How can we keep apologies for past wrongs alive so they are remembered – and not repeated – today?

For this project, we took a look into the past injustices of our nation. We started by listening to a short podcast about the history of halloween. I can’t really remember why. We started the project on halloween, but I doubt there is much connection between halloween and the history of racism to Canada. 

We were given 3 options for an event we could do our project on: the Chinese head tax,  the Japanese internment, and the Komogata Maru. I was assigned to research the one I knew the least about, the Komogata Maru.

Before this project began, I had not a single modicum of knowledge regarding the Komogata Maru. If you, dear reader, are like me, you can learn about the Komogata Maru here. Now that we all know what it is, We started this project by finding an unbiased, truthful story of our event. I scoured the internet through archives collecting first-hand sources on the Komogata Maru including newspaper articles, letters, photos, and more. After collecting our sources, we assembled a keynote timeline of events using the sources. My keynote timeline is my proudest achievement in all of PLP, so I have included it in this post. 

Komagata Maru Timeline

At this time, we were explained the connection we would make in this project. For our project, we would compare themes of racism in Canada to the movie Avatar. I had never seen Avatar before this project, and many other PLP students hadn’t either, so the PLP teachers organized a viewing of the film. Unlike the movie, I will keep my review short: I fell asleep halfway through and when I woke up, I felt like I didn’t miss anything. 6.5/10.

Finally, after we had used ethical judgement to create a story about our events, we began to make a memorial in groups of three. My two partners were Claire and Julian. We began to plan a design for a memorial. Julian was away so me and Claire made the executive decision to make our memorial on the Komogata Maru and not include Julian’s topic. We also decided we wanted to do a design similar to the Memorial to the Victims of Communism in Prague. However, our ideas for materials were to complex so we decided to make a painting instead.

Our memorial connects to the Komogata Maru in a few ways. The ship moves from the dark, impoverished land of India to the bright red Canada. However, as the ship moves closer to the red side of the paper, it begins to break down, representing how racism affected the passengers on the ship.

At this point, we went on our week long retreat to Loon Lake. Click here to read my Loon Lake blog post.

After we got back from Loon Lake, we began to build our memorials. We made our painting, added a drawing over it, and build a frame. When I say we, I mean mostly Claire. After about a week of building, our memorial was complete. We presented our memorials at the annual PLP exhibition. This year, the grade 8s and 9s did most of the planning. The 8s and 9s project required them to break apart into themed rooms. My group was placed in the library, AKA, The Racism Room. Specifically, the back of the library, which was the “coloured room.” I found it kind of ironic how I think I was the only person of colour in the coloured room. During the exhibition, me and Claire explained our memorial, while Julian helped out with other parts of our room. Overall, the exhibition went pretty well, except I got really thirsty and my feet hurt pretty soon. One interesting thing I noticed was how almost everyone we explained our project to had no idea what the Komogata Maru was.

To congratulate us on a successful exhibition (and if you paid $20), the PLP teachers took us to the premiere of Avatar 2: The Way Of Water. This movie was excellent. It was so much better than the first one. The story was much better, even though this movie is an hour longer. This is also probably the best movie I have ever seen in terms of visuals. 9/10.

To answer the 1st driving question, there are a few ways to make a good apology. One of the most important is sincerity. At the beginning of this project, we watched a few examples of celebrities and other important people apologizing for various things. The key factor in determining if the apology was good or not was sincerity. Other than that, other ways to make a good apology include acknowledging your mistake, being truthful, and planning to make a difference.

The second driving question is “What does James Cameron’s world of Avatar reveal about our own society?” I think that above all, the first film shows the consequences of greed. We can see the greed of the US military and their ruthless path of destruction towards achieving unobtanium.