Countless Journeys

By Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21Society & Culture History Personal Journals Places & Travel

Countless Journeys episodes

May 17, 2022 Season 3 Trailer
Devoting your life to making art takes guts. Many newcomers have, and Canada as a country is richer for it.
Join host Paolo Pietropaolo and many incredibly talented artists in the creative and performing arts who also happen to be immigrants to Canada in Season 3 of Countless Journeys. People like The Mariachi Ghost band lead singer Jorge Requina Ramos born in Mexico City but has called Winnipeg home for more than twenty years, famed photographer and Armenian refugee Yousuf Karsh and dancer Ida Beltran Lucilla, former principal ballerina with Ballet Philippines.
This is Countless Journeys. Listen now on your preferred podcast streaming platform. Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
2 min
August 02, 2021 Game Changers
The Game Changers brings us the stories of two men, born just a few years apart, who came to Canada under very different circumstances and who both built hugely successful business empires, starting from scratch.
First we hear from legendary broadcaster and publisher Moses Znaimer. The man who brought the music video to Canada. Along with so many more media innovations.
Back when most Canadians had access to only a couple of TV channels, Moses Znaimer saw a future filled with channels--each catering to a small slice of the market. And he began launching networks that would do just that. He founded CityTV, and then MuchMusic, Fashion Television, Bravo, and many other networks too.
“I always, always preferred being intensely relevant in the lives of two percent than being vaguely of interest in the lives of twenty percent.”
Narinder Dhir was a successful young businessman in Punjab who gave it all up to come to Canada in 1969, where he started over and met with more success than he could have imagined.
Narinder founded a company called Twin Brooks Developments, which has been the foundation of his success.
“My first job I got on Burrard, Vancouver—Burrard Street. They were opening Vancouver Auto. They asked me to wash cars, clean floors, but I have a feeling inside, very much ashamed that I belonged to a very good family. What is happening? But the owner advised me, he say, “I came to this country. My wife was working in a rich man’s house, I was going to university, I’m a German, I learn lots of English here, and I work hard. I’m a mechanic, now I’m a partner of this company. If you want to succeed in Canada, everybody’s equal, you are to set your own goal. You have to work hard and no shame, nothing.” So I took a lesson from him.” Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
40 min
July 19, 2021 Community Builders
Creating healthy and successful communities is the focus of this episode of Countless Journeys. We meet two women who have devoted their lives to helping others help themselves.
Dr. Lalita Malhotra is an obstetrician and gynecologist who has lived in Prince Albert Saskatchewan since she and her husband arrived there in 1975. Originally from Delhi, India, Dr. Malhotra has, incredibly, delivered more than 10,000 babies in her community, earning herself the nickname Angel of the North from the Indigenous communities she serves.
She talks with host Paolo Pietropaolo about the importance of fostering deep ties within communities, mentoring youth, and really listening to patients to better understand the issues they are dealing with.
“I connected so well with the aboriginal women here. And it was a good connexion. And there were so many things which are very common between India and here. Even now, I can always see the connexion, the hypertension, the thyroid, pregnancy, gestational diabetes. All these are so common factors between India and here.”
And Marcie Ponte has been a leading organizer and activist helping immigrant women and their families access services and advocate for better labour conditions within the immigrant-heavy cleaning services sector in Toronto.
Originally from Portugal, Marcie bucked tradition and moved out of her family’s suburban home in Leaside as a single 19-year-old, and moved to the vibrant urban neighbourhood of Kensington Market, home to generations of Portuguese-Canadians.
“I wasn't ready to go off and just get married and have babies. I wanted to live my life. I wanted to experience things. I wanted to do different kinds of work and within the sector. So it was a great experience for me and it really shaped who I am today.”
It’s there that she began her community activism, and today, more than forty years later, she is the executive director of the Working Women’s Community Centre, which provides support and programming to help immigrant women succeed.
Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
39 min
July 05, 2021 Legends part 2 Sonja Bata
Sonja Bata was a young bride from Switzerland when she settled in Ontario with her husband Thomas shortly after the end of World War 2. She joined him in the challenging task of building and expanding the Canadian branch of the world-renowned Bata Shoe Company.
Their partnership, both as husband and wife, and business partners, is the stuff of legend. And in this episode of Countless Journeys we hear from their daughter Christine Schmidt, about what drove her mother’s incredible success, which apart from the business, included a rich volunteer life, as well as the creation of the Bata Shoe Museum, home to the world’s largest collection of footwear.
“They found Canada as a fairly young country, just a land of incredible opportunity where you could if you really wanted to do something, you could jump right in and you could do it.” Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
32 min
June 20, 2021 Legends part 1 Wally Buono
Wally Buono is the winningest coach in CFL history who led the teams he coached to a remarkable five Grey Cup wins.
And that’s on top of the two Grey cups he won as a player.
Wally, along with his older brother and his mother arrived at Pier 21 in Halifax from Southern Italy in the early 1950s, on their way to Montreal to join their father.
In a wide-ranging conversation with host Paolo Pietropaolo Wally shares the early challenges his family faced after the tragic loss of his father, and the mentors Wally was helped along by in those tough years in the aftermath of that loss. Mentors who, along with his incredible mother, taught Wally a lot about the value of a supportive community, and how that influenced his approach to coaching.
