Indo-Caribbean Canadian Culture & Community: A Conversation with Ryan Singh

The Indo-Caribbean Canadian Experience with Ryan Singh

In the last full episode of 2025, Hema is joined by Ryan Singh, the Founder of the Indo-Caribbean Canadian Association (ICCA). They explore the nuances of Indo-Caribbean identity, the impact of colonial history, and the struggle for cultural recognition in Canada. 

Ryan shares the origin story and mission of ICCA, various community programs such as youth mentorship, support for single parents, and advocacy for LGBTQ+ rights, plus the Share Yuh Rice initiative that brought the Association to Hema’s attention. Share Yuh Rice aims to provide culturally appropriate food to food banks at Christmas and throughout the year.

Ryan talks about one of their big initiatives being led by the ICCA with participation from Caribbean organizations around the country: the petition for establishing a Caribbean Heritage Month in Canada, emphasizing the importance of cultural preservation, community engagement, and the intergenerational evolution of Indo-Caribbean traditions.

Links & Resources

• Indo-Caribbean Canadian Association 
• Donate to the Indo-Caribbean Canadian Association  
• Caribbean Heritage Month in Canada 
• Barbados House Montreal 

Episodes referenced:

Two Times Removed with Tiara Jade Chutkhan 

Transcript

Ryan: Now, I think what's important to recognize is that what I call modern Caribbean culture, right? Because I think there's Caribbean culture with the Indigenous um, people before that, um, but modern Caribbean culture is influenced from around the world. Um, you know, The food we eat, the music. Out, all those stuff I said earlier. So, it came from somewhere. Roti and curry just didn't emerge one night in um, in Trinidad or Guyana.

[music]

Hema: Hi Ryan. Thanks for joining me today on The Moreish Podcast.

Ryan: Thanks for having me here. I'm looking forward to this conversation.

Hema: I've been following your association on social media, and I think I came across your group late 2024 when you were doing a program and a food drive, which really caught my attention because you were doing it in a bit of a unique way, which we'll talk about.

So I'm really excited to have you here today, but before we dive in, can you introduce yourself?

Ryan: Yeah, for sure. First thing I'll say is thank you for following us on social media and our work and, and supporting us through that way. So my name's Ryan Singh, born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, to Guyanese-Canadian parents.

My family immigrated here in the mid-eighties, like many Indo-Caribbean people who live here. I work right now as a government relations professional. My life trajectory took me working in politics, which really introduced me to advocacy and organization. Later in life I had some reflection about who I am, my culture, and I know we'll probably get into this in the conversation, and why we started the organization.

But I leverage those skills right now to what I see as benefiting our community through the Indo-Caribbean Canadian Association. 

I'm passionate about our community and passionate about making sure we have a voice, and making sure we're seen, and what started off as an Instagram account to, to achieve that has now, I think, turned into a full-fledged robust, I like to say virtual community center. So, looking forward to sharing more about that on the podcast here today with you.

Hema: The Indo-Caribbean Canadian Association. You founded it.

Ryan: That's right. Yeah. I'll give credit to one of my cousins, Sabrina, her and I in late 2000, so this is around the Christmas break period, midst of the pandemic. I think we were just in the second major lockdown here in Toronto, um, chatting with her on the phone and we were having some dialogue about our culture and people misidentifying us. So when folks see us, especially here in Canada, there's a natural assumption, especially my last name being Singh, and even if they don't know my last name, my skin complexion, that I'm Indian. And yes, we are Indian in some form or fashion, but our story takes a bit of a remix in the Caribbean, right? So, in speaking about who we are and being misidentified and the lack of awareness about our culture and our history, we got into a deeper conversation about what problems and issues arise from that. 

So we see a lot of ethnocultural groups thrive and have community centres and national month recognitions and fully incorporated. We see community programs built for Black and Afro-Canadians, Indigenous Canadians, et cetera. And because there's one a misidentification and people can't necessarily put us in a box or they assume our box, there's not space carved out for us. 

So an example we, we discussed was, um, sometimes there's Caribbean specific programming from the government or you know, services, et cetera. It doesn't have to be government just in general, a lot of times those are actually intended for Afro-Caribbean individuals and I recognize that is very much needed. And us at this organization we've been supportive of that. But that's not a place for myself and my peers and our community to go. That is space made for the black community. 

