TRI-CITY PICNIC

The early 80’s saw the birth of the well-known and looked-forward-to summer event called TRI-CITY Picnic.  As the name implies. three cities – Montreal (FCAWI), Ottawa & Kingston meet every summer for a picnic and a friendly sports competition of men’s softball and men’s and women’s volleyball. A revolving trophy is brought home by the winner. The children are not left out as they are treated to some fun parlor games and win prizes.  Organized by FCAWI & Ottawa, the former hosted the first picnic  held at Woodland Park in Long Sault, Ontario.  Kingston joined a year after and completed the TRI-CITY name.  As the picnic is held on a Sunday, a Mass is celebrated by a Filipino priest at the Park.

In 2008, a leader of the Montreal Federation of Filipino Associations in Montreal attended that year’s Tri-City and finding it so much fun, requested her association  be included in hosting the event which Ottawa, FCAWI & Kingston  agreed.  From then on, though it’s still referred to as TRI-CITY, in reality there are four participating Associations taking turns in hosting this annual summer event – Ottawa, Kingston, FCAWI & Montreal (a representative of a downtown Montreal Association).

In 2010, an added feature, the crowning of a Miss TRI-CITY was introduced as a form of fundraising to cover expenses such as sports equipments, trophies, music, parlor games and food allowance for all cities. 

In what has become an unbroken tradition, TRI-CITY Picnic continues to be held every summer and is now permanently set on the second Sunday in July at Woodland Park in Long Sault, Ontario.  It remains to be quite a formidable gathering of Filipinos young and old.