Indian Summer festival opening attracts a large crowd

by Charlie Smith on July 4th, 2014 at 9:41 AM

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Last night, people were lined up around the block in Chinatown to attend the grand opening of the Indian Summer festival, which continues in Vancouver until July 12.

It featured a culinary tour of South Asia curated by chef Vikram Vij at the Dr. Sun-Yat Sen Classical Chinese Garden.

It drew university presidents (Andrew Petter and Arvind Gupta), former and current politicians (Joyce Murray, Sam Sullivan, and Wally Oppal), writers, and even some community activists, such as Imtiaz Popat and David Wong.

Tonight, the festival programming continues with three events.

• Poets Priscila Uppal and Renée Saklikar will give a presentation called One Life Isn't Enough at 6 p.m. at the Goldcorp Centre for the Arts at SFU Woodward's.

• Indian Summer in the Park features a free showing of Bend It Like Beckham in Victory Square at 7 p.m.

• I'll moderate a discussion with writer Rana Dasgupta on the evolution of capitalism in an emerging megalopolis. He's the author of Capital: A Portrait of Delhi in the Twenty-First Century. It takes place at 8 p.m. at the Goldcorp Centre for the Arts at SFU Woodward's.

Below, you can see some of the people who attended the opening last night.