Pearl D'Silva
Vancouver, Sep 10: Monthi Fest was celebrated with great zeal, fervour and devotion at the Immaculate Conception, Delta on September 7.
Children, in their festive best with flowers in baskets and plates, offered the flowers to Mary, Mother of Jesus and Mother of all. With the blessing of the Novem at 6.30 pm in front of the Church, all moved to the Church for the solemn Mass with children leading the procession, singing “Sokkod Sangatha Melya” to the Blessed Mother and adorning the way with flowers.
Trishna Nazareth welcomed and thanked the congregation in the church. The event started with a grand celebration of Mass by Fr Jerry Dsouza OCD. and Fr Saju Sebastin. Melodious hymns were sung by the choir. Children were so enthusiastic and full of energy to offer the flowers to Mama Mary was breathtaking as these moments took us down memory lane of the feast being celebrated in our hometown Mangalore. It is so evident that Mangalorean tradition and culture is no where near extinction in fact would only get stronger and spread around the globe. Thanks to the community and dedication of many Mangalorean cultural ambassadors around the world.
After the mass the crowd gathered at the parish hall to participate in “Novem Jevchem”, cultural programmes and entertainment. The community was welcomed into the hall by Trishna, in her speech she mentioned that the objective of initiating Monthi Fest in Vancouver was to propogate the faith and celebrate the birth of our dear mother, promote culture and for the convenience of new immigrants and people who could not travel to other cities to attend this feast. She then opened the floor to the Emcee of the evening, Mr Jeevan Tauro who ran the show with his subtle comedies and interaction with the guests.
Lauren Monteiro and Keiyona Tauro inaugurated the event with a very inspiring prayer dance which was choreographed by Noeline Saldanha. Our fabulous photographer Tenzin captured amazing photographs throughout the event.
Fr Jerry Dsouza OCD, blessed the novem and the same was consumed in the coconut milk, with reverence by the entire community.
Sumptuous and traditional Mangalorean vegetarian dinner prepared and served by generous families in the community.
The organizing team had a table of raffle prizes that were distributed based on the winnings of raffle tickets from various games that were played at the event.
The event was a successful one under the guidance of the organising committee of Sujay /Trishna Nazareth , Noel /Karen Sequeira and Joel/Pearl Sequeira.