» «© Ome: beautiful International Elders Day a grassroots celebration. WE’VE BEEN told that here on the North Shore are accumulated even more senior folk than in all of Victoria, which we secretly think of as the old-age capital of the world. We had not been told, or stopped to think of it, that amongst our many seniors are upwards of 35 different nationalities. On Oct. 1, the day the United Nations General Assembly chose to designate in 1990 as International El- ders Day, a good many of those nationalities came to a party here in North Van- couver. They were bent on celebrating the pleasures and responsibilities of melding their national backgrounds into our safe and promising country. One couldn’t heip wishing that, for occasions like this, Canada, too, had a national dress. - ‘There were Netherlanders in wooden shoes wearing winged lace caps,. just like the pictures in the story- books; there were. Chinese dancers most exotically costumed, even to deiails of . their coiffures; there were ‘sturdy Danes in knee-socks and - jerkins and sashes, singing a song ‘from their ‘homeland. There were filmy floating garments worn by ladies -..from India;: and intricately ‘embroidered vests and skirts, all. brought out of trunks - and tissue. paper to ‘share with us in proud iden- tification. . . For some, the costume is -- all that is left of their na- tion; wars and politicians ‘have so distorted bound- aries once. thought in- defeasible. We have space in our countryside and in our -. hearts. to. give them stability again. woman, smali and slight, from Austria, looked like an il- lumination ‘in a precious manuscript with her long elegant dress of shimmering cloth: and wearing a most intricate head-piece of gold mesh.. There was nistory and tradition and great artistry in all these lovely garments — I wished at least for a pair of glass slippers. Check Your i BW Eleanor Godley . THE VINTAGE YEARS The party had been ar- ranged by the Seniors’ Hub people, who did it last year, too, the only piace in Canada where the day was ‘thus observed. Their only regret was that they couldn’t make it a public event this time, for reasons of space. ‘The hall of St. Mariin’s on East Windsor was crammed with seniors who'd had invitations from all across the North Shore, but there were lots of others who couldn’t be accommo- dated. . A giant gathering would likely defeat the underlying principle of neighbor-to- neighbor. Let us try to plan for multiple parties next Oct. 1 that will welcome everyone who is a senior, wherever on our shore. The structure the people at the Hub set up for the party was charming and unselfish, and worth establishing as a permanent framework. They made a _list, you see, of certain out- standing local seniors, peo- ple with varied talents like Rete Mackay who has been the energy for all kinds of good local projects, and Sonia Grandmaison the ar- tist, and Evelyn Horne, who couldn’t come in person but who has been a vigorous friend and neighbor in North Vancouver since 1918, These and others were paired each one in turn with a young person who has also displayed leadership and empathy for all ages. Young people such as Sheila Ranger, in her short life, already become a pillar of the Guiding movement, and Brad: Joseph, award-win- Ning young sculptor, and Raymond Liens, whese special talent is in linking young and old for mutual benefit. There were altogether about 14 of these pairings, and each person received a certificate, very handsome, designed and offered by SGD Consulting, and a long-stemmed rose from Li- ly, generous florist. Some mayors came and congratulated us for lasting this long and the chairman of the Capilano Community Services, our hosts, im- plored us to foster the multiplication of interna- tional seniors and help them to integrate. Jean -Taylor, who is coordinator at the Seniors’ Hub, deserves a lot of kudos for undertaking the project, let alone seeing it to its completion. : Jean worked in Switzerland for years before emigrating to Canada and ran a community centre there which embraced 150 different nationalities, so she enjoyed the chance to expand on this background when the edict came down from the U.N. in 1990. She had kept ties that made it easier to master the moves to secure the sanc- tion of the U.N. for this coming together, .especially as the wording of its Action Programme on Aging calls for what Jean well under- stands -— that we prosper only with the grass roots of neighborhoods, cf families and individuals and businesses and schools as well as the media. Growing old successfully is not a specialized process but rather one of daily liv- ing intertwined with all the people with whom one shares one’s piece of the world. This is the crux of the UN’s 1982 Plan for Ag- ing, which has ripened now, in 1992, to enrich our fur- ther years together. a a NS Se SS ES CN SD CoD evan come