On the flip side, there are programming and initiatives aimed and targeted towards the South Asian community. And many times those aren't even offered in English. And that's one issue, we can't attend because so many of us don't speak the dialects from, from South Asia. But, and we will probably discuss this also, a lot of discrimination when we access that space that we don't belong in that space either. So, that whole conversation led to us deciding to start an Instagram account to one, educate ourselves and the broader public about to be Indo-Caribbean, what is Indo Caribbean? And more importantly, what is Indo-Caribbean in Canada, where can you find us? Where can you get some of our great food? And I know you, you like talking about food on this podcast, so we, we can definitely talk about that. Awareness is key before we went down a path of doing anything else.

So that's the, uh, that's the genesis story of how we were founded and why we are, here we are today, almost four and a half, close to five years later.

Hema: You've really nicely summed up a lot of the things that I've been feeling. My family is Trinidadian. I was born and raised in Toronto and, there's a lot of, a lot of times that I come across things like you were just talking about, when I was looking at funding options for this podcast.

I came across very specific funding for specific groups, and then there was sort of the general funding options, but nothing that was specific for someone like me, someone like you.

That there's opportunities for other groups, but then feeling a little bit sad I feel like we're not recognized.

Ryan: No, a hundred percent. I don't think it's intentional, of course, I think we are a small pocket of the population here in Canada, at least in my experience, however, we shouldn't be left out and we should find a place. And, I look at examples from other ethnocultural national groups here in Canada and how they've carved out their community and their space, and we're learning from their example.

I look at the Tamil community, the Sikh community, and I see what they're doing and how they've mobilized. Now these, these things don't happen overnight. They take time. And just recently I was talking to a new volunteer and I said, if we don't do it because it hasn't been done before, we can't wait for somebody else to do it.

So kind of fell into it accidentally, but now I sort of see it as a mission to continue this. It is a little weird because I don't wanna sound like I'm the messiah of the Indo-Caribbean community or anything like that, but you know, I always pause and say like, if we, if I didn't stop that night and have this conversation with my cousin, and if we didn't come up with this brand and this logo and now have this website, would there have been something that happened in the last few years? And don't, I don't think so, sadly. 

So I'm happy to be part of this. We have just between 40 to 45 volunteers, who've, who've are currently in the organization. And we have some former volunteers. So close to 50 to 60 people at some point have volunteered and organized with us. And I speak to all our volunteers all the time and nobody gets paid, they give up time after work, weekends. And we're all so committed, and when I speak to them about the work we do, I can tell the passion to having our community voice heard and to what you just said there, making sure we carve out our place and that's, there is something for us. Right? 

And, so many of them also share there was this sadness that we didn't have a place and a proper way of identifying ourselves. So I'm really, I'm proud of what we've accomplished and I'm super excited about, falling it into accidentally and not having a strategic strategic plan. And now we're at the point where we're building out a strategic plan. We have set programming, we have solid fundraising mechanisms in place. It excites me about where we'll be in five years from now. So, very much engaged and, and optimistic about what the future holds.

Hema: The time during the pandemic really sparked a lot of creativity and a lot of ideas in people. And you are the second person that I've had on the podcast who had this burst of ideas and creativity. I spoke to Tiara Jade Chutkhan, who did the book series Two Times Removed, and that also came out of that time during the pandemic.

Ryan: I, I, definitely feel the pandemic and boredom had led to a lot of this. During the pandemic though, there was a significant event, the murder of George Floyd in the United States, and we saw the rise of Black Lives Matter, what I call like a racial revolution. And, being a person whose parents are from the Caribbean and in Caribbean spaces, we share a lot of spaces with the Afro-Caribbean and Black communities, you know, it made me pause and think what's my role here in responding to this. I'm not Black. I'm very empathetic and understanding of what is what they're feeling right now. I'll never feel and never experience what a Black Canadian feels on a daily basis. And I have friends who share things with me and I see discrimination happen to them right in front of my eyes. But identifying who I am allows me to be a better ally to that community. It's important for us to understand who we are, it's It's important for us to then position that, you know, uh, I came across something that said the Indo-Caribbean community and identity is shaped by Afro-Caribbean community. They were there in the Caribbean before us. 

And I always say they're our neighbours. They're our friends, they're our family. There's so many interracial relatives that we have. So much of their experience influences who we are as people. And I think it's so important that we pause and think about our role.

