December 2016
Parkallen
News In this issue… • Points of Light • Drainage • Parkallen Knitters • Community Rink Update • Doing Infill Right • Mature Neighbourhood Overlay Summary
Finding the warmth of safety in the Edmonton winter By Anne Pratt When you ask Hasan Al Hariri and Farja Yassin what they like most about Canada, their answer is simple: it is safe here. Safety is something we take pretty much for granted, most of the time. At least the kind of safety Hasan and Farja are talking about. As we are preparing this newsletter for print, the crushing of Aleppo nears its horrific end. The United Nations has described the events in Syria as “a complete meltdown of humanity.” Amid the unfolding horror of that war, Hasan and Farja brought their six children
out of Daraa, the epicentre of the Syrian revolution that sparked the war. They fled to Jordan where they lived for three years, first in a refugee camp and then, as soon as Hasan found work, in a small rented home. But they could not stay there forever. They applied for refugee status, and then they waited. One day, Hasan got a call from the UNHCR. Canada was opening its doors to 25,000 people, and the Al Hariris were among them. Sitting in a sunny living room on a bitterly cold Edmonton day,
with tea, coffee, dried fruit and chocolate on offer, it is hard to imagine what this family has experienced in their bid for a safe home. Marion Hyde and Lawrie Seligman, long-time residents of Parkallen, are both the Al Hariri’s next-door neighbours and their landlords. “For many years we rented our property to students,” says Lawrie. “Marion and I wanted to do something different.” The Al Hariris also wanted something different. After arriving in Edmonton early in 2016, Hasan and Farja decided they wanted to live in a community