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‘We belong… and we are giving back”: Sikh celebration enlivens downtown Winnipeg

Downtown Winnipeg came alive with vibrant sights, sounds, and scents on Sunday, as Manitoba’s Sikh community flocked to Memorial Park to celebrate its annual Nagar Kirtan procession and festival.

This year marked the 422nd anniversary of the completion of the Guru Granth Sahib, the holy scripture central to the Sikh faith. Shortly after 1 p.m., a palanquin bearing a copy of the scripture was led in parade through downtown Winnipeg, with musical accompaniment.

“This is a chance to tell the public and the whole community where we come from and who we are,” said volunteer Prabh Grewal shortly before the procession got underway. “In a community there are people from every race and every country, and our main objective is to have everybody live in peace and harmony together.”

Before, during, and after the procession, the park hummed with life. As many as 55,000 people converged on the site, with the majority dressed in festive traditional attire. Near the height of the day’s 30 C heat, families relaxed in patches of shade, enjoying plates of Punjabi cuisine dished out for free at dozens of tents sponsored by local businesses.

For newcomer pizza purveyors, it’s all about crafting solid foundations

A recent poll conducted by an Internet-based market-research firm determined that close to 20 per cent of people eschew their leftover pizza crust.

Some argued that the residual crust lacks flavour. Others submitted that it’s too hard or crunchy to enjoy sans toppings. Given that information, what are we to make of Crusty Craft Pizza, a five-month-old takeout spot whose owners are so confident in their European-style pizza crust that they’ve chosen to highlight it in their business moniker?

Whenever somebody informs them they don’t like pizza crust, their response is, well, they haven’t tried theirs, says Oleksii Samokvhal, who together with his wife, Iryna Mehedyn, opened Crusty Craft Pizza in early April, at 1311 Day St. in Transcona.

“It’s thin in the middle, with raised edges we hand-form ourselves,” says Mehedyn, a native of Ukraine who, like her Kyiv-born husband, relocated to Winnipeg to escape the conflict in their home country.

What’s open, what’s closed, what’s up in Winnipeg on Labour Day

Here's a roundup of hours of business for services and things to do on September 7.

‘Soapy disco’ for your ride

For Kyle Thompson, foam is where the heart is.

As a high school student at Winnipeg’s Transcona Collegiate, one of his classes required him to create a business plan. He was cleaning vehicles part-time at the Chamois Car Wash and Detail Centre, so he used the assignment to envision a car wash of his own — one with a Regent Avenue address.

Fast forward some 25 years later and that dream is a reality. Thompson is the co-owner and general manager at Flamingo Express Car Wash.

Located at 868 Regent Ave. West — east of the row of car dealerships that call the thoroughfare home and across the street from an Amazon distribution hub — Flamingo opened last month.

Four teens dead, four others sent to hospital after crash near Manitoba resort town

WINNIPEG - Mounties in Manitoba say four teens died and four other victims, including two children, were taken to hospital after two vehicles crashed and landed in a ditch near a resort town over the weekend.

RCMP say they responded just after 9 p.m. on Sunday to an intersection near the town of Winnipeg Beach, located about 80 kilometres north of Winnipeg.

Police say a car with four occupants was westbound on Highway 229, and was crossing Highway 8 when it was hit by a southbound van.

Both vehicles went into a ditch, with one of them rolling over on to its roof.

Dauphin ER reopening ‘monumental team effort’

DAUPHIN — The emergency department at Dauphin Regional Health Centre reopened Monday morning after a closure of just over two months, restoring 24-7 emergency services to Dauphin and surrounding communities.

Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara hailed the reopening as a major milestone.

“It’s been a monumental team effort to get to this point,” Asagwara told the Brandon Sun on Monday afternoon before embarking on a tour of the facility.

“We asked everyone to approach this as one team and that’s exactly what we’re seeing the results of now.”