We Are Not Strangers

The 1907 Bellingham Riots were a coordinated attack by white workers on South Asian immigrants, most of them Sikh, who had settled in Whatcom County, Washington. Hundreds of men were driven from their homes in a single night. The Sikh community came back. Satpal Singh Sidhu, a Sikh community member in Bellingham, is the film's central figure — a man who has spent years ensuring that the history of both the riots and the community's persistence is known and acknowledged.

In 2007, on the 100th anniversary of the riots, the city of Bellingham issued a formal declaration of healing and reconciliation. By then, Sikh farmers had grown to represent roughly 50% of berry farming in Whatcom County. We're Not Strangers is a film about what it means to stay in a place that tried to expel you, to build something real and lasting there, and to eventually be in a position where the community that once wanted you gone is formally acknowledging what it did. It's a film about the long arc of belonging.