The Multicultural Youth Society of Chestermere hosted Chestermere’s first two-day Cultural Days event at Camp Chestermere to celebrate September being Alberta Culture Days month.
From Sept. 18 to Sept. 19, a variety of activities and workshops were available for Chestermere residents to participate in, such as pranic healing and mediation, psychic angel intuitive awareness, archery, and cultural dance performances.
“It was very successful,” said Event Organizer Satish Lal.
Chestermere Cultural Days began with Siksika Nation drumming.
“We do a lot of cultural events, and our main culture in Canada is First Nations. For us, we’ve acknowledged them every time at our events, but we haven’t promoted them. We want to promote their culture, and learn about their culture,” Lal said.
He added, “We had a lot of comments coming from the people who live near Camp Chestermere saying that was the best thing they had ever heard.”
Following the drumming, Acharya Vinod Kumar Sodiyal of the Hindu Society of North America performed Aarti.
“There was an Aarti ritual and prayer, to pray to the universe for the water that we have. It also purifies the water, the environment, and the air,” Lal said.
“We want to promote our culture for how we pray to the universe because we are mostly water, water is one of the main ingredients of life, and without water we can’t survive,” he said.
On the second day, there was a pranic healing a meditation session, and a psychic angel intuitive awareness session.
“It was an eye-opener for most people. Learning how we can use energy from the environment or from the universe to help yourself and realign yourself. It was very well received,” Lal said.
“We were considering mental health issues when we were putting the program together. With COVID-19, everybody to some degree, whether they were sick with the virus or not, they are mentally upset about it,” Lal said.
Adding, “Bringing awareness to pranic healing was something we wanted to introduce and give people other options.”
To finish the two-day event, residents could practice archery, kayak, or play volleyball and basketball.
“This is the first time ever that this sort of event has happened in Chestermere, and I’m hoping this turns into an annual event,” Lal said.
“It was an honour to have Leela Aheer, and Ritesh Narayan there, and to be at Camp Chestermere,” Lal added.
