Anti-racism activist hopes to make our communities mutually respectful

Dr. Rehman Abdulrehman is a clinical and consulting psychologist at Clinic Psychology Manitoba. He has a consulting and coaching firm called Lead with Diversity, he is the assistant professor with the department of clinical health psychology at the University of Manitoba and he has just written his first book, Developing Anti-Racist Cultural Competence, which aims to help people develop practical skills, insight and better empathy when working with diverse groups.

Le logo d’un francophile de cœur

Originaire du quartier Tyndall Park à Winnipeg, c’est pourtant à Saint-Boniface que l’anglophone Jonato Dalayoan a choisi de s’installer il y a 22 ans. “C’était mon premier domicile, et depuis je suis toujours resté ici avec ma femme et mes enfants.”

Lui-même d’origine philippine, et sa femme germano-philippine, ils ont pleinement embrassé Saint-Boniface, sa culture francophone, et bien sûr son Festival du Voyageur. “Mes enfants vont à l’école d’immersion française et parlent couramment le français, affirme-t-il avec fierté. Je les appelle mes francopinos! En fait, ils parlent très bien le français mais pas du tout le filipino.”

Le Festival du Voyageur, la famille Dalayoan y a donc passé de nombreuses journées à travers les années. Jonato Dalayoan raconte: “Je vis proche du parc Provencher et je me souviens que dans mes premières années à Saint-Boniface, il y avait des sculptures de neige du Festival dans le parc Provencher. C’était toujours quelque chose que j’avais très hâte d’aller voir.

“Aujourd’hui, on va souvent au parc du Voyageur avec les enfants. Le Festival a beaucoup changé dans les cinq à dix dernières années, il y a beaucoup de nouvelles activités, de nouveaux spectacles, de nouvelles musiques, c’était vraiment cool pour toute la famille!”

National symbols can be problematic, and the Canadian flag has been through a lot in its 60 years

So, folks, where are we at on the Canadian flag? Is it cool to unfurl the ol’ girl again or what?

Noir et fier met les mots sur les maux

Noir et Fier revient jusqu’au 28 février pour un mois de festivités et d’animations placées sous le signe de l’échange et de la guérison. Wilgis Agossa, directeur artistique, nous en dit plus sur les nouveautés de la quatrième édition.

“Mots sur Maux,” voilà le thème du festival Noir et Fier cette année. La programmation a été pensée de façon à créer des temps d’échanges autour de diverses activités où des histoires touchantes pourront être racontées, celles des personnes noires.

La première nouveauté se tiendra au Théâtre Cercle Molière (TCM) lors des “Dimanches en famille”. Ce rendez-vous hebdomadaire, déjà en place au TCM, s’adapte pour proposer des animations telles que de la danse, du break, des jeux ou encore des contes pour “nous permettre de nous enrichir,” indique Wilgis Agossa.

En parallèle, un autre moment de rencontres se tiendra chaque milieu de semaine avec “Les mercredis je conte,” de 17 h 30 à 19 h. Le public pourra y découvrir des histoires de plusieurs peuples. “Dans les cultures noires, la tradition orale a une grande richesse, explique Wilgis Agossa. Quand on veut faire passer un message et dire les choses, on utilise le conte. Ce rendez-vous nous permettra de voyager vers un autre continent, que ce soit avec les contes d’Afrique centrale, d’Afrique de l’Ouest ou même des Caraïbes.”

Manitoba surpasses goal of hiring 1,000 health-care workers, says health minister

WINNIPEG - Manitoba's NDP government has surpassed its goal of hiring 1,000 health-care workers since taking office more than a year ago, but the news is receiving mixed responses from some groups who represent health-care staff.

The province announced on Friday that from last April to the end of December it hired 1,255 net-new health-care workers, including nurses, physicians and midwives, to work within the public system.

"Each and every one of these 1,255 frontline health-care workers have joined our system because they want to care for their neighbours, their fellow citizens (and) their community members," Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara told news reporters.

The NDP government committed to hiring 100 doctors, 210 nurses and 600 health-care aides as part of its 2024 budget.

‘A divine feeling’: Mosque becomes a reality for Morden’s Muslim families

There’s a new place of worship in Morden — the city’s first mosque.

Operated by the Pembina Valley Islamic Society, the mosque is located in an 1,800-square-foot former commercial space in a downtown strip mall on North Railway Street.

Approval for the mosque, called a masjid in Arabic, was granted by Morden city council on Dec. 23.

