2nd Annual Canadian Immigration Celebration
Women & their Accomplishments
It was bright and sunny. A glorious day to be outside, and yet we had a fabulous crowd at the 2nd Annual Celebration of Macedonian Immigration to Canada which was held at the East York library as we celebrated Women and their accomplishments!
Most of the women who immigrated to Canada in the early days of the 20th C came as brides for the men who finally settled here. Women that emigrated from Macedonia in the latter part of the 20th and early 21st C were decidedly better educated as a rule, and came to Canada with a different goal and perspective.
Women can be so much more than wives, mothers, the hub of a family, and we wanted to feature women and their separate accomplishments from those that have to do with husband and family. The criteria were to include women from the various regions of Macedonia. e.g. Republic, Aegean, Pirin and Mala Prespa. However, it was challenging to find women in our community that were from Mala Prespa or Pirinska Makedonija.
It was a difficult choice to make because there were so many worthy candidates and the women selected represent the many that are part of the Macedonian Canadian community who are equally qualified.
Our first woman to come to the stage was Natasha Denkovski. As she pointed out, she had spent almost three decades in her hometown, Skopje. This woman achieved a great deal before she even decided to come to Canada, both as an artist and in sports with a Silver Medal as a shooter on the Macedonian National team. She was a well-known model in Macedonia, as well. She had a very busy career before her marriage in Toronto.
However, she had decided even as a child, that eventually she would leave Macedonia. She had her Ph.D. in Agriculture in Macedonia, but found that upon arriving in Canada, there was little call for her qualifications so Natasha attended Ohio State and got her Masters in Engineering. There came a point though, when she asked herself – who and I, or perhaps where am I going? She decided to make the business community her goal, and got a job as a loan officer for one of the banks. From there she proceeded to get her MBA. She made the point at the end of her presentation that whatever she has been able to achieve was ultimately for her children. They will never have to line up for sugar, but have the opportunities only Canada can offer. Her achievements are a great inspiration because she has covered so many aspects – sports, business, academics, arts.
Most of you are familiar with Pobeda Piskaceva who produces, shoots, writes, and reports on current news in the Macedonian community with her TV program Macedonian Edition. It is one of the two television programs for Macedonians here in Toronto and Canada.
Pobeda emigrated from Macedonian in 1990. She was trained as a lawyer in Macedonia, but eventually got a job as a journalist on Macedonian television. She and her husband decided to come to Canada to test it out and if they didn’t like it, would return. Her first job in Canada was a flower shop where she designed flower arrangements for the next two years. As she was fluent in several languages, she was able to pass the exam for interpreters and earn considerably more on an hourly basis. Her next challenge was to continue her work on television, by securing a job at OMNI called Diverse City. She said that the two years she spent on this show was the best time on a job in Canada so far. Unfortunately, the show was cancelled due to lack of funding.
Pobeda decided to produce her own television program called Macedonian Edition which started in 1998 at Rogers Cable. Since that first show, she has recorded 355 shows so far. She has interviewed prime ministers, and war correspondents, archbishops and produced a documentary in 1988 about the Begaltsi. She has had to support her children, totally on her own as well as buy a house, while passing her exams to become an insurance agent. In addition she now produces another television show on Rogers Cable. A renaissance woman.
Sandra Danilovic emigrated from Skopje at the age of ten, along with her parents and sister. She has always been interested in the arts, as her first love was art and photography. She attended York University and received her degree in Fine arts and Film. Her interests have been in the “personal” and it is no wonder that her first documentary was Portrait of a Street: The Soul and Spirit of College (2001) with its stories and testimonies of growing up Italian and black as immigrants on College Street. Her next one was closer to home as she told the story of three Macedonian couples who emigrated to Canada, their journey and experiences, good and not so pleasant, called Just Arrived (2004). This exploration of immigrant narratives was broadcast on American PBS and Rogers OMNI Television.
As funding shrunk for independent filmmakers in Canada, and although she had her own production company, she started to teach. One of the first courses she taught was Women in Film which was a dichotomy to her own situation as it was extremely hard to find funds for her to continue in the industry.
Sandra makes sure that she travels to Macedonian every summer. She finds that Macedonia rejuvenates her artistic soul, and working on her doctorate makes this annual pilgrimage very important. She is completing her doctorate in Information Studies at the University of Toronto. Her current research explores computer game design as a medium of self-expression and social transformation. Her semi-autobiographical Machinima documentary, Second Bodies, won Best Documentary at the New Media Film Festival in San Francisco, 2010.
Our next immigrant is Maria Lazarova Manceva, who came to Canada in 2005, with a degree in mechanical engineering. Maria has always noticed and admired well-dressed and fashionable women, and since having a career in fashion was not acceptable (by her parents) as a career, Maria followed her father’s directive and entered Engineering in Macedonia. Although she started to work after graduation in her father’s company, she and her husband decided to try Canada, and Montreal specifically as she had studied French in school and not English.
