This Is Omar

This is Omar. He is an awesome kid.

I met him with his family when they arrived as part of the effort to take in 25,000 Syrian refugees beginning in 2015.

Omar wanted to save up for a Nintendo Switch, so he started a lemonade stand. His mom told him about another boy about his age that she knows from Syria who needs surgery after being diagnosed with throat cancer.

Omar decided that helping someone else was more important than his Nintendo Switch, so he is using the profits from his lemonade stand to raise money for the young boy’s surgery.

He is based on the Pictou Waterfront and you should make a trip to visit him if you can!

Our community is lucky to have Omar and his family, who also run a small restaurant on the waterfront.

Their spirit of kindness, generosity, and entrepreneurialism has come to define my experience with many of the newcomer families I’ve met since I was first elected.

Though our original commitment was to bring in 25,000 Syrian refugees, communities across Canada stepped up beyond any reasonable expectation, and privately sponsored so many families that we nearly doubled the target.

Thanks to people like Omar, our country and our communities are better off for it.