This Saturday is the annual Chinatown Clean-Up festival, organized by the Chinese Family Service of Greater Montreal, a non-profit community organization. It might sound kind of odd — a clean up festival? — but it promises to be a lot of fun. Participants will spend a couple of hours sweeping up different sections of the neighbourhood and a variety show will present music, sketches and other entertainment. Best of all, volunteers will be rewarded with an organic cotton American Apparel t-shirt and a free lunch at the Man Sau Centre.
This year’s event is green-themed and co-sponsored, among others, by Éco-quartier and Green Life, a group dedicated to raising environmental awareness in the Chinese community and promoting a more city- and community-focused kind of environmentalism.
Picking up trash is not the only priority of this year’s Chinatown Clean-Up, a green-themed community event that will take place this weekend at Sun Yat Sen Park, at the corner of Clark and La Gauchetière.
“It’s meant to get the Chinese community together, but it’s also an intercultural exchange between everyone in Montreal,” says assistant volunteer coordinator Laine Tam. “I think it’s a great way to showcase what Montreal is all about, that it’s a multicultural and multilingual city, despite recent controversies.”
On Saturday, volunteers will put broom to pavement in an effort to give Chinatown a new sheen—but that’s not all. A variety show will present sketches on recycling in Cantonese, Mandarin and French, and information booths will tell you how to reduce your environmental impact. The Salvation Army will also be on hand to take and reuse old clothes and a green-themed mural will be unveiled at the corner of St-Laurent and de la Gauchetière.
The 2007 Chinatown Clean-Up will take place on Saturday, Sept. 8 from 11 a.m.–2 p.m. Contact Laine Tam at lainecfs@gmail.com or (514) 861 5244, ext. 231, for more details.
I’ve spent a lot of time in Chinatown over the past several months. It’s a bigger neighbourhood than most people realize, extending beyond the short commercial district between St. Urbain and St. Laurent. Thousands of people live there, most of them elderly immigrants, and every corner of the district is packed with history. The Chinatown Clean-Up could be a great way to reacquaint yourself with the neighbourhood.
One comment
CHINATOWN! To be frank, I am always enchanted by this name and eager to experience the life in CHINATOWN……But only a few days :) Otherwise, I will be homesick. So, sometimes I don’t know whether I should admire or show “pity” to overseas Chinese who live in the CHINATOWN. Everything around u is the same as in CHINA. Yet, it’s not and can never be. I have read a lot of articles or blogs showing their homesickness for CHINA. Are u? Besides communicating with your neighborhood, how can u getting to know more Chinese to expressing your homesickness? Maybe this is a silly question. BTW, I am a Chinese student, of course, in CHINA. But I am told there are some dating sites especially for CHINESE. U must know it. So I believe it will be a wonderful thing to communicating with CHINESE PEOPLE online. And one site is http://www.CNCupid.com/i/blog . If the name is correct. I think U can try and recommend to your friends. Good luck! Love CHINATOWN!