By: Hannah Fraser, News Writer
On July 20, the seventh annual Burnaby Pride Festival celebrated the “diversity of our local 2SLGBTQIA+ communities, families, and supporters.” The festival was held at Bonsor Field and had live music, drag performances, family-friendly activities, and more.
Burnaby Pride kicked things off at 12:30 p.m. with a pre-show DJ set by DJ Moaning Lisa. The day featured musical performances, with queer artists like Hollow Twin, houseguest, Haleluya Hailu, SIESKI, and The Rainbow Concert Band. houseguest is an “all-trans indie rock band” formed in 2023 and The Rainbow Concert Band is Vancouver’s “first and only” 2SLGBTQIA+ concert band formed in 1990.
The Peak interviewed Athena Affan, Afro-Caribbean chair of Burnaby Pride. Affan said Burnaby Pride began in 2018 to highlight community organizations offering services to support the 2SLGBTQIA+ community, such as Trans Care BC and Rainbow Refugee. Trans Care BC “connects trans people, their loved ones, and clinicians with information, education, training, and support.” Rainbow Refugee is a “Vancouver-based organization that promotes safe, equitable migration” for “people fleeing persecution based on their sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, or HIV status.” With the same goal of highlighting community organizations like these, the festival featured over 40 booths this year.
Comedians Joanne Tsung and Sasha Mark, who “co-hosted Burnaby Pride for the past three years” also joined the festival, putting on comedy performances. Affan said this year, Burnaby Pride featured kids’ events, where children listened to a story about inclusion and made shadow puppets to recreate the story on their own.
“We’re always trying to make new relationships and try to support community partnerships to offer different kinds of activities during the Pride,” said Affan. “We know that the community is really broad and diverse in terms of interests.”
The Burnaby Pride Festival aims to “hold space in the community and show Burnaby that 2SLGBTQIA+ people are here, we’re visible,” she continued.
“One of the unique issues we have in Burnaby is that we don’t have a lot of dedicated queer spaces.” Affan said she wants to “create a sense of community, make opportunities for folks to come together, and be together in Burnaby” for those community members who “don’t really know how to find each other.”
“2SLGBTQIA+ people are here, we’re visible.” — Athena Affan, chair of Burnaby Pride
Affan added, “For the community at large that’s not queer, they can come to our event, they can talk to and engage with community booths, they can see some performers, and in that way, we hope to increase awareness of the community in a way that isn’t putting a huge burden on our community members.”
Drag performers put on a show at the end of the festival, including performances from Bebo, Batty Banks, Beardney Spears, Genesis, and SKIM. To highlight a few of the performers, Bebo is a “POC trans Bollywood performer,” whose act featured “Indian cultural and Bollywood-themed dance forms through drag which is not often showcased in the Canadian Drag scene.” SKIM is a “non-binary lesbian drag king” who has performed globally and is an “active member of the House of Rice and founder of King Sized — a drag king-focused show.”
On July 15, Burnaby Pride held a Flag Raising event at Burnaby City Hall to “proudly raise the intersex progress Pride flag” together. They also hosted a free “Pride at The Planetarium” event on July 17 at the BCIT Planetarium, “celebrating the beauty of space and the diversity of our queer community.”
Affan hopes Burnaby Pride can march in the Hats Off Parade, a “grassroots festival celebrating the best of the Burnaby Heights community since the early 1980s,” next year in June “to bring some glitter and colour and awareness.”
For more information about Burnaby Pride, visit their Instagram @burnaby_pride or website, burnabypride.com.