After some time, they both felt that Toronto was where they should be and moved again. In the meanwhile her family kept growing. When she first arrived, she sought out the Macedonian church in Mississauga, in order to volunteer. She managed to make contact with Pat McDonough, an icon in the Global fashion world and co-founder of the Fashion Design Council of Canada. This was a very beneficial move as Maria learned at the feet of the Master for over two years. Maria became part of a Consortium of young designers that were able to design and present their fashions, along with someone of McDonough’s reputation. This was a real boost to Maria’s career as a fashion designer. Maria also had visuals which included her designs and some of the people she has designed gowns for.
Vera Belazelkoska, born and raised in Skopje, but she found herself in 2001, along with her family, immigrating to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with only 2 suitcases for each family member. She was interested in international development in high school, and went on to study Economics in Minnesota. She wanted to see what the world outside the States was like. She has volunteered in various places throughout the world, including nine months in Namibia with an action group working on micro financing for women. Vera has previously worked in parts of Africa, Asia, and South, Central and North America on various initiatives that utilize her community engagement, field research, project management and evaluation skills. Her volunteering has taken her to New Orleans as well as working on the Obama campaign.
The family decided to leave the States, and once more emigrate, but this time to Canada and Toronto. She is presently a Manager of Community Engaged Projects at the STEPS Initiative, a Toronto-based not-for-profit organization that connects people to public spaces through art. She graduated with a Master of Arts in Political Economy of International Development at the University of Toronto, focusing on community development. She is passionate about collaborating on innovative projects that foster social change domestically and abroad. In answer to a question put to her, “was it more difficult being both an immigrant and a woman?” Vera answered “Yes, it was, however, it is more important to push the boundaries”. And this young woman certainly has, and will continue to do so.
Next on the agenda was Zoe Christo, someone familiar to the community who have been in Canada for a long time. She was able to share her story about emigrating from Aegean Macedonia, and arriving in Canada in 1947 as a young child. It was her personal story of being an immigrant just after WWII when her family was able to leave at the beginning of the Greek Civil war. She was very grateful that they immigrated when they did, as the situation got much, much worse.
It was a strange land when she arrived as an eight year old, and she felt like an alien in school, since she had to change her name from Zojka to Joyce in order to fit in. Her early years were a blur but when she took a business course and started working, she really felt Canadian. As her biological clock was ticking, she happened to meet the man that she would spend the rest of her life with. After her son and daughter became more independent, she was able to realize a dream she always had – opening a business on one of the prime streets in Toronto – Yorkville. It was called Zoë Christo Fashions.
Zoe has been involved with the community by organizing fashion shows, She loved working and helping people, and when she decided to close the store after 20 years, she got into personal coaching, and became a Professional Certified Coach in 2014. What is really important is that the young girl who came to Canada many years ago, never stopped growing and wanting to attain and ask more of herself and therefore becoming an incredible model for her family. Zoe is a proud Baba and still wanting to help people through her coaching. She has truly had a very long journey from Vumbel to Yorkville.
Our keynote speaker was Aleksandra Nasteska from Montreal. Aleksandra was born and raised in Skopje, Macedonia. While living in Skopje she was working as a television host for music, youth and urban culture shows. She immigrated to Canada to pursue studies at the Vancouver film School. After her studies she worked in the television and film industry in B.C. as well as in the non-profit sector.
Today, her interests and work converge on progressive policy, gender equality, sustainable development and democracy, among others. She was the co-founder and director of We Canada, a campaign for Canadian leadership in sustainability at the Earth Summit 2012, and member of the United Nations Environment Programme’s Youth Steering Committee for the International Children and Youth Conference, Tunza 2011. For her work with We Canada, and the Canada-wide tour Dialogues and Action for Earth Summit 2012, she received the Top 25 Canadian Immigrants Award 2013.
She currently sits on the board of directors at FEM international, Montreal-based organisation that works on economic empowerment of women, and the social enterprise and eco-fashion boutique Ethik-BCG. She is also the current president of Fairtrade Montreal, a coalition of organisations that are working to designate Montreal as a Fairtrade Town, as well as the Montreal representative for United Macedonian Diaspora. Aleksandra is presently working on her degree in nursing as she would like to become a Nurse Practitioner.
Many of the women in the audience could very well be telling you their story as to where they came from, etc. In fact, one of these women just got elected as the first female President of an Orthodox church. Vera Belchevska. Vera gave us a quick sketch of her journey as an immigrant with her husband, working in a hospital and then owning two restaurants that were part of a franchise. Her election has been something she has striven towards for a very long time.
Tony Markovski opened the event with an introduction about the Historical Society and closed it with a presentation to our keynote speaker, a book called Macedonian Village Dress, Going, Going, Gone to Aleksandra Nasteska. Each of the six women participants was presented with a living flower to represent life and their struggle with a wish for a bright future. We had time to have some tea and snacks made by several members of the Historical Society.
Virginia Andreoff Evans