British Columbia·Photos

Frybread giveaway in Vancouver's DTES provides more than food

The Indigenous Action Movement is bringing a little bit of home to the homeless in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside for the ninth year.

Annual frybread giveaway goes ahead despite less than half the usual number of volunteers

The Indigenous Action Movement is bringing a little bit of home to the homeless in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside for the ninth year.

"A lot of them can't go home, whether it's expense or any other issue that they can't spend New Year's with their families, so this is bringing a little bit of home to the Downtown Eastside," said organizer Kathie Norris.

Norris says, this year, the event lacked volunteers with only 30 of the usual 100 showing up. She spent five hours with those who were there to help to prepare all the bread, enough to feed 1,000 people.

The ingredients were donated along with other foods and free toiletry items for women.

Aboriginal advocates started the Indigenous Action Movement after the death of Frank Paul, who died of hypothermia after police left him in an alley in Vancouver in 1998, according to a public inquiry into his death.