And as I mentioned, my, my parents were from Guyana and sadly in Guyana, and I don't, I'm not gonna get into the entire history, but there has been racial schisms instituted by the former masters, if you will. And some people hold those archaic, I'll call very simple terms, Brown versus Black, and I know one, we're in Canada here right now. That stuff simply doesn't stand. And two, you have to move beyond that. But I go back to, you have to identify who you are, to position yourself as a good ally. 

So a lot of what we do, yes we do stuff for Indo-Caribbean people and the culture, but we also talk about the anti-Black racism within our community and how do we address that? 

So, I reflected on a lot of the catalyst of why we started this and that was a huge reason why this came about. So, I mean, it's kind of, it's kind of symbolic, we, after emancipation, South Asian indentured workers were brought over, right? So yeah….

Hema: Yeah. There's a lot that you just talked about, but before we move forward, I wanna make sure that everybody listening understands what we mean when we say Indo-Caribbean or Indo-Caribbean. 

Ryan: Yeah, it's, it can be controversial sometimes about that. In simplistic terms, the way I let people know, it's simply individuals who have South Asian ancestry, and part of that South Asian ancestry lived or was in the Caribbean, Caribbean, for a, for a time. That's the most simplistic.

Now, some folks would extend that saying you have to have had relatives who were indentured at some point in that history. I know folks identify as Indo-Caribbean and their families came from South Asia to, to the Caribbean later on. I'm not super picky. I, I think if you have South Asian ancestry of some sort and your family lineage stopped at some point in the Caribbean, I think that's I think that's more than enough to understand the culture, and an appreciation for the culture's contribution. I might say the culture, not the Indo-Caribbean culture, but South Asian cultures contributions to the broader Caribbean mix.

Hema: On this podcast, we, we focus on those historical events, the times of colonization, chattel slavery, indentureship, and how all of the people that were brought, taken, arrived in the Caribbean, really shaped what the culture is like in every single Caribbean country. 

That is the crux of the conversation and the culture, right? It is derived from so many influences, from so many places around the world. 

One thing I think is good to define at this juncture is the difference between race and ethnicity.

Ryan: Yeah. That is, that is massive because there's so many different races in the Caribbean, but we share cultures. So just last night I was on a phone call, cause we're working on this campaign for Caribbean Heritage Month in Canada, and I was on a phone call with a St. Lucian organization based in Montreal and a a group called the Barbados, uh, Montreal or Barbados House Montreal. They were Afro-Caribbean Canadians, and when I met with them, there was just so much, there was such a connection, I felt that I was talking to family, right? So that that ethnicity, that culture bonds us together. 

But, you know, to your point, here in Canada, they, we pride ourselves on multiculturalism. But I always say the, the Caribbean was multicultural before that was even a concept here in Canada, right?

You had obviously the Indigenous individuals and people of that region, you had folks from Europe, Africa, South Asia, Asia, cause there was a lot of Chinese indentured workers that were brought over as well. And that that's reflective in our music, our food, the language that we speak. So it is, it is beautiful to see what's emerged from what was such a dark period.

I, I wrote an article about that, and the analogy I used was, you know, it's this caterpillar that was put in a cocoon and then came out this, what, what would be a beautiful butterfly. So through slavery and indentureship and those dark periods, we have this beautiful Caribbean culture now that doesn't differentiate so much where things come from, everything is encompassed in it. 

Hema:  It is, it's really quite an interesting topic, and before we started recording, I was telling you that I, I've come across some really interesting comments on social media and, I find it quite fascinating, knowing who we are. So in Caribbean, everybody knows what the history is and how 

Ryan: Yeah.

Hema:  their ancestors got there, but I think, and this is a generality, but in

In most cases, people growing up in India, Pakistan, South Asia, they don't understand that history and how their ancestors arrived in the Caribbean. 

And so I was looking at a video of somebody talking about how people from India got to the Caribbean and what that process was and how indentureship came about. And there was a lot of conversation in the comment section from people saying they were from India and saying two things essentially. One that we as Indo-Caribbean people are ashamed of being Indian. And then there was a whole set of other people saying, we're trying so hard to be Indian. 

And others in the comment section trying to explain to them that culturally we're West Indian, it's different. Having this divide of understanding of what is the difference in culture, because our religions are the same, but we practice it a little bit different. Our foods are called sometimes the same thing, but they're a little bit different.

Ryan: Yeah. II've talked to so many people about very topic and, to me what it boils down to is to each their own, right? I think the beauty, and my complexity is that I was born in Canada, right? So how do I identify? There's, there's two times removed and then, sometimes I'm three times removed. But, I think everybody should be able to express themselves, number one, how they want and identify.

