Vaughan Mills, Canada's First Enclosed Regional Shopping Centre Opens
Located 10 minutes drive away from Goan Overseas Association property at Highway 400 & Kirby Road
Vaughan Mills, a 1.2 million square foot, single-level, fully enclosed retail and entertainment destination, will ultimately feature 200 specialty stores, restaurants, and entertainment venues. It will be one of the largest centers in the region and a destination for millions of Canadians and
Americans.
Located on the east side of Highway 400 at Rutherford Road, Vaughan Mills features a "racetrack" layout to ensure easy flow to retailers. The center will feature six unique architecture mall neighbourhoods, six themed transition courts and a 1,000-seat food court. The mall will contain manufacturers' outlets, specialty retail stores, department store outlets, off-price retailers, category dominant stores and entertainment retailers.
Vaughan Mills boasts Canada's first Hudson's Bay Company's designer Depot, Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World(R), NASCAR(R) SpeedPark(TM), Lucky Strike Lanes, Burlington Coat Factory(R), Town Shoes Outlet, Tommy Bahama Outlet, and Benetton Outlet. With an emphasis on value retail, Vaughan Mills also features many of the fashion names Canadian consumers already know and love. Among them, the largest Tommy Hilfiger Outlet in the world.
Other major anchor stores include H&M(R) (Hennes & Mauritz), La Senza/La Senza Girl, Linens 'N Things(R), Urban Behavior, The Children's Place Outlet(R), and Winners and Home Sense.

"Unlike any other shopping centre in the region, Vaughan Mills is a destination for the entire family, catering to all ages and tastes," said Carol Hyams, general manager, Vaughan Mills. "Only at Vaughan Mills will you be able to find fabulous designer deals at brand name outlet stores, drive a go cart and enjoy a great meal all under one roof."
Vaughan Mills is located at 1 Bass Pro Mills Drive in Vaughan, Ontario, 32 kilometres (20 miles) north of downtown Toronto, at the corner of Highway 400 and Rutherford Road.

The Goan Overseas Association 10 acre property is located 8 Km north of Vaughan Mills at the SW intersection of Highway 400 and Kirby Road. The City of Vaughan is Canada's fastest growing urban area with more than 42 housing projects underway.
See aerial photo at:
http://www.ivanhoecambridge.com/Properties/vaughan_mills/documents/aerial_shot_june_03.jpg

U.S. to start fingerprinting Canadian immigrants
Toronto Star - Nov 4, 2004
CANADIAN PRESS
New rules requiring landed immigrants of Canada to be fingerprinted and photographed before entering the United States begin to kick in this month.
The measures also apply to those who need visas to travel south of the border for business purposes or because they are engaged to an American. "In the end . . . we want to know who's knocking on our door," Robert Mocny of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said at a news conference today. "When you know who the individual is, you're more than happy to welcome them into your home."
The fingerprints and photos will be filed into a database so officials can check people against terrorist watch lists and a national crime database. The new regulations are part of the anti-terrorism program called U.S.-VISIT that started checking all foreign visitors arriving by air and sea in January.
Fingerprinting and photographing will begin at the Blue Water Bridge at Sarnia beginning Nov. 15 and be implemented at 17 other Canadian border crossings by year's end.
Canadian citizens will be exempt from the new measures.

