David Smith (Bean, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This past weekend, Canberra held its annual multicultural festival, one of the highlights of the calendar every year. And—while it's rare you'll find me praising events held on the wrong side of the lake!—the festival brings together the multicultural community from right across Canberra and Australia and showcases our community in its best, with its great diversity and its great strengths. From adobo to za'atar and momos to gyoza, a plethora of cuisine and culture was on display. It was great to be able to meet with my friends across a number of communities, including the Bhutanese, Thai, Tibetan, Nepalese, Latin American and Greek communities. I also joined on stage with Nim Osborne, a great leader of our multicultural community, to demonstrate not only my Thai cooking skills—or lack thereof—but more importantly to help showcase a strong example of culture, cuisine and community working hand in hand to unite us. Diversity is one of the great strengths of this nation, and being able to join in this celebration at the centre of our city is always a joy. And may this joy continue for all across the Bean electorate and right across Australia that celebrate the Lunar New Year.