And yes, some, some individuals do feel a closer connection to South Asia, and our our, our connections through culture that way. Whereas some, some individuals feel that Caribbean culture is very distinct and it's, it's on its own. 

Now, I think what's important to recognize is that what I call modern Caribbean culture, right? Because I think there's Caribbean culture with the Indigenous people before that, but modern Caribbean culture is influenced from around the world. The food we eat, the music, all those stuff I said earlier. So, it came from somewhere. Roti and curry just didn't emerge one night in Trinidad or Guyana. Doubles is an offshoot of channa bhatura, right? That came from somewhere. I like pointing out cannabis didn't exist in that region. It came from South Asia. 

So, it, it's fine, I think to say you're Caribbean and being proud of that Caribbean history, but I think it's really important to, to understand about where you came from because if you're not Indigenous, your ancestors came from a different part of the world.

There's no fiction behind that. So, that's a little bit of what we try to do is educate people that so much of what we do and so much of what we practice and, and eat on a daily basis, yeah, some of it actually came from different parts of the world and some of it came with our ancestors, through the Kala Pani to, to the Caribbean.

Hema: It's, it's very much a morph and a mixture. And just like my parents when they moved from Trinidad to Canada, they brought with them their foods and thoughts and traditions, but it changed a little bit based on what's available here in terms of ingredients, what they could find. So just like when our ancestors went from India to the Caribbean, their lifestyles, their cultures changed a little bit to adapt to their environment.

Ryan: Yeah, 100%. With our organization, we do a lot of posts about the historical nature of our, of our community. And you get to learn about adaptations made by our ancestors, when they moved there. 

To your point, different ingredients, different access to different items. You know, they didn't have statues, murtis to, to worship, for example. So they were using the flags that you would put, that you would erect at the end of a ceremony, and then that evolved, like the flag was jhanda, so then the word jhandi ended up people related that with puja, I'm going to a jhandi, right? But the actual, what you're actually saying is I'm going to a flag. But it's just these little things kind of evolved. 

But on the flip side too, as much as we evolved, there was so much culture that was preserved. We did a research post on the dhantal, which is still an instrument used in Guyana, Trinidad, and Fiji. But you show that to a person in India and it's almost extinct. So there's so many aspects of culture during that time period that was preserved. And then there were so many other little things that were evolved or non-existent anymore in South Asia. 

So, I think we have to give our ancestors credit, that despite the um, challenging period that they were living in, I mean servitude and having limitations on what they can eat and they were working, they were toiling in fields, they were still able to hold on and preserve so many aspects of our culture and our heritage.

Hema: Yeah, that strong influence exists today, has existed, in one way or another, and it changes and it morphs a little bit. But when you look back, specifically in in Indo-Caribbean culture, that Indian influence is always present. 

And you said earlier that we really need to recognize that the African enslaved people were there first and our people came later. And there was this meshing, intermingling, this comraderie that came out of it. But, when we speak about maybe some divide between the two groups, historically, we can look back and say, that was intentional by the colonizers and by the powers that be.

Ryan: 100%.

Hema: And while people might not know that and recognize that today, it was very intentional.

Ryan: Yeah, a hundred percent, it was definitely intentional. They didn't want a mixing of the races, I'll call it, because they knew that we would've been stronger together, and it's, it's really, I went back to Guyana last June, that was 32 years since my first visit. And, my parents were telling me how much the country's changed since the period that they've been back. My dad himself hadn't been back in 32 years. And you saw so much more intermingling between different community groups, you saw so many Afro-Guyanese individuals selling traditional Indo-Caribbean foods, et cetera, right? 

I was looking at recent Diwali celebrations online and in Trinidad, and you see how many people who, and it's not just Afro and Indo, but individuals of Christian and Muslim faiths also taking part and, and observing those traditions as much as Hindu Caribbean individuals are participating and, and recognizing Eid and Christmas right as well.

So, so it's, it's great to see the evolution of, there's more intermingling and more, I would say, calm from that instilled division. But there's still archaic mindsets in some people, and because of events in the sixties, seventies, and eighties, that are still being weeded out.

And, this is one of the things that we try to do through our organization is build that conversation about how we can we participate in that. We have a zero tolerance, for example, and any racial discrimination. 

Our boys program and our new girls program, we have um, some people message us and they said, my child's mixed, the dad's Black and the, the mom's Indian and can they participate?

