I'm starting to detect a distinct trend of feel-good, slightly religious bhangra songs these days. Gurminder Guri has done this with his latest album and here's a catchy song from Kaka Zaildar.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Made From Canada
As a proud Canadian, other than the last 5 seconds (I'm a non-drinker), I have to say this is a pretty darn good ad. However, Canadians better be careful, we're almost getting as overly patriotic as the Americans.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Harinder Singh From Sikh Research Institute - India Speaking Tour 2010
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Gurmat Gian Group
I got to hear one of the members from the Gurmat Gian Group perform Kirtan last year at a Sikh retreat and I was amazed by her beautiful voice. Based in Ludhiana, the Gurmat Gian Group is composed of three young Sikh women, Gurpreet Kaur, Keerat Kaur, and Japjit Kaur.They have released several CDs and produce great videos of the shabads they sing, complete with the Gurbani and scenes of nature. You can read more about the group in this article.
Rather than describe their music, listen for yourself. Here are their videos on Youtube.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Good Girls Marry Doctors (Call for Submissions)
A call for submissions to an interest project...
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
MAMA SAYS GOOD GIRLS MARRY DOCTORS
Retaining Control, Negotiating Roles:
South and East Asian Diasporic Women and their Parents
Editors: Piyali Bhattacharya and Josephine Tsui
Contact: goodgirlsmarrydoctors@gmail.com
Submission Deadline: July 1, 2010
Visit the website: http://goodgirlsmarrydoctors.webs.com/
Are you a good girl? You know what we mean: you listen to your parents, there’s no
gossip about you in the “community.” Or are you a bad girl? Were you caught smoking in high school? Did you marry that white boy against your parents’ wishes?We ask you to contribute your story to a forthcoming volume: “Mama Says Good Girls Marry Doctors.” This book focuses on the pressures on South and East Asian women who have grown up in North America to be “good girls.” It seeks to collect the stories of such women, and their traumas, victories, and defeats as they face the control that their immigrant parents try to exercise over them in relation to the choice of a partner, or a career, or their freedom. We want to know how negotiating these pressures affects young Asian diasporic women, their relationship to feminism, to their parents and to their partners or siblings.
We DO NOT seek academic essays, but creative non-fiction pieces, narratives,
reflections and personal histories and memoirs. You can tell your own story or that of a friend or relative. As Asian women who have experienced such issues ourselves, we want this volume to bring a range of stories out in the open and available to other women who are facing the same issues.
Your essay might focus on one of the following:
- How did your battle with your parents affect the way you viewed them, either immediately after any given incident, or retrospectively many months or years later? How did it affect the way they viewed or treated you?
- Is there a difference in the way your parents treat you versus your brother? Has it made a difference if you are an older or a younger sibling? Has your parents’ treatment of you affected the way you interact with your siblings?
- What were the creative ways in which you dealt with negative reactions from your parents about your partner, career, parenting skills, or any other issue?
- Have your friends outside your family or community been unable to understand the pull or responsibility you feel toward your parents? How have you dealt with this?
- Have you found that your economic class differentiates your experience from what is considered the “norm” or from other women from your ethnic/cultural community?
- Have you ever felt like your life decisions in regard to your parents have compromised or altered your feminism?
Of course, these are by no means the only questions we are focusing on. We want to hear your unique story. We are looking for women who have undergone interesting processes of self-discovery and want to hear about how these women have chosen unique ways in which to handle negotiations with their parents, and about the outcomes of their various efforts.
We want to hear your voice and your story!
Send all submissions (3,000 – 4,000 words) to: goodgirlsmarrydoctors@gmail.com by JULY 1, 2010.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Satinder Sartaj - Adhi Kick Te Start Mera Yamaha
Sometimes you just have to appreciate the small things in life, like when your Yamaha starts on the first kick during on a cold winter day...
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Passages to Canada Reception
Passages to Canada is a story telling initiative where people who immigrated or came as refugees speak to students and community groups about their experiences using an anti-racism framework. They are expanding into Mississauga and Brampton.Passages to Canada: Dismantling Racism is coming to Brampton and Mississauga!
Passages to Canada is one of the Historica-Dominion Institute’s flagship educational programs. Since 2002, more than 100,000 students and New Canadians across the country have heard the inspiring personal stories of immigration from some of Canada's most successful immigrants. Through Passages to Canada, you will hear how it feels to leave one's homeland and to arrive in a new and strange place; how it feels to encounter racism and misunderstandings about one's culture; how it feels to try to fit in, to learn a new language and to have to start over; how it feels to realize that you have indeed found a new home in Canada. The Dismantling Racism initiative is new to the Passages to Canada project.