“You know, what you're trying to do with a football team is build a family structure, build a family atmosphere, you know, obviously if you show love and respect to your children and to your wife, the players see that. They see that your words aren't idle or they're not empty, and a lot of them don't necessarily always come from that.” Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
26 min
June 06, 2021 Generation 1.5
Generation 1.5 features the stories of three women who had to figure out a whole new life and a whole new identity - before they even knew who they really were.
Trey Anthony burst onto the Canadian theatre scene in 2001, with her play Da Kink in My Hair. Da Kink in My Hair became the first play written by a Canadian to be performed at the Princess of Wales Theater in Toronto. It also became the first television series in Canada to be written and created by a Black woman.
“I was 12 turning 13. And I think that age is difficult for anybody, much less being a child who's coming to assimilate into a new country, meeting a woman who is supposed to be her mother, who she has had no contact with - very limited contact with - for the last four years and going through puberty and changes. So it was a lot. Now that I look back on it, I realise how much was expected of me. And yet nobody really acknowledged how much change was going on in my life.”
Gabriella Hong was born in Seoul, South Korea, and came to Canada when she was five. Now she lives in Ottawa, where she works in computer technology. Gabriella believes arriving at such a young age had a huge impact on her experience of immigration. She uses a software analogy to describe what she means.
“It's different if you're born here. We call them the 2.0 generation. And I'm like kind of stuck in between, so, I'm the 1.5. And the students who come at a later age, the 1.0 generation.”
Mimi Sheriff was born in Zimbabwe. She earned a law degree in Johannesburg, South Africa, and then moved to Canada in 2009 to pursue a masters degree in Gender Studies at Memorial University in St. John’s, Newfoundland. The move to Newfoundland had a profound impact on her. It really made her think differently about her core identity - about who she was.
“One of the things that I think I became a lot more convicted and stronger is saying that I was African like that is something now that before I don't think that was part of my identity. I even had a little little thing on my bracelet made out of the continent of Africa. So I think I've become more African than I ever was before I came here.” Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
44 min
May 24, 2021 Tastemakers
Dinner and a movie. It’s the classic evening out. And on our first episode of season 2 of Countless Journeys we hear from two men whose life’s work has been centred on making those two experiences a little bit more pleasurable.
First we hear from renowned Montreal chef Nantha Kumar. Born in Malaysia, Nantha came to Canada in the late 1980s where he worked for several years as a journalist. He shifted gears to cooking in the 1990s, revolutionizing the food scene in Montreal’s Plateau district, and being at the forefront of the pop-up restaurant experience - decades ahead of others.
“I realised long ago that having a physical restaurant was not the way to go. It's like being a D.J. you don't need your own bar. You don't need your own studio to do this.”
And Salah Bachir arrived in Canada with his mother and siblings in 1965, when he was ten years old, leaving behind political tensions in Lebanon.
He went on to build a hugely successful media company, Cineplex Media. He’s also a leading philanthropist and an advocate for LGBTQ rights. Salah shares the roots of his activism, beginning when he was a teenager, through to today, and the wonderful programs he has supported as Honorary Patron and fundraiser for The 519, a Toronto charity committed to the health, happiness and full participation of the LGBTQ2S communities.
“There was always a sense of helping where you can help someone have a better life. And I think there were hands extended to my familyto come to and to help out here. And it's kind of almost embedded in me that if you can help you do.”
Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
36 min
May 21, 2021 Season 2 Trailer
Our second season of Countless Journeys shares the stories of how immigrants from a wide background of countries and cultures contribute to this country daily.
By creating families, businesses and communities, immigrants have had a profound and lasting impact on Canadian life.
We hear from them in their own words, through original interviews as well as oral histories, as they share with us both the obstacles and the fun they experience on their way to building lives that would create opportunities, jobs, and understanding for countless others along the way. People like broadcasting visionary Moses Znaimer, groundbreaking playwright Trey Anthony, community activist and organizer Marcie Ponte and the CFL’s all-time most winningest coach Wally Buono.
Hear their stories coming up in Season 2.
Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
3 min
July 10, 2020Canadian Dreams
In this episode:
Bostjan Skrlj an adventurist originally from Slovenia who was motorcycling around the world, and stopped in Whitehorse.
Gaetan Pierrard is a musher from Belgium who also lives in the Yukon.
Yogi Omar from Indonesia, arrived in Canada as a student, today is a business owner and LGBTQ2+ activist in Vancouver.
Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
34 min
June 11, 2020Working Life
In this episode:
Erlinda and Armand Tesoro. Erlinda arrived in 1968 from the Philippines to work in the Garment Industry.
Musician Yosvanii Castañeda defected 40 years later during a stopover in Toronto from Japan to Cuba.
Thank you for listening to Countless Journeys.
Planning to visit Halifax? Be sure to follow and tag Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 on Facebook or Instagram!
34 min

About Countless Journeys

From the publisher's feed

Countless Journeys & D’innombrables Voyages are original shows created by the Canadian Museum of Immigration located at Pier 21 in Halifax, the site of arrival for nearly a million immigrants.…