And I said, why not? Right? Their parents say they want them to understand both sides of their culture, right? 

So, so we embrace that and we recognize that, and I think that that's what makes being Caribbean so special is that we're not homogenous like many other ethnocultural groups. I look at a lot of other groups and most people are the same religion and same race and there's not a lot of intermingling even with neighbouring countries and other demographics. Whereas us, it's part of who we are. 

Seeing a household where you can have dinner and one person's Christian and one person's Hindu and another person's Muslim, and that's fine. And that's common, and there's nothing wrong with that. That makes me proud about who we are as people. And I think we demonstrate the ability, with all the struggles happening around the world with so many divides, that it is possible for people of different backgrounds and different cultures and different religions to actually get along live together. 

Don't get me wrong, there's still small incidents here and there. There's a couple of ignorant folks, but we demonstrate there's a path towards building a culture of acceptance and understanding.

Hema: Yeah, I think it shows up quite nicely in our food.

Ryan: Yeah. 

Hema: In that you'll have influences from literally all over the world that come together to form Caribbean food, and you're gonna see everybody, regardless of their background, eating everything.

Ryan: Yep. Not just eating everything, but making everything. Chow mein and fry rice that came from Asia, curry, doubles, roti, India, dumpling soup came from Africa, pepperpot, indigenous. Then there's a lot of our European influences, like the rum cake and black cake that we make at Christmas., right? 

I look at my mom and all that food that she makes. She's making food from all these cultural groups, but technically that's all belonging to us as a culture.

And again, when people ask about, I've had so many conversations about food, and how our food is underappreciated. I think our food is completely undervalued. For one, it's diversity and it's complexity, but the labour that goes into a lot of these foods and the ingredients that goes into it, because of that mixture, because of that history, and the history is deep. 

It's fun when I get to do research or I learn about culinary history and I was so excited to learn about doubles and how that came about. Somebody just wanted an extra bara. It's really fascinating because you see the evolution of a culture right before your eyes.

And it's not ancient history. This is our grandparents and our great-grandparents, and they're doing and their work. So yeah, our food is absolutely so representative of, of who we are as people. And, of course our food is some of the tastiest in the world. I'll, that's my own bias, but I'll say it.

Hema: I agree. It's some of the tastiest in the world. Now, mind you, I haven't tasted food from every different part of the world, but I also am biased. 

I, I was talking to someone else, who wrote a cookbook about Caribbean history and food, and she was saying that ours is probably one of the first, if not the first, examples of fusion cuisine.

Ryan: I can absolutely agree with that. Yeah. I mean, if you think about it and the mixing of cultures and ideas, you know you have folks from different backgrounds making foods from different places around the world. Yeah, a hundred percent. It's, it's absolutely probably the, the best example of fusion cuisine. And the first example of fusion cuisine.

Hema: I wanna go back to some of the programs. You alluded to it a little bit, but your organization association has many programs and I'd love to talk about some of them. Specifically, I'd like to start with the food donation that caught my attention last year.

Ryan: Yep. So, um, Share Yuh Rice, and RICE acronym for Raising Indo-Caribbean Essentials. That was driven out of, unfortunately, the need in food banks. All around the world we're seeing, especially in Toronto, a drastic increase in individuals going to food banks. And in conversation with a lot of my peers, a lot of us donate, but what do we donate? Kraft dinner, pastas, tomato sauce, those sort of things. Don't get me wrong, those are probably all in our diets, living in North America, but I know when I go visit my parents, what I want to eat, it's good roti, curry, those types of foods. So, it comes down simply to, just because a person is a client of a food bank doesn't mean they should not have access to our traditional foods. So what we're trying to do here is promote our community specifically, but others, to donate Caribbean-specific food items. We want to get that in the shelves of food banks. 

To know that we're able to allow people to make their cuisine that they are familiar with, a cuisine that they grew up with, that that's something special.

And whenever I do promo videos for Instagram about our food drive out, my line is always, uh, think about what you enjoy in your table. And just remember, other people want to have that same joy. 

So that's the work we're doing. We just launched our holiday blitz. It's gonna run from Canadian Thanksgiving, which was on the 13th to Christmas the 25th. We have about 24, 25 locations across the greater Toronto area. Mostly grocery stores, Caribbean restaurants, a couple other small businesses. All the locations are on their website. I'm encouraging folks to go out, make a donation if they can. We also make it possible that if individuals and anybody's listening to this, wanna make a donation and e-transfer us the money, we will do the shopping and send you the receipt. Makes it so much easier. It's a good feeling to know we can help families have the ingredients that they're so familiar with on their tables, especially during the holidays.