The mosque, which will serve about 150 Muslim families in the area, joins 17 other places of worship, all of them Christian, in the city of nearly 10,000 people.

Province invests $17M in Magellan Aerospace to create additional jobs, training

The NDP government is continuing its aggressive support of Manitoba’s aerospace industry, announcing Thursday a significant investment in Magellan Aerospace.

The province is providing Magellan with an $8 million grant and a $9 million loan (to be repaid over 12 years). The investment expects to lead to the creation of more than 60 positions at Magellan. (Its current workforce is about 650.)

The financial assistance will leverage additional capital investment from the company. It is a global player in the aerospace industry, with head offices in the Greater Toronto Area. In addition to its Winnipeg plant, Magellan has three manufacturing operations in Ontario, six in the U.S, six in Europe and two in India.

The Winnipeg plant has been around for close to 100 years. In addition to being a centre of excellence for the company when it comes to machining aero-engine parts, it is also Magellan’s space centre, having manufactured five satellites currently orbiting the Earth.

How changing demographics and tastes are shaping Canada’s grocery stores

It’s mid-December at a large supermarket in Mississauga, Ont., and Christmas music plays softly over the speakers as customers roam the aisles, picking the perfect lemon and eyeing the large olive counter in the middle of the store.

But this isn't just any grocery store. Walk past the produce and the olives, and you'll see trays of tabbouleh, hummus and fattoush, as well as shawarma cooking on rotating spits. Further, you’ll find a large dessert section with neat displays of golden baklava and other sweets. Behind two swinging doors, rows of puffed-up pita bread emerge on a conveyor belt from the oven, ready to be packaged and sold to customers.

This is Adonis, a Middle Eastern grocer that got its start in Montreal in 1978. The grocer is gearing up to open its 16th store, this one in London, Ont., next summer to meet demand from customers who often travel weekly to shop at the Mississauga location.

Specialty stores like Adonis are enjoying growth thanks to not only immigration but also the more diverse tastes of younger generations.

Serving — and feeding — the community

A group of young Muslim men walked up and down Main Street Saturday morning offering sandwiches, loaves of bread and cans of pop to Winnipeg’s homeless population in the spirit of holiday giving.

“This is what I was taught from a very young age, to volunteer for a good cause and to give back,” said Faraad Tahir, who has been a part of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association since he was a boy.

Tahir and others from the 50-person group spent the morning making more than 100 sandwiches before loading up their vehicles and heading downtown. The group handed out the food and drinks to people outside of Main Street Project and Siloam Mission before they planned to give out the remainder — if there was any — at Portage Place.

Tahir, 22, came to Winnipeg from Pakistan as a child and immediately felt the group’s community support.

Slow fashion houses embrace made-to-order to reduce waste

TORONTO - On occasion, fashion designer and clothier Katelyn Woodburn is accused of running a scam.

When a customer makes a purchase without reading the "about" section on her website or following her on social media, they might send an email a week or two later saying something like: "Where's my order? It hasn't even shipped yet? What's going on?" Woodburn recounted from her Vancouver studio.

"Which is a totally reasonable response," she added. Consumers are conditioned to expect instant gratification when it comes to clothes shopping, but that's not really how Woodburn does things.

"I'll say, 'Oh, your shirt is being cut out. We're going to sew it tomorrow.' I tell them the whole process of what's happening. And 100 per cent of the time, I get a response going, 'Oh my gosh, I didn't even realize. This is so cool, no rush at all.'"

Peacemaking and Canada’s international reputation

For many years, Canada had a much-lauded and highly respected reputation for peacekeeping — it helped define our national identity.

It started back in 1956. That’s when Lester Pearson, then minister of external affairs, proposed the creation of a United Nations peacekeeping force to resolve a crisis in Egypt when Great Britain, France and Israel attacked that country after it nationalized the Suez Canal.

The introduction of peacekeeping troops, including from Canada, stabilized the situation and allowed the belligerents to work out an agreement to end the fighting. For his efforts, Pearson was awarded the 1957 Nobel Peace Prize.

For decades after that crisis, Canada remained at the forefront of international peacekeeping operations. Altogether, the country sent about 125,000 trained peacekeepers on over 50 peacekeeping missions around the globe.

Les Aces de Saint-Anne lancent une soirée francophone

Le Comité culturel de Sainte-Anne lance sa première soirée de hockey francophone. Le 7 décembre à 19 h, les Aces de Sainte-Anne affronteront les Hawks de Notre Dame à l’aréna Maurice-Chaput.

