Yesterday, I wrote about the ongoing protests by Canadian-Tamils on Parliament Hill and the symbols attached. Over 10,000 activists arrived on Parliament Hill today to listen to speeches, drumming and chanting. Most noticeably different from days past, the flag of the Tamil Tigers and the Canadian flag were gone (replaced by black flags). The speakers on stage seemed unhappy about it. One said, "giving up their rights to carry this flag of our nation is a violation of the Charter".

The crowd was extremely well behaved, organized and effective at picking up litter and feeding the thousands of people.

The leader of the New Democrats, Jack Layton, appeared for a quick two-minute speech (only captured by a freelance Global TV camera) and the Liberal leader had a meeting with what one senior Liberal told me were "safe-Tamils, you know, people whose backgrounds we knew." Question Period in the House also featured questions from two Liberal MPs. [Will update when the Hansard is ready.]

I recorded this intro from the crowd:

Here are videos to give you a sense of the size of the crowd today:

And finally, here is one of the younger speakers introducing the former-hunger strikers:

Let me know what you think of this foray into "citizen journalism". I'm planning more coverage like this; mixing and mashing up video, audio and words to add my perceptive to the changing media around us.

(Full disclosure; as most regular readers will know New Democrat leader Jack Layton was my boss for the past number of years.)