Hema: I will be sure to leave a link to some of these things that you just talked about in the show notes so people can easily access them. I think about something like rice and dhal. For me, that's a couple of very simple ingredients that you can buy. Dried goods, maybe a couple of spices that are actually not super expensive, but would make a real difference to somebody's meal and their joy of eating.

Ryan: A hundred percent. Such simple ingredients, but for me it just brings me joy and I enjoy eating that. But I can't imagine what it's like if you have to use a food bank, that you can't access dhal and the spices needed to season that to make it taste the right way. So, that's what we're trying to strive for. Now, we'll take donations of any kind. I think it's great to get any sort of food in the food banks, but, it was interesting, we saw cans of callaloo, we saw cassareep donated, these things matter, packs of geera masala. 

Again, these are things a lot of us take for granted. We're privileged to have that in our kitchen cupboards, or in my case, in my parents' kitchen cupboard. But, I wanna make sure that other folks have that access.

Hema: I think there's, there's merit in having these conversations because it's not just specific to the Indo-Caribbean community, although that's what we're talking about, but if people want to think broader, and they're donating to food banks, is really to pay attention to some of those foods that might be related to somebody's cultural background. 

Ryan: Exactly. And the onus is on us to know what we like and what we're familiar with, and to replicate that in our donation bins. It's as simple as that. And yeah, individuals from other ethnocultural community groups, they'll donate what they know and what they're familiar with.

And food banks collect diapers, feminine hygiene products, so it's not just limited to the, the food essentials.

It's also about basic human needs too. So always look into whether you can donate other items to help support people.

Hema: Yeah, we're going through some challenging times at this moment in Canada and as much as we can help, I think we should. And I love the focus on some very specific items that will bring some joy and bring back home recipes. 

I'm gonna put you on the spot. 

Ryan: Okay.

Hema: Five items that you think would be really good to donate to your food drive.

Ryan: So, so definitely number one are spices. You need a number of spices to really make a good curry or even in the dhal we talked about earlier. So definitely that I'll consider that one. I don't see a lot of lentils being donated. And then you think about the holidays, there's cassareep, other essentials to make Pepperpot, so that's number three. And then there are other like canned Caribbean essentials. So, I saw canned callaloo, which I didn't even know existed until I was pulling it out of a basket when we got it donated.

So thinking about those canned non-perishable items. And then lastly, I'll say, from my foodie side, and I'm gonna do a big generalization here, but think about fun stuff like cream soda, which the Grace brand and Bedessee brand and those brands that we're so familiar with, not just the ones, the generic ones off the shelf. Those Caramel, those Tunnocks Caramel bars,

Those are things that, some people just, that's a luxury for them. So thinking about those fun items, I would think that would be my number five, that you can donate to ensuring some child somewhere has, cookies that are culturally appropriate. We get those, I know it's really popular in the Caribbean, those, those Danish brand, the blue tin ones, that's something that brings back nostalgia for, for people from our community. 

So, so you didn't put, you didn't technically put me in the spot. Like there's list is long of stuff you can donate.

Hema: The list is long, and as you were talking, I was thinking about, specifically around the holiday time, there's things like Milo.

Ryan: Milo, yep.

Hema: Sorrel, rice. Any kind of, whether it's channa or chickpeas or lentils or pigeon peas, you can get dried. Those would be great. Something like a maybe canned sardines 

Ryan: Yep.

Hema: or corned beef. 

Ryan: Yep. So you mentioned there are canned sardines, corned beef, corned mutton. Donating canned proteins is so essential, and culturally appropriate for, for folks to make foods that we know. 

Hema: What other programs do you have and do you run?

Ryan: Yeah, so we have five other programs. So we have Star Bhai, which is a youth mentorship program for Young Indo-Caribbean Boys, 8 to 18. We, based on the, the success of that program this September, we recently launched Star Gyal female-identifying individuals between the ages of 8 to 18. We launched SPICE, which is a single parent Indo-Caribbean exchange. We have EPIC, which is equality and pride for Indo-Caribbeans,addressing the homophobia, transphobia, bi-phobia in our community. And we have something called VOICE, and you probably notice I like my acronyms. VOICE is the voter organization for Indo-Caribbean engagement. And that was born out of me working in politics. And I, I actually was a campaign manager for the first Indo-Caribbean person elected to the provincial legislature here in Ontario. And him and I were talking about the apathy in our community, and I see so many other ethnocultural communities immobilize and get active. So it's our attempt to, in a non-partisan manner, engage our community and let them know about the importance of voting here in Canada. 

