BRAMPTON: On the occasion of Fiji’s 51st Independence Day anniversary on October 10, Brampton inaugurated a park named after the Pacific island nation.
The Fiji Park lies at the corner of Thorndale Road and Kanashiro street.
“This is the only Fiji Park outside of Fiji in the world,” said Sam Basra, the driving force behind this historic event.
“We are about 8,000 strong in the GTA, but the real big community is in British Columbia.”
“Yes, there are about 70,000 Fiji-Canadians in BC,” chimed in Bobby Nand, another member of the community. “Lots of people in the Fiji islands are of Indian origin,” he explained, adding “so you see many Indians with Fiji roots in the crowd.”
Prakash Maharaj , president of the Fiji Association of Ontario (FAOO), added with pride, “Recently, Fiji was in the news as we won the gold medal for rugby again at the Olympics, after winning in Brazil in 2016.”
Against a background of very lively and upbeat meke music, the crowd gathered tapping their feet while waiting for the official opening. Meke music, as one young guy explained, is the traditional Fiji music and dance where “men demonstrate strong virile movements and the women are expected to be graceful. Has a great beat as you can tell.”
Shooting the breeze, while eating snacks and drinking tea, the public was extremely happy that Fiji Park was finally approved by Brampton’s council.
Finally, Mayor Patrick Brown and a handful of other dignitaries, including MPP Sara Singh, MP Maninder Sidhu, Councillor Harkirat Singh, Regional Councillor Pat Fortini and a host of others, showed up to join FAOO president Prakash Maharaj.
A short welcoming and thank you ceremony, known as Sevusevu, was performed and a herbal potion called Kava was offered to all the dignitaries as is the custom in the Fiji islands.
After several short congratulatory speeches from a few people, Mayor Brown took the podium and told the story of how Fiji Park came to be.
“I met Sam Basra in 2017 and a year later he came to me with the idea of having a park in Brampton named after Fiji. Every week, he would (relentlessly) call me for an update and… finally after 3 years Fiji Park was passed unanimously by the council!”
He recounted a humourous situation where two councilors arm wrestled to decide where it would be located, which prompted laughter from the attendees.
True to the adage “travel leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller”, Mayor Brown told his story of visiting Fiji sometime ago where he was left speechless.
Then the man of the hour, Mr Sam Basra, took centre stage, thanking the Mayor and the council for their approval and requesting them to look into upgrading the park so the neighborhood can better enjoy its facilities.
Finally came the customary cutting of the cake and the ribbon.
Fiji Park, the brainchild of the Fiji-Canadian community, is born!
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