More than 15,000 turn out to celebrate Greek culture and Canada Day
For the first time in years, the yard outside Holy Cross Greek Orthodox Church on Souvenir Blvd. in Chomedey was filled with an almost overflow crowd last Saturday evening for a celebration on day two of the Laval Greek community’s annual Hellenic Summer Festival.
In recent years, attendance at the Laval Hellenic Summer Festival fell off discernibly as unpredictable weather patterns, as well the Covid-19 pandemic, discouraged many with Hellenic roots from turning up for the three-to-four-day event.
Hellenic ancestry celebrated
But last weekend, on the Saturday evening following Canada Day, all that was but a memory.
Tighter than usual security dealt with long lineups at the gate, as 3,000 people with Hellenic ancestry from all over the Montreal region converged at the landmark church for the largest celebration of Greek heritage seen in Laval in some time.
In all, more than 15,000 people attended the Laval Hellenic Summer Festival. It was one of several Hellenic cultural festivals held each summer in Parc Extension, on the West Island and on the South Shore.
Now in her second term as the Hellenic Community of Greater Montreal’s regional president for Laval, Katerina Hulis was delighted that the weather this year was perfect compared to a good number of years past.
“We’re having a full three days of sunshine – it has been such a blessing,” Hulis, who helped lead the committee which organized the festival, said in an interview with Newsfirst Multimedia.
Festival expansion next year?
According to Hulis, there was also a big demand by vendors hoping to set up merchandise kiosks – to the point some had to be turned away, she said.
As such, she suggested it might be necessary next year to expand the festival’s offerings given an apparent revival of interest in Hellenic culture by members of the local Greek community.
Hulis saw the resurgence as a sign that a younger generation of Montreal’s Greeks are becoming more involved in their ancestral community.
“I think that by us embracing the youth and allowing them to actually feel what it is to be a member, we are giving them a space where truly they feel they are supported and belong and I feel they have connected with that,” she said.
As it was just a few days since Canada Day, the festival was an occasion, as always, to celebrate the nation’s cultural origins and its multicultural diversity – even though the festival remained primarily a celebration of Hellenic values and culture.
Festival format updated
In a significant updating of the festival’s format this year, the “head table” (where the dignitaries normally sit together, although cut off from the rest of the crowd) was set aside for something less formal.
Cocktail tables were placed a short distance from the the stage, where anybody could chat the dignitaries up and talk politics or current issues.
Among the dignitaries who dropped by to enjoy some Hellenic ambience, some BBQ’d Greek delicacies and a piece of Canada Day cake were HCGM president Basile Angelopoulos, Chomedey city councillor Aglaia Revelakis, Renaud city councillor Seta Topouzian and Le Carrefour city councillor Mohamed Bâ.
Also on hand were L’Abord-à-Plouffe councillor Vasilios Karidogiannis (representing Mayor Stéphane Boyer), Souvenir-Labelle councillor Sandra El-Helou, Chomedey MNA Sona Lakhoyan Olivier and Laval-Les Îles MP Fayçal El-Khoury.