So those are the programs we operate that are public facing. We also have a monthly online newsletter called Iconic. And Iconic is Indo-Caribbean Online News in Canada. Uh, that's to let people know what we're doing for the community, but we have a community section in there with other events that other organizations are putting on as well. So we try to promote that and we share stories and happenings from other individuals.

Hema:  There's a couple of programs that you mentioned, uh, EPIC, I believe. 

Ryan: Equality and Pride for Indo-Caribbeans.

Hema: I think that's a really important one, and we don't have enough time to really dive into some of these conversations, but homophobia still exists, and, and it's very much an opportunity to bring awareness, support our community in a different way. So tell me about that program.

Ryan: Yeah, so that emerged, um, we were founded in May in 2021, and we decided to do a webinar with three individuals talking about just being queer and being Indo-Caribbean. Eventually when the pandemic let up, we did our first Pride social, and then since then we've done, I think five now, Pride socials, and now we do other community events. 

It's sort of twofold. One is about combating homophobia, transphobia, bi-phobia. I have a lot of friends from the community. I talk to 'em about their experiences. Being here in Canada, I just know it's not right. But it's not right that just because these are beliefs or views instilled in our culture from years ago, that doesn't mean that has to continue and exist. So we've seen success in terms of taking that on and challenging it. Building safe space is another one, ensuring that there's culturally appropriate space, I'll call it, that folks can express themselves. 

I will tell you there's probably about a handful of moments running this organization that are some of my proudest moments.  One of them was, uh, we had a Pride social, it was a party. People were drinking and partying and dancing and playing chutney music. And somebody came up to me and they're like, oh, this is the first time they heard Chutney music in the gay village in Toronto. But somebody said to me, thank you, they say they go to West Indian places and they have to pretend to be straight. They go to queer spaces and it's not representative of their culture. And they're like, tonight in this room, they were able to be both sides of their identity and not care and not have to mask one versus the other. That made me really proud of what we're doing, and the conversations we're having around that.

It's, it's a bit of a struggle. It's hard to find donors. Sometimes vendors are, are shying away from working with us in general or specifically on that front. But myself and all our volunteers, we know it's the right thing to do. So we press forward and we create that space. 

Hema: I think that it is gonna take time to completely eradicate some of these mindsets and you may never, for some people they're just never going to be able to see people as people just for who they are. But hearing one person express that they were able to fully be themselves at your event, I think that just empowers, that's empowering and it goes to show that the work you're doing is important.

Ryan: Yeah, I, I mean, the work we're doing and to seeing the impact it has for me, that's our, that's my reward.

We don't get paid for this. But knowing that we're, we're able to create that space in this instance, that's what fuels us to do more and continue these programs and put the energy behind it.

Hema: You have a petition on the website for Caribbean Heritage Month in Canada.

Ryan: Yeah. This is something I hope that we can accomplish. It astonished me that there's about over a million people of Caribbean origin or lineage here in Canada, and I see smaller ethnocultural groups recognized by our federal government and various provincial governments. So we, before I get into the nuance about the petition, doing my work through the Indo-Caribbean Canadian Association, I, I recognize the under-appreciation for that community, but being part of then the broader Caribbean community, and doing my part within that, I recognize and see the under-appreciation for that broader community. 

And we've been talking about this for a while, that we need a Caribbean heritage month here in Canada. One, raise awareness, educate people, celebrate our triumphs, amplify the community, connect the community, and then find support for the community. 

So the legislative process in Canada is very complicated, and I worked, I worked in a legislative office at the provincial level. So I have a very intimate knowledge of this. I said last night to some folks I was meeting with, if we don't try and push for this, we're not gonna get it. Nobody's just gonna hand you it. 

So the first step is having parliamentary petition with the House of Commons, and we have Michael Coteau, a federal member of Parliament who's endorsed that petition. Our minimum threshold we needed was 500 and we're well past that now. Encourage anybody listening, if you live in Canada, go on our website or you can visit caribbeanmonth.ca and you can sign that petition. The petition will demonstrate that there's appetite out there for this. The next step is having legislation introduced, and we have the option of the House of Commons through a member of Parliament or the Senate with a senator. I'm exploring working with a senator, just because of legislative ease, and a more clear cut, less political ability to, to have this introduced and expediated. 

