Here are some highlights from the Peace Run in Vancouver in 2018, when the team visited Ling Yen Mountain Monastery, Vedic Cultural Society of British Columbia (Hindu Temple), Temple Shalom Synagogue and Indian Cultural Centre of Canada (Sikh Temple). The team also ran through Stanley Park and concluded with an event at the Peace Arch.
Welcome to Canada! As our Peace Run team members run from their respective homes all around the world, they are dedicating their miles to a symbolic route around North America. This weekend would have been the first time of many along the route that the torch crossed the border into Canada.
We warmly welcome the Peace Torch and the Peace Run Team to the West Coast of Canada! First entering into Victoria, on Coast Salish Territory and then traveling over sparkling waters to Vancouver which is on the traditional territories of three Local First Nations: the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh. We would end the weekend at the Peace Arch, the border between the communities of Surrey, British Columbia and Blaine, Washington.
One of our team members Yasodhara shared this photo of her first Peace Run in 1987, near Truro, Nova Scotia. All these years later, she has been putting in around 50 kilometers a week in Ottawa.
Rashi from India and Maiko from Japan have been putting in their kilometers around their home in Ottawa. Each of them shared a reflection on peace:
"What does Peace mean to you?"
Rashi: "When my thoughts agree with my emotions"
Maiko: "Sense of belonging and embracement"
Sumitra, a longtime Peace Runner from Victoria, always greets us with a beaming smile! It is something that our team will really miss this year, but we cannot wait to see her and hear her stories the next time we come.
Back in 2017, when this photo was taken, we asked Sumitra for a message of peace, she said:
"We all have a very important role to play. If we have peace in our heart then we have something to share with the rest of the world."
Butch Dick is a Songhees Elder, artist, master carver and educator who has been a longtime friend of the Peace Run. We were honoured to present him with the Torch-Bearer Award many years ago. This photo is from 2014, when he kindly welcomed the team to the Songhees Recreation Center.
We met with Raven La Certe (right) in 2017 in Victoria. She is the co-founder and youth ambassador of the Moose Hide Campaign, a national grassroots organization of men and women working together to end violence against women and children.
Penny Joy and Saul Arbess, co-founders of the Canadian Peace Initiative, seen here with Narmada, our excellent Victoria Peace Run Coordinator. In 2018, we presented them each with the Torch-Bearer Award.
Genevieve von Petzinger is a talented paleoanthropologist and rock art researcher. We were so happy to meet her and her lovely family in 2017.
Devakripa with longtime friend of the Peace Run and C3 and Students on Ice Founder, Geoff Green. This picture is from when the Canada C3 Expedition ship docked in Victoria in 2017. Back in 2010, we were thrilled to present Geoff with the Torch-Bearer Award. He continues to do great work for our country and has since received the Order of Canada.
Local Vancouver Peace Runners Bozena and Andrjez, showed the team the "Peace Mile" in 2018. This Peace Mile was inaugurated in 1986!
Before we cross the border back in to the USA, we always spend some time at the Peace Arch. In this photo from 2018, some team members are pictured with members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Washington State Patrol.
The Peace Arch is inscribed with the phrase "Children of a Common Mother". May peace always prevail in and between both nations.
