Toronto to Banff

This fall we are biking over 4000km from Toronto to Banff as a way of celebrating milestones in our respective sobriety. With the help and support of our community we are raising funds for an organization that provides traditional meals and medicines, harm reduction and health supplies to unhoused Indigenous people.

Toronto Indigenous Harm Reduction (TIHR) is a Queer and Two-Spirited led initiative that has provided over 3000 meals for people living in encampments since the first COVID lockdown. TIHR provides life saving services to the frontlines after the city failed to give proper and safe shelters for people in need during a pandemic.

They are now working with Native Art Society and have locked down a space for an Indigenous-led gallery for people to sell, create, and showcase their art in a judgement-free space.

Our goal is to raise at least 10,000$ to help not only with the cost of running the gallery but also to help with their crucial day to day work providing harm reduction to the people they help.

Thanks!

For more information about the initiative please go to :

https://www.torontoindigenoushr.com

A little about me:

For generations my family has struggled with addiction. I found myself sleeping in shelters and on the streets in my early 20s, the same way my biological father does to this day. I became chemically dependent to the point of seizures and landed in the hospital for a week due to pancreatitis, the doctor said I wouldn't live to see 30. I had no high school education, no job, no future and I was thousands in debt.

Five years of sobriety and I have accomplished things I couldn't even fathom in the past.

Lucas O'Hara and Nikolai Berda have not only been my friends of more than a decade, they've served as an inspiration to me. Their hard work ethic, loyalty and love for their friends and family has served as a guide for me to become a better person. I am honored to say that I will have them with me on this ride. 

Aside from support from family and friends, I credit my sobriety to making music and learning more about my ancestral Indigenous roots in Mexico. I strongly support the idea of healing through art and de-colonization by reclamation of identity.

What TIHR is doing is crucial and I would be very grateful if I were to be able to help the cause through this journey.