We are very happy to have received journalistic recognition from ours peers in Canada (two awards), Austria, and Poland. Maciej Plazynski Award Granted by the Press Club of Poland and the late Maciej Plazynski’s son Jakub to journalists and media serving the Polish diaspora around the world June 2018, Museum of Emigration, Gdynia, Poland Gala Canadian Ethnic Media Association (CEMA)’s Award CEMA’s 39th annual award, awarded to Margaret P. Bonikowska and Tomek Kniat Category: Podcasting November 2017, Toronto, Canada Golden Owl – Goldene Eulen Awarded by the Polish Congress in Austria, Jupiter Magazine and the Polish Intellectuals’ Club in Austria…
Author: Malgorzata P. Bonikowska
This story is featured in Episode 54 This great idea was born out of a close intellectual, spiritual and artistic connection between two women who live on the opposite sides of the continent (one in California, the other one in Ontario, Canada) and who had never met in person until their project was ready to be shown to the world. Dorota Skowronska-Krawczyk does research in biochemistry at the University of California at San Diego and Ewa Henry is a visual artist based in Mississauga, next door to Toronto. Their respective passions came together to create VISIONS, an innovative project which…
This story is featured in Episode 54 Many people undertake trips across Canada, this vast country, the second largest in the world. On POLcast we featured a Polish Canadian who cycled across Canada and a couple who travelled with a red couch to celebrate Canada’s 150th birthday. Monika Grzelak, a photographer, came to Canada for just a year 7 years ago, but she stayed. She has just completed a solo road trip from Toronto to Vancouver Island in the west coast to look for Canadian love stories. “Love across Canada” was the theme of her journey.
This story is covered in Episode 54 Marcin Zaród lives and works in Tarnow, Poland. He is an English language teacher in Janusz Korczak High School there but his definition of what teaching is about is different from that of many other teachers. His mission is to show his students that true learning is not just about classrooms, textbooks, and exams. This is why his work has won him many honours – he was the winner of the “Polish Teacher of the Year 2013” Award and of the “Teacher with Culture 2016” Award. He believes in spreading his ideas about teaching…
This story is featured in Episode 53 Many great ideas appear and then… disappear without ever being implemented. But here’s a story of one idea that didn’t follow this sad path. In Episode 48 we talked about a movement of young dynamic Polish Canadian professionals who have organized 12 annual youth conferences called “Quo Vadis?”, which means “Where are you going?”, the last of which was held last fall in Burlington. They had been meeting and talking about the future of Canada’s Polish community until they came up with Konekt, a new young Polish Canadian professionals’ own organization. On April…
This story is featured in Episode 53 We exist despite the sober formality of great concert halls, despite the boredom of classical musicians’ life, despite fanatic lovers of classical music, despite fans of rock, rap or pop who are afraid of classical music. We treat our Muse with a humorous irony and we’re sure, she will have nothing against it!” MozART group There are four of them, most accomplished virtuoso string players (two violins, a viola and a cello), graduates of prestigious music Academies in Warsaw and Łódź. They have been playing together since 1995, when they began to create…
This story is featured in Episode 51. Sylvia Beauchain, a Polish Canadian artist, lived in Japan, then for 7 years in France and now she is back in Japan, where she lives in Okinawa with her family. Sylvia has devoted her life to her two great passions – art and helping those in need, which she has successfully connected to change other people’s lives. She believes that helping others doesn’t have to mean creating huge organizations that need lots of money to operate. In 2003 she set up her Chi-Ki Children’s Charity – a small organization which empowers local people…
This story is featured in Episode 51. They met “Vlesie” (W lesie) which in Polish means “in the woods” in 2015 – playing music in a Canadian forest, at the Folk Camp organized by Kosa Kolektiv. They loved each other’s music, and created a unique combination of Eastern and Northern European styles. Their leader is a Polish ethnomusicologist Ewelina Ferenc, an experienced folk musician and a world music singer who has sung in about 20 languages – who came to Canada from Poland in 2015. Ewelina is an active member of the Toronto grassroots community, organizing many different cultural events,…
In this episode you will hear: Interviews: • A legend that needed to exist Dariusz Rosiak, a renowned Polish press and radio journalist and author, has just published his 6th book “Biało-czerwony. Tajemnica Sat Okha” (White and red. The secret of Sat Okh). Sat Okh, Long Feather (c. 1920 – July 3, 2003), was supposedly born to a Polish woman and a native Canadian Shawnee chief, then returned to Poland, where he fought in WW2, worked in the navy and then started his career of informing Poles and other Europeans about the culture and tradition of native Canadians. • Time for…
This story is featured in Episode 47 Many episodes ago we presented to you stories of Canadians who embarked on a task to learn Polish at a night language school which I had visited. One of them was a most enthusiastic fan of Poland Nancy Campbell. She visits Poland regularly and has even purchased an apartment in Krakow. In January she initiated an international collaboration between an elementary school in Poland and an organization out of Edmonton called No Stone Left Alone. On Sept. 1 Nancy attended an event in Krakow, which was the result of this unique partnership between…