Vaisakhi parade is always a colourful and tasty event
Surrey Now April 23, 2011 Comments (7)

Ian Lindsay/Vancouver Sun files

Colourful demonstrations of skill are always part of Surrey’s big Vaisakhi parade, set for today.

The parade will begin at approximately 9:30 a.m. at Gurdwara Sahib Dasmesh Darbar Temple, located at 12885 85th Ave. The festivities will conclude there at approximately 4 p.m.

The parade, which features a variety of floats, community groups, live music, dancers and performers, travels along 124th Street, turns left onto 75th Avenue, continues on 76th Avenue, onto 128th Street, then back to the Temple.

One of the pre-eminent aspects of the Vaisakhi parade is the tradition of celebrating the harvest by giving away food to attendees. Both participants and onlookers are treated to a wide range of free food items, prepared by hundreds of local citizens and distributed without charge to those along the parade route. From traditional Indian foods and sweets to more mainstream food offerings, parade goers are treated to a wide range of goodies.

To facilitate parade activities, there will be road closures, traffic disruptions, restricted access and temporary parking restrictions.

Traffic controls will be in place beginning at 7:30 a.m. until approximately 5 p.m., or until police deem the route is safe to be reopened to vehicular traffic.

Access to 128th Street and road sections along the parade route will be impacted most significantly. Increased delays may be expected for travel through and within the area between 72nd Avenue to 88th Avenue, and Scott Road to King George Highway.

More details about the event can be found online at www.surreyvaisakhiparade.ca.
© Copyright (c) Lower Mainland Publishing

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Surrey celebrates Vaisakhi
Vancouver Sun April 23, 2011

The annual Vaisakhi parade gets underway, April 23rd, along Surrey’s 128th street.
Photograph by: Ward Perrin, PNG

More than 100,000 came out to join Surrey’s Sikh community for their annual Vaisakhi celebrations.
© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Canada’s three major parties on immigration:
Vancouver Sun April 23, 2011

CONSERVATIVES


. The Conservative government recently announced that 280,636 immigrants came to Canada in 2010, emphasizing that number was the highest in 57 years.


. The Conservative government passed a bill that would accelerate the process for expelling false refugee claimants, and has introduced legislation to intern claimants who arrive en masse.


. The Conservatives cut $53 million from immigrant and refugee-settlement programs in December 2010, mostly in Ontario. Conservative leader Stephen Harper announced $6 million for immigrant-training programs this month.


LIBERALS


. Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff said Canada’s future economic success “turns” on immigration. “Immigrants are finding it tougher to get ahead. We’ve got to have language training as long as you need it. We need to have integration services as long as you need it.”


. Ignatieff said he would reverse what he called a 15-per-cent cut in family reunification visas, and the 25-per-cent cut to those for parents and grandparents.


“Why are you going to come to Canada if you can’t bring your family?” said Ignatieff, who noted his father came to Canada from Russia.


. Ignatieff called for a “fairness commissioner” in Ottawa who would check on professional organizations -such as those representing doctors, engineers and pharmacists -to make sure they are not discriminating against immigrants.

NEW DEMOCRATIC PARTY


. NDP leader Jack Layton says: “One of the most disturbing aspects of what the Harper government is doing is that they’re encouraging more and more people to come here as temporary foreign workers . What we’re seeing is more and more of this focus on the immigrant as some kind of an economic unit.”


. The NDP promises to stop the decline in family reunification under Canada’s immigration system, and to work to meet the target of allowing immigration to reach one per cent of the population per year.


. The NDP promises to implement an appeal division under the Immigration Act -to give refugee claimants an opportunity to have decisions quickly reviewed, without having to go through the lengthy process of applying to the Federal Court of Canada.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Playing Canada for a fool

First posted: Saturday, April 23, 2011 2:00:00 EDT AM

When it takes an 11th-hour order from a judge to prevent the pre-deportation release of a bogus refugee claimant with a stack of 76 criminal convictions in our country, then the system is totally dysfunctional and in dire need of a fix.