L’idée vient de la “voix des Aces” Marc Connelly, s’inspirant des soirées thématiques dans les sports professionnels. “C’est une manière d’encourager les gens à venir à nos parties,” explique-t-il.

Peu après avoir proposé l’évènement à sa mère, Diane Connelly, secrétaire au Comité culturel, un nouveau sous-comité a vu le jour pour organiser la soirée.

“On veut essayer de mettre autant de français qu’on peut dans la fête, ajoute Diane Connelly. Une grande soirée est planifiée, car on veut que la ville sache, qu’au rural, on fait des choses!”

The gift of hijab: Fashion designer found empowerment in modesty

As a Muslim woman living in Canada, Hafsa Altaf faced countless challenges on multiple fronts when navigating the fashion industry as a woman in a hijab.

Rejected by local trade shows and craft markets and criticized by detractors in the South Asian community who disapproved of her sartorial ambitions, the 27-year-old artist and designer remained undaunted.

Undeterred by naysayers, she relentlessly called and emailed event organizers, determined to convey the values and mission of her label, Fashion by Hafsa.

Facing down the conservatism of her community was an altogether different struggle, but it was also one of the “greatest things” she has ever done, says the Pakistani-born Canadian, who moved to Saskatchewan with her family when she was four.

Miss Shakespeare turns gender bias on its ear

Winnipeg Studio Theatre kicked off its season with the guts and glory of female empowerment in its all-women-led local premiere of Miss Shakespeare.

The two-hour musical — directed by company artistic director Erin McGrath and presented by Rainbow Stage — runs through Oct. 5 at the University of Winnipeg’s Asper Centre for Theatre and Film. Saturday night’s crowd eagerly lapped up its feminist ethos.

Its quasi-historical protagonist, Judith Shakespeare (played by a spunky Rhea Rodych-Rasidescu), is the Bard’s real-life daughter “born with a poetic soul.” Judith lives in the shadows of her famous father during the repressive 1600s, when women were relegated to becoming wives and mothers, rather than pursuing their own passions.

Judith yearns for her own identity as a self-actualized creative powerhouse, and cobbles together the “Gossips,” a merry band of like-minded women who surreptitiously meet each week in the bowels of The Cage tavern to create a play. They spar, share stories, and dream, risking public humiliation if they’re discovered treading the boards like their male counterparts.

Vehicle hits cyclist at downtown protest about woman fatally struck by police cruiser

A protest at Portage and Main Wednesday, to denounce the death of an Indigenous woman who was fatally struck by a police cruiser, was the scene of violence as officers stayed back from the intersection at the request of demonstrators.

The Winnipeg Police Service said officers “were strategically placed out of view” of the intersection, which had been shut down by about 100 people beginning during the noon hour. The rally was called to mark the death of Tammy Bateman, a homeless woman in her 30s who died after being struck by a police vehicle at the Fort Rouge Park riverside homeless encampment Monday night.

About 20 minutes after the protest began, a driver in a Chrysler New Yorker tried to drive north on Main Street at Portage Avenue, but was blocked by several protesters. The motorist drove through the blockade and struck a cyclist who was blocking the way. The bike was dragged by the vehicle.

Several protesters, who wore vests emblazoned with “Crazy Indians Brotherhood,” jumped on the vehicle and kicked its windshield. Another demonstrator jumped in the passenger side of the vehicle. As the male driver accelerated through the blockade, the protesters fell off and out of the car.

Manitoba bans cellphones for K-8 students

Manitoba has announced a ban on cellphones in elementary schools and strict rules to silence devices and keep them out of sight during Grade 9-12 lessons next month.

Kindergarten to Grade 8 students will be barred from using phones at any point in the school day, including during lunch and recess.

High schoolers will be asked to leave their phones in their locker, with a teacher or at the principal’s office when classes are in session.

Teenagers can access their devices on breaks and when a classroom teacher approves usage for educational purposes.

Canadian news engagement down significantly one year after Meta’s ban: study

MONTREAL - A new study is painting a grim portrait of how local Canadian news outlets are struggling to reach audiences one year after Meta began blocking Canadian news content on its Facebook and Instagram platforms.

The Media Ecosystem Observatory study published today finds that Canadians’ total engagement with news content on social media has been reduced by 43 per cent, despite efforts to increase social media engagement on other platforms.

The social media giant banned Canadian news content after Ottawa passed the Online News Act in June 2023, which compelled tech companies to enter into agreements with news publishers for the use of their content.

Local news outlets, many of which rely on Facebook, have been especially hit hard — 30 per cent of them are now inactive on social media, the study found.