There are two things from my childhood in Toronto that I mourn deeply. One is what the Canadian National Exhibition used to be. The other is Caravan.
The CNE is still with us, although I increasingly struggle to identify what exactly is Canadian, national, or an exhibition about it.
Caravan is gone. And I miss it terribly.
For those too young to remember, Caravan was a two-week festival in June when Toronto's immigrant communities opened their doors to the rest of the city.
You bought a passport. You travelled from pavilion to pavilion, collecting stamps, eating food, watching performances, meeting people and exploring neighbourhoods you might otherwise never have visited.
It was magical.
And I want it back.
## The city was the exhibition
Caravan arrived just as the school year was ending. Summer vacation was almost upon us, and for two weeks Toronto became an enormous adventure.
My father and I would spend Friday evenings and Saturdays travelling across the city. We'd take buses, walk unfamiliar streets and visit community halls in neighbourhoods I barely knew existed.
There were express buses between pavilions. Getting around was part of the fun. You were travelling, genuinely travelling, without ever leaving Toronto.
I remember eating some of the best teriyaki chicken of my life at the Tokyo Pavilion.
My wife, who hates eggplant, once ate a moussaka at the Macedonian Pavilion in Thorncliffe Park that practically changed her life.
And I remember a sign outside the bathroom at the Australian Pavilion announcing a raffle.
First prize: an all-expenses-paid one-week vacation in Australia.
Second prize: two weeks in Australia.
I still laugh at that joke.
And that's important. The Australians weren't asking us to appreciate their cultural contribution to Canadian society. They were having a laugh, and inviting us to join them.
Caravan wasn't a lesson in multiculturalism.
It was a demonstration of its benefits.
## Nobody had to tell us diversity was good
Too often, multiculturalism is presented as a moral obligation. Something we're expected to embrace because doing so makes us better people.
Caravan took a rather different approach.
It showed you that having neighbours from all over the world was an enormous advantage.
You could eat seven different meals from seven different countries. Hear instruments you'd never encountered. Watch dances you didn't know existed. See crafts and products made by people whose traditions went back centuries.
And then you could have a beer and listen to some music.
The daytime Caravan was wonderful for families. In the evenings, some pavilions became decidedly more adult. London, Australia and New Zealand knew how to put on a night.
Not every pavilion needed to do everything.
And nobody needed to be persuaded of the virtue of attending.
You went because it was fun.
One of my favourite things was watching young Ukrainian dancers, perhaps twelve or fourteen years old, performing routines they'd spent years learning because it pleased their grandmothers.
Suddenly, those traditions had an audience.
Strangers were applauding. Their friends could see that what they'd learned at home was something special.
The grandmothers were delighted. The children were recognized. The audience was entertained.
And the community centres, churches and cultural associations made a few bucks in the process.
Everybody won.
## Sharing your roots was being Canadian
I think this is the part we've forgotten.
Being Canadian didn't require you to arrive without a past.
You could have a history, traditions, values, a code of your own. You could be proud of where you came from.
But you also had an openness to sharing those things, and an interest in learning about the people with whom you now shared this land.
**Sharing your roots was being Canadian.**
That was the bargain.
You didn't have to become culturally indistinguishable from your neighbours. You had to be willing to be their neighbour.
Caravan made that bargain real.
It wasn't a government campaign telling us how to think about one another. It was a Greek grandmother making dinner for strangers. A Japanese family sharing its traditions. An Australian making fun of Australia.
And thousands of Torontonians enthusiastically accepting the invitation.
## Canada needs more of this, not less
Canada has made a fundamental demographic and economic choice.
We are a country that depends heavily on immigration for population growth. We attract people from around the world to build lives here, contribute to our economy and become Canadians.
I support that ambition.
I also believe we should make it economically easier for people who want children to have them. Housing, childcare, taxation and the costs of raising a family shouldn't punish people for doing something our society needs.
But immigration and family policy are only part of building a country.
We also need to build a shared life.
We can welcome people from every corner of the globe, but if we don't create opportunities to know one another, we risk becoming a collection of communities living alongside each other rather than a society living together.
Caravan offered something wonderfully practical.
It made getting to know your neighbours enjoyable.
Not compulsory. Not virtuous. Enjoyable.
## So let's bring it back
I don't want to recreate the Toronto of 1975.
That Toronto is gone.
The communities that were transforming the city then were Greek, Portuguese, Italian, Ukrainian and many others.
Today's Toronto is different. We have newer and growing communities with extraordinary traditions of their own.
And I think the resurrection of Caravan should begin with Middle Eastern communities.
There's something fitting about that.
For centuries, caravans carried people and goods across the Middle East and Central Asia. Travellers encountered new languages, foods, customs and ideas. Caravanserais offered places to gather, trade, eat and rest.
The very name of our festival evokes that tradition of travel and exchange.
Imagine Iranian, Lebanese, Syrian, Iraqi and Palestinian community organizations coming together to found the new Toronto Caravan.
Not because they're obliged to represent their communities to the rest of us.
Because they have something wonderful to share, and because there is a genuine opportunity to make money, build relationships and celebrate their heritage.
Start with four or five pavilions.
Not fifty.
Establish a clear charter. Publish the standards for participation. Make the economics work for the community organizations that do the hosting.
And invite everyone else to join as they're ready.
The Greeks, Portuguese, Germans and English can get their acts together and apply just like everyone else.
Nobody gets a permanent pavilion because their grandparents had one.
## And please, don't put it all in one place
This is essential.
Caravan cannot become another collection of food stalls in a park.
The journey was half the experience.
I want to buy a passport. I want stamps. I want to travel across Toronto to places I've never visited.
I want express buses connecting pavilions.
I want daytime programming for families and nighttime programming for adults.
I want community halls full of people, music spilling out into the street, and children discovering that the strange things their grandparents taught them are actually rather wonderful.
And I want the money to flow back into the organizations that make it happen.
We don't need to begin with a massive budget or a grand civic institution.
We need a handful of communities willing to open their doors, a small organization to coordinate them, and a city willing to come.
Then we grow.
One pavilion at a time.
## Me, Prime Minister
I occasionally imagine what I'd do if I were Prime Minister.
There are plenty of serious problems to solve. Housing, productivity, immigration, education, economic growth.
But nations aren't built entirely through legislation and economic policy.
They're also built through shared experiences.
Through the memories children make with their fathers on a Friday night in June.
Through the discovery that the neighbourhood you've never visited has the best chicken you've ever eaten.
Through the realization that your neighbours' traditions aren't something you have to tolerate. They're something you get to enjoy.
I don't actually need to be Prime Minister to bring Caravan back.
And perhaps that's the point.
I'm running a business. I have plenty to occupy my time. But I can think of few things that would give me more personal satisfaction than spending part of the next decade bringing those two magical weeks back to Toronto.
So here's my invitation.
If you remember Caravan, tell me what you remember.
If you belong to a cultural organization that might want to host a pavilion, I'd love to hear from you.
If you know how to organize festivals, arrange buses, find sponsors or convince a few thousand people to buy passports, we should talk.
And if you've never heard of Caravan, I hope one June you'll discover what we lost.
Because I want another generation of children to experience
what I did.
To discover their city.
To discover their neighbours.
And to discover that sharing your roots is one of the most Canadian things you can do.
**I'm resurrecting Caravan. You really should help me.**