No more proof is needed.

Just tack Walford Uriah Steer’s picture on a wall, and you have a 39-year-old poster boy for bureaucratic incompetence, weak immigration enforcement and political soft-headedness and complacency.

What Steer represents is just the latest dash of reality in a recipe for disaster that has been pressure-cooking since the Liberals under Jean Chretien steered clear of stirring this ugly pot.

We’re hopeful Steer’s case will now blow off the lid, and spew all the ingredients that went into this mess so they can be examined by those with stronger political will.

Like the Conservatives, for example, who vow if re-elected with a majority to stop the abuses of our immigration system.

The Liberals and the NDP, meanwhile, think they can rehabilitate scorpions, and turn seasoned criminals into social workers.

But forget Steer for a moment. Forget that this convicted violent offender sits in a detention centre waiting deportation only because a judge saw the absolute idiocy of having him released into the public to await yet another plane trip home to Jamaica.

Forget that he was already deported once, but breezily swung back into Canada on fake identification and then schmoozed the Immigration and Refugees Board to actually consider his refugee status, and all the perks that come with it.

Forget it because Steer is but one of too many playing Canada for a fool.

Wandering our streets at this moment are upwards of 41,000 illegal immigrants destined for deportation who have been lost by the Canada Border Services Agency, mainly because the Crowbar Inns have no rooms.


This would be as if the entire town of Medicine Hat, or three Portage la Prairies, or a city like Belleville, were transformed overnight into ghost towns.


Think about it that way.


Some 41,000 missing deportees — all deemed unworthy, criminal, or dangerous — is no small number.

And who’s against building more prisons for the violent ones?

Ask the opposition candidate in your riding

Good, honest and ethical Immigration Consultants – are they a dying breed?

It is a known fact that people all over the world get cheated by crooked people who pose as Immigration Consultants who can make dreams come true. It is hard to believe that intelligent, hardworking, professional people get cheated for thousands of dollars by these “ghost” agents who will take their money and disappear into thin air. Most people in their desperation to get into “greener” pastures are ready to believe anything and pay any sum of money and overlook due diligence.

So what should you look for when choosing an Immigration Consultant and what are the telltale signs of a “ghost” consultant.

1. Know that ONLY 2 parties are authorized to legally represent a client at Canada Immigration. They are registered Lawyers from a Law society in a Province in Canada or a Certified Immigration Consultant registered with the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants (CSIC). These parties are called “Authorized Representatives”

2. An authorized representative MUST be a Permanent Resident or Citizen of Canada.

3. If anyone says they can get you to Canada ask them if they have a licence to practise and ask for a copy of the licence. Do not be afraid – this is your money and life you are putting at risk. Once you get the copy log on to the society they belong to and search if they are members in good standing, write to the member body (either CISC or to the Provincial Law Society) , call the member bodies if you have to confirm their membership.

4. If the Representative says he/she is just representing an authorized company or person in Canada or that they are agents for a company in Canada, then ask for the name of the company, a copy of the licence of the Canadian party and the agency certificate. Contact the company or person in Canada and make sure it is true.

5. If the representative seems too much in a hurry to sign you up or says the deal is ONLY for today or “I am only here for today – sign up or you lose your chance” know that a life changing decision cannot be made in an instant. Ethical authorized representatives will always provide you with ample time, give you options before they will ask you to sign an agreement or take your money. They will readily give you all information upfront

6. If anyone says they can “guarantee” your visas – know there is something wrong. According to the ethical guideline of authorized representatives no one can guarantee visas

7. Ask the representative if referrals can be provided – call the referrals and find out their experience

8. Ask if they have a website – check out the website.

9. Do your homework about Canada before you go. Know what the Provinces are, some statistics, and question the representative and check if they know the answers. Anyone who does not know about Canada should not be promoting Canada.

(…) So do yourself a huge favour and choose a representative wisely and join us in crushing the underworld of Ghost consultants by reporting them either to Canada Immigration or to the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants. We apologies for erroneously leaving out the name of the author in the Sunday April 10 2011 article published in the Education Times.

