TimesPublished: Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Bright and early this morning, Abbotsford-Mission Times editor Gord Kurenoff and I took our Building an Inclusive, Diverse Community essay contest on the road.
The first stop was at Dasmesh Punjabi School located in Matsqui Village. I have had the privilege of speaking to students and staff there for the past two years and I am always impressed with their work.
I was also invited to speak at a Mission Secondary socials 10 class by teacher Ed Sward, where he had a pile of entries for me. His entire class submitted entries for our contest and Mission has officially taken over the lead. It's looking like another Mission sweep!
A week ago, I briefly discussed that we all have to take responsibility for our actions and stop throwing our garbage on local streets.
I am starting to realize its no different when readers throw "trash-talking" responses into my e-mail bin and make assumptions that South Asians are the only people who litter in our community.
"For all I know where they come from it is normal and accepted to throw garbage from the window of their car," one reader wrote.
Hogwash. Obviously, this individual doesn't get out much. He suggested I put more balance in my approach and coverage.
Specifically targeting South Asians as the sole culprits of harming the environment is utter nonsense and factually not accurate. I have witnessed all kinds of people tossing things from their vehicles and you cannot point the finger at just one group.
He figured we will again see more garbage on our streets during the Diwali celebrations. What this individual fails to acknowledge is we witness the same kind of behaviour - or maybe even worse - with many non-South Asian folks during Halloween.
What I personally dislike are those smokers who throw cigarettes out of their windows, especially when there are cars directly behind them.
Anyways, enough of this rhetorical nonsense and on to real issues.
Man, was it ever a busy weekend. I attended two Diwali events on Friday and was invited to another on Saturday. The Diwali celebration in Mission on Friday night was a huge event with a packed audience at West Heights school.
There were classrooms full of activities for children to participate in (henna, diya painting and crafts). I was really impressed how young kids dressed up and were running around and enjoying themselves. The Mission Sikh Temple donated food.
Later that evening, I attended Diversity Festival 2009 at Northview Church in Abbotsford. It was the first of its kind sponsored by the Centre for Multi-Cultural Ministries. The evening was filled with entertainment and tasty food from five different countries.
Diwali was also celebrated this week at Parliament Hill in Ottawa and Prime Minister Stephen Harper had these comments after lighting the traditional lamp: "The growing Indo-Canadian community is at the forefront of Canada's quest to build an even better country for generations to come."
The Times Oct 30th essay deadline is almost here. The question is: "What have you done or what can you do to build an inclusive community?"
Responses must be 300 words or less and can be e-mailed to me or dropped at the Times office.
- Award-winning columnist Ken (Kulwinder) Herar writes for the Abbotsford-Mission Times. E-mail him at Kenherar@gmail.com.