Trans Community Holiday Dinner

December 16, 2016

Trans community members are warmly welcomed to the Trans Community Holiday Dinner. 

Location
This year, we will be gathering at Broadway Youth Resource Centre on 2455 Fraser Street (at Broadway). The Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam nations have been gathering and feasting on this land since time immemorial. This is their unceded territory, and until there is justice for Indigenous people on Turtle Island, it is important to acknowledge this everytime we gather. We extend a special welcome to Two-Spirit community members to this dinner.

Food
Volunteers will be preparing all of the food. If you have food allergies, sensitivities, or restrictions, please let us know in advance by emailing sivits@vcc.ca.
The accessibility person (with the orange arm band) will be happy to help you identify foods you can and cannot eat.

Accessibility
We will have an accessibility point person on site wearing an orange arm band. Please approach them with questions, concerns, or requests for assistance of any kind. Or just to say hi.
This space, including washrooms, is wheelchair and scooter accessible.
The washrooms will be made gender neutral.
Scents make some of us very sick. Please help us make this a scent-reduced space. Avoid scented body products (shampoos, lotions, perfumes). If you paint your nails, please do so 24 hours in advance.
Nearby bus stops for #99, 9, and 7.

Creating a Safer Space
This December, people are celebrating many holidays, including Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Yule, and Christmas. However, Christmas is the holiday we see everywhere we look. It can feel othering for many of us who don’t celebrate it. At this holiday gathering, we do not wish to centre Christmas in any way. For this reason, our decorations will be snowflake and winter animal themed. We won’t play Christmas carols. There will not be a group prayer. This is a really hard time of the year for a lot of us. Let’s all try to make this event feel as welcoming as possible for as many people as possible.

Some of us use substances to help us get by. Some of us are in recovery. To help everyone feel ok, please avoid using substances near the entrance/exit.

We hope you will join us on Sunday December 18th! Working together to prepare and share a meal is good medicine!