With the Neighbourhood Small Grant I wanted to create a welcoming community that wants to discover the stories of Black, Indigenous & people of colour writers within food. The Book selected to start the conversation was Climbing the Mango Trees by Madhur Jaffrey.
This book opened up a discussion about identity, colonialism with the British Raj, the effects of partition and the spice trade routes. The memoir relates hard to my own story, so it was a chance to make it personal with experiences and racism-based things I’ve experienced (Okanagan included), to make the community a little richer.
I had printed some poster and placed it in the seed snail in Naramata, did a door drop on Noyes Road, the Okanagan Seed Savers group, and a few community centres. I asked people to email me with an RSVP and we had 25 sign-ups, but only 10 showed up to the actual online session. That was okay, it created space for deeper conversations and friendships.
Thanks for the Neighbourhood Smal Grant to help create the opportunity to hold conversations that are meaningful and impactful.
{Post Image:11}
