In December, my Spanish students made 58 handmade cards/letters en español to express their gratitude for temporary migrant agricultural workers in our province of Canada, where there are over 17,000 migrant workers that come anually from countries including Mexico and Guatemala. Our provincial and national agricultural and food economy rely heavily on these hard-working labourers who leave their families, friends and homelands far away to come work on temporary visas, which means they are tied to work for specific companies (regardless of whether the working conditions are ideal, or not…)

I connected with San’s Latin Market in Kelowna, which obtained a list of names of migrant workers and then distributed the cards to them after I mailed my students’ creations. Here is the CBC article that led me to contacting the store. The staff were very helpful throughout this collaboration.

Sentences/expressions included in the cards/letters included:

Gracias por su trabajo duro (Thank you for your hard work), ¿La gente canadiense es amable con Usted? Espero que sí (Are Canadian people kind to you? I hope so), ¿Cuál es su fruta favorita? (What is your favourite fruit?) and ¿Usted habla un idioma indígena? (Do you speak an Indigenous language?).

The cards also wished workers Feliz Navidad (Merry Christmas), Felices Fiestas (Happy holidays) and Que pase tiempo de calidad con su familia (May you spend quality time with your family).

Here are a couple of pictures that San’s Latin Market forwarded to me after the card distribution:

May you have a Happy New Year 2026.