Friday, March 5, 2010
5:30pm - 7:30pm
Staging Room, Mississauga Living Arts Centre
4141 Living Arts Drive, Mississauga, ON
Please call The Historica-Dominion Institute at 1.866.701.1867 or email gsodhi@historica-dominion.ca to RSVP.
Friday, February 19, 2010
“She Is Honour” Painting Exhibition by Gurpreet Kaur Sehra
Her depictions of women in collective environments explore issues related to memory, as defined through Sikh-Punjabi culture and its particular definitions of symbolic femininity.
Snacks and Refreshments will be Served.
Contact:
gurpreetsehra@live.ca
905-457-8294
harpreet@hansra.ca
905-455-5111
http://gurpreetsehra.wordpress.com/
http://punjabidaily.com
Date: Saturday, February 20, 2010
Time: 12:30pm - 4:30pm
Location: Office of Punjabi Daily Newspaper
Street: 1332 Khalsa Drive. Unit #22
City/Town: Mississauga, ON
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Arundhati Roy on India (and the Sikh Genocide)
Arundhati Roy: We call ourselves a democracy but as a society we tolerate the 68,000 dead in Kashmir, we tolerate deeply undemocratic laws like the Armed Forces Special Powers Act, we had the Sikh genocide and what happened in Gujarat, all of these things I question.
Karan Thapar: And the Prime Minister apologised for what happened to the Sikhs, Sonia Gandhi visited the Golden Temple.
Arundhati Roy: Would it be enough for you Karan, if someone killed your parents and raped your wife and the Prime Minister apologises?
Karan Thapar: The Chinese haven't apologised for the Tiananmen Square.
Arundhati Roy: It doesn't matter. The point is when we accept these kinds of injustices and absorb them and the Government thinks by apologising or dissimulating it's over, but they all settle in us like toxins and we become a pretty barbaric society. (Link)
290M bottles of liquor consumed in Punjab last year
Looks like the only growth industry in Punjab is liquor sales. Here's how many bottles were consumed in Punjab over the past two years:
- 2008: 190,000,000
- 2009: 290,000,000
Liquor consumption in Punjab has touched an alltime high
Notwithstanding the economic recession, liquor consumption in Punjab has touched an alltime high, with its denizens guzzling roughly 29 crore bottles of Punjab Made Liquor (PML), Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) and beer in 2009-2010.
This is a whopping increase of 10 crore bottles over the consumption of 19 crore bottles in the preceding year, suggesting that the tipplers have given a major leg-up to the revenue earnings of the financially poor state.
In other words, Punjab with a population of 2.5 crore has one of the highest per capita consumption in the country -- roughly 10 bottles (750 ml each) per head in a year. This, mind you, is apart from the liquor consumed from other sources such as scotch and wine brought by foreign travellers. (Hindustan Times)
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Peasants became poets..
The title ‘Sikh’, ‘The Disciple’, was first given to us by Guru Nanak. We were mere corpses, he poured life into us. We were thus created anew by His love of us. He made us alive with our out-drawn love of Him and left us free. He freed us from the hatred of caste, colour and creed. He made us look straight at the sky towards the Infinite, he made us look upon the sun and the moon and the stars as our kith and kin. He did knit us with the Universe and he wove the design of the Infinite into the texture of our soul.
He gave us then the universal music to sing; birds and animals to be our confidants, woods and rivers and hills to sing with us. This world that sat like a nightmare on us was thrown away: the new world was laid open before our eyes in His Vision. The veil was almost torn asunder and this spiritual universe of love was opened to our vision. And we were elevated from the valleys of darkness on to the sunlit heights. Peasants became poets by His touch.
He gave us then the universal music to sing; birds and animals to be our confidants, woods and rivers and hills to sing with us. This world that sat like a nightmare on us was thrown away: the new world was laid open before our eyes in His Vision. The veil was almost torn asunder and this spiritual universe of love was opened to our vision. And we were elevated from the valleys of darkness on to the sunlit heights. Peasants became poets by His touch.
Puran Singh, Spirit Born People (1928)
Monday, February 1, 2010
Sikh Interviewees Needed in Toronto
Are you interested in participating in a project with the National Commission of Canada?
The company "Moment Factory" is looking to interview (and film) Canadians around the country. The interviews will include a discussions related to the history and culture of our country. The video will be presented in Parliament as a permanent installation.
Here's a link to the interviews that they've done so far:
The team will be in Toronto on February 3rd, 4th and 5th and are specifically looking to interview Sikhs.
Here's a link to the interviews that they've done so far:
The team will be in Toronto on February 3rd, 4th and 5th and are specifically looking to interview Sikhs.
For more information, please contact Julie Bazoge (Studio Coordinator) at the Moment Factory at julieb@momentfactory.com or visit www.momentfactory.com
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