Students of Riverside’s Multicultural Leadership class took part in the Christmas Tree Festival on December 2. The Multicultural Leadership tree is located inside the Heritage Outlet museum.
The Multicultural Leadership class has been taking part in the Christmas Tree Festival for the past three years. “It started as an invitation to schools and businesses,” said Ms. Catherine Yamamoto, the teacher of the Multicultural Leadership class. “I thought that it would be a nice way to get involved in the community, instead of having events in our school. It was a way to introduce Riverside’s Multicultural Leadership to the community.” 
Every year, the Multicultural Leadership class get a Christmas tree that they have to create decorations for that represent the group. “Since we are a multicultural group, we have created tree decorations with various motifs and scenes that represent our different cultures,” said Yamamoto. Some of the decorations include an Eiffel Tower to represent France, an Acropolis to represent Greece, the Colosseum to represent Italy, windmills to represent the Netherlands, pyramids to repr
esent Egypt, and a shrine to represent Japan.
Some of the Multicultural Leaderships students have decorated Christmas trees back in their home countries, but were surprised at the multicultural twist that they were going for. “It seems like a fun idea,” said Allyne Rodrigues, a grade 12 student from Brazil. “I wanted to help out with the tree this year since I didn’t get to do it last year.”
The Christmas Tree Festival is one of the many Christmas activities that Port Coquitlam will be providing throughout December. Come out and enjoy all of the Christmas trees that many businesses and schools have created!