I believe this is something all parliamentarians should support. A lot of them represent large populations of individuals from the Caribbean, or have Caribbean people, in their, in their constituencies. I don't think it's a hard sell. I think if you can have Lebanese Heritage Month. Tamil Heritage Month, German Heritage Month, Irish Heritage Month, Filipino Heritage Month, it Italian Heritage Month, Portuguese Heritage Month, I don't see why we can't have a Caribbean Heritage month here in Canada. We should do homage to the community and give us a month like every other community to be recognized. The last thing I'll say on this is I've been fortunate since we've launched this to meet other individuals who run other Caribbean organizations across the country.

I almost get goosebumps when I'm talking to them because we would've never crossed paths, but this commonality despite how far we live, and they might be St. Lucian or Barbadian, and my parents are Guyanese, but we're, we're collective behind this. And they're all supportive and one person says, said to me, it's about time. We don't give a damn who started it. We need to get behind you and get, get this done. And this is not about the Indo-Caribbean Canadian Association, this is about the broader Caribbean community and culture. So I'm hoping in a year, maybe you'll have me back, I can say that this has been passed. Our legislative process here in Canada can be really fast or really slow, but we're gonna continue pressing forward for that.

Hema: I will be sure to leave a link to the website in the show notes so people can learn about it. Because I think, as you were talking about some of the different months and recognitions. We're not asking for a Trinidadian or a Guyanese or Antiguan heritage month. We're asking for, or you're asking for Caribbean Heritage Month, which encompasses so many countries and so many people, and we have a very strong Caribbean community in Canada. 

Ryan: Yeah. Our footprint is, is significant here. And the more I'm doing on this project I, Montreal, there's a significant footprint there. There's a Carnival celebration in Vancouver Island, in Calgary. There's a footprint in Halifax. I'm meeting with folks from the Windsor-Essex region in Southwestern Ontario. So we're all over the place, and we we're impactful and we're small business owners. We contribute to the economy. community builds and leads places of worship. We're innovative, we're entrepreneurs, but we're just not recognized. 

So I'm hoping we start off with a Caribbean Heritage month in July, and that I hope, will lead to bigger and better things for the community. But it's, it's a one step at a time on this.

Hema:  You talked about identity earlier, and as we wrap up, I wanna ask the question for you, how do you identify? 

Ryan: Yeah. So I say that I am a Canadian from an Indo-Caribbean household. I don't say I'm Guyanese-Canadian. I wasn't born in Guyana, so I think that's unfair to misidentify myself. And I think there's some aspects of being Guyanese that I don't represent. Some people have argued back against me saying, no, you're just Guyanese. And I'm like, I don't think so. Being Canadian is part of who I am. I was born in Canada. I live here. A lot of what I do is through a quote unquote Canadian lens, but I recognize my history and my heritage, and that's critical to who I am.

It's critical to the food I eat, the music I listen to, some some of the words I use, some of my actions. You know, I talked about that political advocacy, and supporting the Black community. So being Indo-Caribbean-Canadian is the box I would put myself in. 

But yeah, I mean, if somebody says Ryan's Guyanese-Canadian, that doesn't bother me either. It's, it's where my parents originated from. Somebody says, you're Indo-Canadian, which hasn't happened yet, but yeah, there's some truth behind that as well. So I guess the great thing about being Ryan Singh is you can identify so many different things.

Hema:  Ryan, I really appreciate you taking the time to come on and chat about the organization, what you guys are doing, just some general conversations about being Indo-Caribbean. I'm gonna leave the links that we talked about to your website, to your social, if anybody's interested in learning more about the work that you all are doing. If somebody wants to donate, that'll all be in the show notes.

Ryan: Yeah, we'll definitely take donations. Cause we offer a lot of these programs for free. So that support is, is definitely appreciated. But I want to thank you for the work that you're doing, very specifically highlighting, our people, our culture, our community, our heritage. It, it takes a lot of time and effort to do the work that we do, and I know a lot of it's just thankless work, but there's an importance to it. So many other people are doing this for their community and their culture. So myself through the organization, yourself, through the podcast, we're creating an ecosystem to supporting and elevating the voices of our community and the people of our community.

So, thank you for having me on. Thank you for highlighting and finding us and, allowing me to showcase the work that we're doing. I really truly truly appreciate that.

Hema: Thank you so much.

[music]