{"id":8112,"date":"2014-12-22T12:12:59","date_gmt":"2014-12-22T12:12:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tat.reddaisytrading.co.uk\/index.php\/2014\/12\/22\/city-of-love\/"},"modified":"2014-12-22T12:12:59","modified_gmt":"2014-12-22T12:12:59","slug":"city-of-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/2014\/12\/22\/city-of-love\/","title":{"rendered":"City of Love"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Christmas Carols Party on a Historical Day at Pakistan Muslim Centre<\/h3>\n

\"\"\/

\nThe Pakistan Muslim Centre\u2019s historical \u2018Christmas Carols Party\u2019 left almost all of the 600 plus strong guest list with a rather joyful taste in their mouths. <\/p>\n


\nWhilst \u2018 Sheffield is a city of love\u2019 appeared to be the most favourite thought occupying most minds, there was a general consensus that something all-embracing had been achieved.<\/p>\n


\n\u00a0A diverse range of guests, included\u00a0 the Lord Lieutenant David Moody, the High Sheriff JC Bramah, Member of Parliament Clive Betts. Police and Crime Commissioner. Dr Alan Billings. City Chief Executive, John Mothersole, local priests, and representatives from the Sikh, Hindu, Bangladeshi, Roma, Slovakian communities attended a memorable Christmas party.<\/p>\n


\nAmongst the many appreciative hands applauding the children singing Christmas Carols were those of the chief guest, the honourable Lord-Lieutenant, David Moody who said, \u201cThe Atmosphere here is remarkable, it\u2019s interesting to what extent PMC are taking the Slovak Roma community under their wing, recognising their problems on arrival and doing so much to help them. It\u2019s then intriguing to see these cultural cross currents, we have just heard the Roma community sing Silent Night in their language but in the tune we use all across Europe. It\u2019s quite wonderful\u201d.<\/p>\n


\nThe Pakistan Muslim Centre\u2019s Christmas Carols Party was organised by the Operation Manager Mukhtar Tufail and Chairman Muhammed Ali. It is part of their ongoing commitment towards empowering the local Roma Slovak community and bolstering healthier community ties.<\/p>\n


\nOver the past six months the centre has played a pivotal role in creating role models from within that community and during the historical Christmas Carols Party, the Pakistan Muslim Centre launched The European Roma Community Forum (ERCF).

\nThe European Roma Community Forum is a forum made up of individuals from the Roma Slovakian community who take their civic responsibilities very seriously and want to bandage the badly bruised community cohesion concept.<\/p>\n


\nCommenting on the success Chairman Muhammed Ali said, \u201cThis has not been done before, we needed to dispel the myths people hold about migrants, but also about Muslims. I was very keen to lead on this and also promote the cardinal principle of life, namely that everybody has a right to practice their religious beliefs.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nOne of the ingenious empowerment strategies implemented by PMC was to improve communication skills amongst the newly arriving Eastern European Community by teaching them Christmas Carols in the English language.<\/p>\n


\nA mesmerising performance on the day saw a group of extremely passionate Slovakian children performing Away in a Manger, Silent Night, and Jingle Bells. There was also live dancing, local singers, and presentations on how Christmas is celebrated in the Eastern Europe. The evening was concluded with various foods being offered by Santa Claus and his Elves. As the crowds indulged into traditional Slovakian Goulash, Asian Chicken Biryani and English Mince Pies, local singers performed some all-time Christmas classics such as Shaken Stevens \u2018 Snow is Falling\u2019 and Wham\u2019s \u2018Last Christmas \u2018. <\/p>\n


\nThe organiser and Operations Manager Mukhtar Tufail stated, \u201cWhen you see people for whom English is not their first language come on the stage and sing \u2018Away In A Manger\u2019 in English with such passion and devotion, then there really isn\u2019t much left to say, This event has taught us that the Christmas festivities can truly bind us all together. The myths that Christmas offends some\u00a0communities have certainly been dispelled here today. This is a proud day for Sheffield, a memorable day in the history of multi-faith community cohesion.\u201d<\/p>\n


\nThe event concluded with the chief guests joining Santa Claus and his Elves with the whole audience singing Jingle Bells. There was a real sense of love and togetherness with one member of the audience commenting, \u201cMuslims teaching Christians Christmas Carols! Feeling the love, Sheffield\u00a0truly is the city of love\u201d. \n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Christmas Carols Party on a Historical Day at Pakistan Muslim Centre The Pakistan Muslim Centre\u2019s historical \u2018Christmas Carols Party\u2019 left almost all of the 600 plus strong guest list with a rather joyful taste in their mouths. Whilst \u2018 Sheffield is a city of love\u2019 appeared to be the most favourite thought occupying […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8112\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theasiantoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}