Welcoming Portagers to learn about its Nigerian population

A celebration called Nigerian Delicacy Day took place Saturday at Stride Place's multipurpose room. 

Oluwasegun Akintajuwa helped organize the effort and everyone was invited to come and enjoy a literal taste of Nigeria. There are about 200 people from Nigeria who've made Portage their home. 

Akintajuwa explains they're not a registered group but came together as an association, wanting Portage to know that a group of people are here and would like to contribute to our society.

"We tried doing it together as a registered group, but for now, we don't really have full structure. We're the Association of Nigerians in Portage la Prairie. We would like to introduce our culture to the community. Our culture is very vast but we are trying to use food and music. Today, we called this Nigerian Delicacy Day, an Introduction to Nigerian culture. Our popular food is jollof rice."

He notes they toned down the level of spice in their food, noting they usually eat it at quite a hotter degree of intensity.  

"Our culture goes beyond that but we think that's a good way to introduce ourselves. We just want the City of Portage la Prairie to know that we're here to contribute. We have a mission and vision and we want to come together in unity with cultural pride. How do we want to do this? We want to achieve this through cultural integration, community service, and educational processes. We want to give back to the community. It might not be financial, but we are ready to show the City of Portage la Prairie that we are here to enrich the fabric of the community."

Akintajuwa says he's been here for a year and a half, and notes others are still making their way here.

"We're still trying to come together as a group. It's not easy gathering people, but on the social media platform WhatsApp, we have about 70 families that we've been able to bring together, just to communicate with people. We intend to have more events and activities to see people come out."

Michael Arnott was there with Kathy Chute. He says it's awesome.

"I got introduced to the culture about a couple of years ago. We have a kind of personal touch with these people because they came and stayed with us prior to taking residence. The organizer and his wife all came in and stayed with us as well as another couple before. So, that's how we got to know about them."

Chute adds we came from the generation of meat and potatoes, salt and pepper; that's it. So, she says the spices they use in their food are quite interesting. 

Arnott adds the Nigerians love their culture immensely and enjoy celebrating it, and love their music. 

"You see by their dress; it's always really colourful. It's a good cultural diversity. It's really nice to embrace and be involved in it."

Leslie Horn was there with her husband, Chris, and adds it reminds her of Folklorama in Winnipeg, noting she attended those events when they lived there.

"I like the jollof rice. It's really nice to see different things going on in Portage and see the diversity."

Chris notes bringing the culture everyone in the community together is the reason they left Winnipeg.

"They need to have things like Folklorama to bring people together, but you can come to the country and in 45 minutes, you're kind of surrounded by it."

Kyle Case attended with his fiancé, Blessing Otoide, who is from Nigeria, herself. 

"It's nice to see a cultural event in Portage and we just thought it would be a good little family outing and to come for a walk to the Island. It's just nice to see events and have stuff to do on the weekends. I've had a lot of Nigerian food already. It's very, very good."

Blessing adds it's just good to meet all the Nigerians, seeing as she is a Nigerian in Portage. 

"It's excellent. I like the diversity it's bringing into Portage, so it's nice."

Niran Adeniyi was part of the organizing team and says it's amazing, heartwarming, and unbelievable, seeing as Portage is like the heart of Canada. 

"To have this kind of event here with the Mayor present, with the MLA present, and all kinds of cultures coming in to celebrate with us, it is amazing. It is very welcoming of the community and we feel blessed to be part of this community."

He's been in the city since 2021 and explains Portage has everything you need. 

"It's good. It's welcoming. I had one or two sad experiences, but hey, there's no where in the world where you have it all perfect, right? Generally, we are above average. It's a nice place to stay and a nice place to raise a family. Most importantly, you have jobs, so you have more people coming in here and settling because of the jobs. And there's an affordable cost of living around here."

Adeniyi says they had a Christmas event this past December and the year before that. 

"Each year, it seems to get larger and better. So, this is like a welcome thing organized by PCRC to help showcase part of our culture, and to create some awareness that has a large and growing community of Nigerian support, who are willing to contribute meaningfully, and also be part of the ecosystem and improve this system. We have a very unique culture. We have a very unique way of life. We are overtly energetic. I want to bring some of that into the community and contribute positively to the growth and sustenance of Portage la Prairie."

Inem Adeniyi works with PCRC and says to see this take place in Portage is amazing for her.

"People of like culture and same colour skin; it's beautiful. I'm just happy to be here."

She explains a trivia game was distributed to everyone as a way of socializing and getting to meet each other, and to find out the extent of what people know about Nigeria, and its customs, and traditions.

"There's plenty of food, there's plenty of the Fufu; the Nigerian Fufu," continues Adeniyi. "You're going to taste that here and yes, a lot to drink and just be merry. This is just an avenue for people to know about the Nigerians who are living in Portage la Prairie's community, to know that there's a Nigerian community here and for us, Nigerians, to know ourselves and find ways of imparting positively to our community."

The Association of Nigerians in Portage would like to thank The Portage Family Resource Centre, United Way in Central Plains Region, Portage Homestead Co-op, the Portage Local Immigration Partnership, the Manitoba Association of Newcomer Serving Organizations, the Portage Learning and Literacy Centre, as well as Mayor Knox and MLA Bereza and all of the volunteers for their support.