Thread by @rupasubramanya

I have now returned from the barren crime ridden wasteland of Ottawa and once again encountered assorted mercenaries, misogynists, anarchists, racists and white supremacists. An update follows. For the faint of heart, you have been warned. Here goes. #FreedomConvoy

Meet Rosina Kharal, Comp Sci lecturer at the University of Waterloo who came with her two kids to the protest. She gave a fiery speech to rousing applause. For her the trucker convoy brings hope. She's not been able to teach as she's unavvxed. She’s Muslim and raised in Canada.

Unfortunately I only managed to get a short snippet of Rosina’s speech. At this point, it was either keeping my fingers warm or have them amputated. It was cold out there. 🥶🥶🥶🥶 She really is a great orator.

Meet Mohammed, Omar, 21 and originally Egyptian, and Ali, 18 (second gen from Iraq). They want to tell the world they're not white supremacists and invite you to come down and see for yourself. They say we know how media/govt propaganda works from the failed Arab Spring in Egypt.

Mohammed, Omar, and Ali are all Ottawa residents and two of them go to Carleton University.

Meet Deep and Bindu, Ottawa residents originally from New Delhi, India. They were sharing delicious hot samosas with anyone who wanted one. They say they're there to fight for their freedom and show support for the truckers.

Btw, Omar pictured above was carrying a video camera around because he wanted to capture the ethnic diversity at the protests to show his friends that what they were reading in the mainstream media that these are white supremacists is garbage.

Group photo with Rosina started with her two sons and two other people and the group just kept growing. #FreedomConvoy