Toronto organizes '50S - '60S BLAST FROM THE PAST Excerpts of e-mail by Tim de Mello on goanet@GoaNet.org
	(See pics at: http://photos.yahoo.com/timdemello) For a second year, The G.O.A. Toronto organized a '50S - '60S BLAST FROM THE PAST DANCE on Saturday, October 30th, 2004. The event was hosted at The Forum Banquet Hall in Rexdale. The dance attracted over 250 people made up of a cross-section of Toronto's multicultural mosaic although more than half comprised Goans. This was a demonstration of how popular the music from that era still is across racial groups.
Auggie Pereira - Pic by Tim de Mello
The band alone comprised of two Goans (rhythm and lead guitarists), an Italian/Canadian (singer and rhythm guitarist), an Englishman (drummer) and an American (bass guitarist). The ambiance of the hall was reminiscent of that era, with life size Elvis cut-outs and the walls decorated with LP sleeves of that time. People attending were also dressed in attire from that era - men in jeans and tee shirts and women in flared skirts and bobby socks. The dance committee worked hard to provide an assortment of entertainment through the evening. The main featured band was Les Ombres. It specializes in music of the 50s & 60s. Guest appearances on stage included Auggie Pereira (ex Tanga and ex Auggie and the Blue Notes). He entertained us with his excellent saxophone playing like oldies Sail along Silvery Moon, Morgen, etc. One dancer commented that his music was best appreciated with the lights turned low - and so they were - very low. Terry Pinto (ex- Nairobi) also took to the stage and entertained us with some excellent keyboard numbers. He was introduced as our Goan Stevie Wonder and he did not disappoint. One other person - Jimmy van Rosie (ex Nairobi) together with his drummer - entertained us to a whole selection of popular Swahili hits from the same era. One guest appearance that needs special mention is our own Miss Tammy Pereira. She has an excellent voice and sang some hits made famous by stars like Norah Jones, Linda Rondstat, Connie Francis, etc. A chorus of admirers shouted that she would make a solid competitor for the Canadian Idol. At 10:00pm there was floorshow by The Habibis. This was a group of three scantily clad women who gave us a riveting performance of belly dancing. In their conclusion they surprised us all by suddenly lurching into the seated spectators and throwing their veils around the necks of three men and pulling them on to floor and challenging them to accompany them in a racy display on the floor. I think the most surprised of the three was Osbert Remedios - but he put on a creditable performance. There was also a Limbo Dance competition. Many brave souls participated but only one - Clive Ferrao - was selected as the winner. Les Ombres concluded its performance with its singer Ralph Privitera singing three songs in "different languages". The first was Marina, sung in his native Italian. This was followed by Mollbailo Dou sung in Konkani, if you don't mind! He received a rousing ovation for this. He then followed with Claudia and the crowd was ecstatic. One of the members of our table immediately christened him Caetan Santan and granted him honorary citizenship of Sawantwadi.

More immigrants needed for workforce: "We will have to attract many more immigrants, and the country and the government already knows that," says Canada's Labour Minister
FROM CANADIAN PRESS
Oct. 29, 2004. 07:54 PM
OTTAWA — Canada's labour minister says the country may need to consider doubling immigration levels to help fill enormous gaps in its skilled workforce.
And even that won't be enough to cope with the shortage of trained workers and lagging productivity, Joe Fontana said today.
As part of a broader review of workforce issues, Canadians must look at dramatically boosting the number of workers it brings in from overseas as well improving skills training for underutilized employees, Fontana told The Canadian Press.
"We will have to attract many more immigrants, and the country and the government already knows that," said Fontana, minister of labour and social housing.
"But even if we move to 300,000 to 400,000 to 500,000 (new) people — that ain't going to do it."
Workers already on the job must upgrade their skills and employers have to make better use of the existing pool of employees, many of whom are underutilized, he said.
"There are a whole bunch of under-employed people and therefore, we have to do an awful lot of training of the existing people-force that we have to make sure that they are in fact going to be able to do the jobs."
Canada would essentially have to double its current immigration levels if it were to reach that level of 500,000 new workers.
Canada admitted just over 221,000 permanent residents this year, Immigration and Citizenship Minister Judy Sgro said in her annual report to Parliament this week.
Next year's target is 220,000 to 245,000 new permanent residents.
But many newcomers still struggle to get their professional credentials recognized in Canada, Sgro noted.
"We recognize that it is vital that Canada continues to be a destination of choice for immigrants," she said.
"To achieve this, we must remove any barriers."
Sgro couldn't be reached for further comment on Fontana's suggestions Friday.
But critics were quick to respond.
Conservative Immigration critic Diane Ablonczy said the Liberal government must make better use of the skilled workers already here, before it tries to meet and beat immigration targets.
That means finding much more efficient ways of formally accepting professional certification and education from other countries. Otherwise a huge pool of skilled workers will continue to be wasted, Ablonczy said in an interview from her riding in Calgary.
She noted that far too many skilled workers — from medical doctors to university professors — are coming to Canada to find the only jobs they can get are stocking vending machines or delivering pizza.
"Do we really need any more PhDs driving cab in Toronto?"
The Immigration department has been working on ways improve integration of new workers, including better language training and recognizing foreign credentials.
Business and labour groups are calling on Ottawa to not only bring in more skilled workers but move to faster on accepting their credentials so they can apply their skills here.
Ottawa must also help employers boost overall staff productivity, said Fontana.
"Immigration isn't going to do it all. . .We've got under-employment and we need to fix that."
Lifelong learning and retraining and more flexible workplaces would help, he said.
"You make (workplaces) family-friendly places, you make them learning workplaces, you introduce hours that make sense, (introduce) flexibility," said Fontana.
"People — if they're too stressed, if they're too tired — let's face it, are not working to capacity."