- Sharmila Perera. ACIS. CCIC. Certified Immigration Consultant – M042390

Toronto student’s death hits nerve with foreign students
ADRIAN MORROW AND JOSH WINGROVE
Globe and Mail Update
Published Friday, Apr. 22, 2011 9:37PM EDT
Last updated Saturday, Apr. 23, 2011 1:43PM EDT

In September of last year, Liu Qian’s parents bid their 23-year-old daughter farewell, and she set off on a 10,000-kilometre journey to attend university in Canada. This week, they made the same trip to retrieve her body, after she was killed in a horrific incident partly witnessed on a webcam by her long-time boyfriend.

Over 200,000 international students, about a quarter of them from China, study in Canada every year, sought after by postsecondary institutions eager to tap their brainpower and expand with the help of their tuition dollars.

Ms. Liu was just such a student: The daughter of a successful academic, she already held a degree from a private university in her home country, and hoped to improve her English skills and attend a Canadian graduate school.

The story of her death has been told around the world, including in broadcasts on Chinese television, hitting a nerve among other parents with children overseas.

“My mom called and told me about it,” said Deng Aojie, 20, a second-year business student at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. “She wanted to let me know when I walk home very late, I need to pay a lot of attention.”

Ms. Liu, an only child, studied at Beijing City College and hoped to earn a master’s in media, applying to universities in Toronto and Windsor. Her grandmother tried to talk her out of it, telling her Canada was too far away, but Ms. Liu was determined to go. It would be easier, she said, to find work.

Ms. Liu enrolled in an English program at York University and settled into the Village, a neighbourhood south of campus where large, cookie-cutter red-brick homes are divided into eight or nine suites and rented to students. Her sweet personality earned her new friends.

(…)

In January of this year, she moved to another apartment in the area.

She was chatting with her boyfriend in Beijing, Meng Xiaochao, when a man knocked at her door around 1 a.m. last Friday. He asked for a hug, Ms. Liu turned him down and the two struggled, Mr. Meng said.

The man shut her laptop and her boyfriend sprang into action, sending messages to friends in Canada. They found Ms. Liu dead hours later.

In China, her family reacted with disbelief. The reality sank in when they tried to contact her.

“We were praying for the possibility that the victim was a different person with the same name,” said her father, Liu Jianhui, research director of Communist Party history at the school that trains party officials. “Soon, we found that we could no longer reach my daughter.”

There was no sign of trauma on her body, and the cause of death has not been determined. But police decided within days they had enough to charge Brian Dickson with first-degree murder.

A 29-year-old with a chiselled jaw and reddish hair, Mr. Dickson spent a decade at York without earning his undergraduate degree. A perennial dabbler, he had been involved in the school’s model NATO club, briefly served on the student union, appeared in small-time theatre productions and worked for several months at a think tank. His lawyer said he would plead not guilty.

Late Thursday morning, Ms. Liu’s parents met with Toronto police Chief Bill Blair at downtown headquarters before officers took them to the nearby coroner’s office to formally identify their daughter’s body. As they waited this weekend to learn when they could bring her home, others who have come from China to study took stock.

Rachel Zhao, a 19-year-old life sciences student at the University of Toronto, said she would be more cautious when finding a place to live next year. “I got the phone number of the Chinese embassy, just in case,” she said.


Lena Lu’s parents, meanwhile, phoned to check in on her.


“My parents said Canada is not a safe country,” said the first-year U of T commerce student, who emphasized that the incident wouldn’t have prevented her from coming.


Administration at York did not respond to requests for comment on the subject. Officials elsewhere acknowledged the effect of such a high-profile case on parents overseas, but said Canada’s safety record should overcome those fears.

“We need international students who bring international knowledge and culture to our classrooms,” said Cen Huang, the University of Alberta’s director of International Relations and Recruitment. “I would say this is probably one of the very, very unfortunate cases, but it’s not a common case in Canada.”

With reports from Tim Alamenciak and Associated Press