Hundreds in Toronto ride the ‘Underground Freedom Train’ to mark Emancipation Day

Toronto: Apna Punjab Media: Hundreds of people boarded TTC subway cars late Monday for the annual Underground Freedom Train Ride, marking the start of Emancipation Day celebrations in Toronto.
Those taking part rode from Union to Downsview station as part of the symbolic yearly journey celebrating the Slavery Abolition Act 1833, which initiated the process of ending legal human bondage in the former British Empire.
The ride is meant in part as a nod to the legacy of American abolitionist and activist Harriet Tubman and the famed Underground Railroad, a network of secret routes used by enslaved African Americans to escape to freedom in some northern states and Canada after slavery was abolished here.
We are in an imaginative time in an imaginative world, and we have the subway. And the subway, the last time I checked, runs underground. So we could use the power of that word to speak to a historical moment,” said Ita Sadu, who co-founded the event 10 years ago.
As people boarded the train, a choir sang traditional freedom songs, while others danced to the sound of drums. This was the first year Oral Deen Brown participated in the ride. She brought her daughter along as well.
The ride also has a connection to the upcoming Toronto Caribbean Carnival (formerly known as Caribana), Sadu said, itself a celebration of emancipation. Illuminating that connection was a key part of how the freedom ride was conceived a decade ago.