Awakening Chinatown festival to celebrate Victoria's Chinese community
The history, culture and traditions of Greater Victoria’s Chinese community will be celebrated in Canada’s oldest Chinatown on Sunday.
The Awakening Chinatown festival showcases the important contributions made to Canada and B.C. by Victoria’s Chinese community for more than 160 years. This is the second year the Victoria Chinese Museum Society (VCMS) has hosted the one-day festival in Victoria’s Chinatown.
The group says the festival is an opportunity to share the culture and stories of Victoria’s Chinese community as it celebrates Asian Heritage Month. It also highlights the struggle that was endured by Chinese immigrants as they made a new home in B.C.
“The history and stories of these people are deeply embedded in the larger story of British Columbia,” said VCMS chair Dr. Grace Wong Sneddon. “The VCMS is passionate to share these stories through the lens of Victoria’s Chinatown, a place that we believe is a living museum.”
Wong Sneddon says the streets and buildings of Canada’s oldest Chinatown help to tell the history of Canada’s Chinese community. She says it is important to recognize that the story of the Chinese community in Victoria is not just one story.
“It is important to recognize that we are more than the railway worker, the gold miner or the restaurant owner,” said Wong Sneddon. “We want to share about who we were then and who we are today.”
From the eye-dotting ceremony to wake the lion to traditional demonstrations of dance and song, the festival highlights the Chinese culture and the people that helped to make Victoria what it is today.
“We really believe in our unique identities,” said Wong Sneddon. “This is the area that our ancestors came. They flourished, they struggled, but they resisted and we are here because of their hard work and their sacrifice.”
The free event kicks off at noon at the corner of Fisgard and Government streets with the traditional dotting of the eye ceremony to awaken the lions and runs until 5 p.m. The lion parade will then travel through the neighbourhood to awaken Chinatown and bring good fortune and prosperity to all.
On the festival’s main stage, festival-goers can enjoy a variety of entertainment, from traditional martial arts by the Wong Sheung Kung Fu Club to Asian opera singers and Victoria’s Happy Drum Group. There will also be a performance by the Victoria Society of Chinese Performing Arts Evergreen seniors choir and an Asian drag review by Vancouver’s House of Rice.
“We, as Chinese Canadians, are an evolving culture and we are learning and growing as we live our lives in Canada so we are not the one story that we get painted with in popular culture,” said Wong Sneddon. “Chinatown is a really fun place to visit and we encourage people to come and revitalize it and see the little gems that it offers.”
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Prince William and Kate release photo of daughter Charlotte to mark ninth birthday
Prince William and his wife Kate released a picture of their daughter Charlotte to mark the princess's ninth birthday on Thursday.
Ontario man loses $1,500 applying for Nexus cards on social media
The trusted traveller program between Canada and the United States is extremely popular and almost two million Canadians have a Nexus card.
NEW Facial reconstruction reveals what a 40-something Neanderthal woman may have looked like
Scientists studying a Neanderthal woman's remains have painstakingly pieced together her skull from 200 bone fragments to understand what she may have looked like.
Concerns about Plexiglas prompt inspections at some Loblaws locations in Ottawa
Inspections are underway at more than one Loblaws location in Ottawa after complaints were filed about tall Plexiglas barriers.
Weight-loss drug Wegovy available in Canada starting May 6
The makers of Ozempic say their weight-loss drug Wegovy will be available to patients in Canada starting Monday.
Five human skeletons, missing hands and feet, found outside house of Nazi leader Hermann Goring
Archeologists have unearthed the skeletons of five people, missing their hands and feet, at a former Nazi military base in Poland.
This Canadian restaurant just lowered its prices. Here's how it did it
A Canadian restaurant lowered its prices this week, and though news of price tags dropping rather than climbing sounds unusual, the business strategy in this case is not, according to experts in the field.
NEW Companies letting customers opt out of Mother's Day ads
In an effort to balance the profitability of Mother's Day with the pain it causes some people, some brands are offering customers the choice to opt out of Mother's Day email advertising.
NEW A mother's hopes to free her son from a Syrian prison is revitalized by a new human rights report
Just days before the seventh anniversary of the day Jack Letts was thrown in prison with thousands of suspected ISIS fighters, his mother, Sally Lane, delivered a small stack of envelopes to the headquarters of Global Affairs Canada in Ottawa.