By Dr. Suresh Kurl
For the third consecutive year, on November 8th, 2015, the residents of Richmond, joined millions of people to celebrate Diwali in India, Canada, UK, USA, Fiji, Trinidad and Tobago, Surinam, Thailand, Gyana, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Kenya, South Africa, and wherever else people of Indian origin live, including Russia. Only a few months ago, I recall having the best vegetarian lunch with my family in St. Petersburg.
Beyond Diwali’s historic importance and time honoured traditions, Richmond’s Diwali celebration is not only a festival of lights, as it is popularly known, but also as an opportunity to celebrate Canada’s multi-cultural and multi-ethnic character sharing harmony with our inter-faith community.
We started small, and were able to hold our first Diwali celebration in 2013 with the help of Mayor Malcolm Brodie, the Richmond Cultural Centre, SUCCESS and my family with a tiny amount of funds. One of the notable contributions came from the performers and artists who performed without honorariums.
Last year we enjoyed greater success. We received additional support from the City of Richmond, City councillors, the Bank of Novascotia, Coastcapital Savings, the Canadian Race Relations Foundation and Save-On-Foods. This year, Reid, Hurst and Nagy, a BC Accounting firm also joined us.
Suresh Kurl with the help of Mr. Alan Hill, City Diversity Coordinator, Coordinated the festivities.
Before the start of the entertainment part of the festivity, he welcomed the distinguished guests and Shachi Kurl, Senior Vice President of the Angus Reid Institute, emceed.
Suresh talked about the spiritual aspect of Diwali stating that for thousands of years, world religions have been trying guiding us to negotiate the ups and downs and unpleasant curbs of illusions, ignorance and sufferings we encounter on the path of our lives. In such turbulent times, the light that triumphs over evil, defines our truth and shines through our doubts is synonymous with Diwali, no matter to which culture we belong.
In 1999, Pope Paul the second, performed Eucharist in an Indian church, decorated with Diwali lamps. His Holiness had a sandalwood paste mark (tilak) on his forehead and his speech made reference to the festival of lights.
Richmond Diwali festivities started with the performance of the auspicious ceremony of lighting diyas. Suresh invited Mrs. Bindoo Boggaram, Monk Karma, Mr. Anand Jain, Ms. Lynne Fader, Father Joseph Nguyen, Saeid Mozaffari Zadeh-Yazdi, Mr. Farid Rohani and Mrs. Neel, respectively representing Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Bahaism and Sikhism, to light diyas, with an ancient Upanishadic chant — asado ma sad gamya, tamaso ma jyotir gamaya, mrityor ma amritam gamaya, which has never been and never will be in conflict with any faith, meaning: “lead me from the unreal, from the darkness to the light, from death to immortality.”
The celebration moved on with Devika’s Bharathanatyam (Mohiniyattam), one of the classical dance forms from the state of Kerala.
Then Japanese Sat Suki Dance performers entertained the audience with the famous folk dances such as, Picking Green Tea Leaves, the Moon over the Ruined Castle, The Cherry Blossoms followed by the festival song from Fukushima making a wish for a good rice harvest and a fisherman’s folk song, while the Rainbow Dance Group of Chinese dance performers kept the audience captivated with a Wedding Dance and Journey To Tibet.
In between performances, Suresh and Shachi shared the podium narrating the ancient Ramayana story to the audience; the treacheries and conspiracies that took place in the family of the mighty King Dashratha, how his cold hearted third wife Kaykayi and her cunning personal servant Manthara, manipulated him to exile his eldest son Rama, his wife Sita and his younger brother Lakshmana for fourteen years. When, the trio returned after completing the period of their exile, the citizen of Ayodhya expressed their joy for their home coming by lighting up the entire kingdom with bright diyas.
The Acting Mayor Linda McPhail, Mr. Joe Pechisolido, the newly elected Member of Parliament from Steveston-Richmond East, Mr. Albert Lo, Chairman of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation and Father Joseph Nguyen, Reverend vicar-general of the Catholic Archdiocese of Vancouver delivered short speeches about the importance of making Diwali –victory over evil–a truly Inter-faith festival.
Before Shachi introduced the performers of the Vancouver International Bhagara Celebration Society led by dance instructor Hardeep Singh Sahota promoting Punjabi culture and its beautiful art-form, Mr. Neel took a few minutes explaining the socio-cultural aspect of Bhagara, its agrarian birth history and the team spirit the dance promotes.
Suresh offered his heart-felt thanks to all the supporters, performers, audience, who in the spirit of Diwali, brought donations of canned food for Richmond Food Bank, and all the volunteers for their hard work, and concluded the celebration with another Vedic chant wishing everyone success, peace, perfection and an auspicious path in life.
