Peace Is The Highest Of Human Values
The Saturday Huddle is a weekly column that features opinion, analysis and reflections on Huddle stories, podcasts and business news in the region. Mark Leger is the editor of Huddle and the Director of News Content for Acadia Broadcasting.
Many of our immigrant entrepreneurs do a remarkable job of resettling here under difficult circumstances and building successful businesses.
Last week, I wrote about immigrants operating restaurant and online food delivery businesses in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, all with deep roots in the food and beverage industry in their home countries: Naz Ali and his family at Caribbean Flavas in Fredericton; Mary Nkrumah, who runs Mary’s African Cuisine in downtown Halifax; and Mohamed Khirallah, the owner of Fredericton-based Rôticana Coffee.
The stories of immigrant entrepreneurs remained very much on my mind this week with the tragic events unfolding in Ukraine since the Russian invasion.
Oksana Posatska, the owner of Galbraith Florist in Saint John, moved here with her husband and daughter in 2015, a year after Russia invaded and annexed Crimea, in southern Ukraine.
“The first goal was to live in Canada for a better future for our daughter,” Posatska told Huddle in 2018 after they purchased Galbraith. “We always have been dreaming about this. My husband found work here as a painter and we came here after he immigrated. Five months after him, we came to Canada and we just fell in love with the country and the people.”
Related: Galbraith’s New Owner Oksana Posatska: Florist And Plant Whisperer
Posatska had a wealth of experience as a florist and entrepreneur before she and her husband purchased Galbraith. When she was 15, she took a job in a shop owned by a woman who would one day become her mother-in-law.
She and her husband also owned and operated a store in Ukraine, which they transferred to her mother when they moved to Canada.
Posatska got back into the flower and plant business after she arrived, first working for Cedarcrest Gardens in Saint John before they bought Galbraith, which they have owned and operated for the past three years.
She has many family members still living in Ukraine, including her mother, father and sister. She is obviously very worried about their safety and the welfare of the Ukrainian people.
“We are glued to our phones and checking them very, very often,” she told Huddle reporter Elizabeth MacLeod. “We are all Ukrainians, and we are quite devastated by everything that is happening right now.”
Earlier this week, she launched a “Flowers For Ukraine” campaign to raise funds for relief efforts. Galbraith sold a “Stand with Ukraine” bouquet for $50 and 100 percent of proceeds of sales were donated to the Canadian Red Cross Ukrainian Relief Fund.
The bouquet was composed of yellow and blue flowers (the colours of Ukraine’s national flag) such as irises, delphiniums, blue Gerber daisies, and sunflowers.
“People are calling, offering help, ordering and it’s amazing – I’m honestly speechless right now,” she said.
The campaign was wildly successful. In the first three days alone, she sold 1,100 bouquets and raised $55,000, with the help of 63 volunteers. The campaign is now closed, but she’s encouraging people to continue making donations to the Canadian Red Cross Ukrainian Relief Fund.
The spirit of generosity toward Ukraine includes Maritimers who have been victims of war themselves.
Peace By Chocolate, based in Antigonish, N.S., is donating the proceeds from the sale of its Peace Bars and the Peace Maker collection to the Red Cross’s Ukraine Humanitarian Crisis Appeal.
Tareq Hadhad and his family, the company founders and owners, came to Canada in 2015 after a civil war forced them to flee their home in Syria. Hadhad’s father, Isam, ran a chocolate company in Syria. Both their family home and factory were bombed.
“Watching the images and videos of people losing everything in a split second and fleeing their homes for their lives and the lives of their loved ones, it just brought back memories from our own experiences in the war in Syria in 2012… when the [war] destroyed our lives, stole everything from us, destroyed our house, and destroyed our chocolate factory, killed many of my family members,” Hadhad told Huddle associate editor Trevor Nichols in an interview earlier this week.
Incredibly resilient and determined people, they rebuilt their lives and family business in Canada.
“When immigrants come to Canada, they don’t come empty. Everyone has their own skills, their own talent and their own passion, their own stories and experiences,” Hadhad told me in a podcast conversation last year.
“Even though we lost everything in Syria we didn’t lose any of that…They did not kill that knowledge, that skill, that talent. This is not something you lose in a war. This is something that goes with you forever until you die.”
Podcast: Syrian Chocolate Maker Joins Ranks Of Cod-Fathers And Code-Fathers
Hadhad says it’s important that he, and all Canadians, show Ukrainians they have love and support in a time of tremendous pain and upheaval.
“I want to tell [Ukrainians] that we see you, we hear you, we know that you are there,” he said. “War can teach you many things and can probably unveil how ugly the world can get. But don’t lose hope and faith that there is goodness and kindness all around you.”
When I interviewed Hadhad last year, I was most struck by his strength and resilience, the characteristics of so many of our immigrant entrepreneurs. As Russia wages war on Ukraine, and people like Posatska worry for the safety and security of their family members back home, one quality of Hadhad’s now stands out above all others: that peace is the highest of human values.
Feedback? E-mail Mark Leger: [email protected]