I just learned that California upheld the Proposition 8 decision of November, 2008. As a scholar of environmental studies, I find it extremely ironic that California’s ultra progressive approach to environmental policy is NOT reflected in its LGBT and overall human rights approach.
Extremely ironic, indeed. When other states started copying California’s increasingly stringent air quality standards, the race to catch up was called in environmental policy texts, the “California effect” (a race to the top, the opposite from a race to the bottom). California became the highest common denominator for good air quality standards.
It’s only thus ironic that now California stands in shame as compared to other states like Iowa, where gay marriage has been approved. Or Canada, where the marriage of homosexuals has been legal for a long while now. Ah, the ironies…
Given that I have a PhD in Environmental Studies, anything to do with water, marine ecosystems and research always catches my attention. Recently, Living Oceans (a local environmental NGO) contacted me to let me know about their Finding Coral expedition.
From their website:
Living Oceans Society is excited to announce the launch of our Finding Coral Expedition on June 8th. The expedition will use two mini subs to explore deep sea corals in Hecate Strait and the Queen Charlotte Basin. The subs will be piloted by Jennifer Lash, our Executive Director, and a blue ribbon science team who will dive to depths of up to 500 meters to gather evidence of corals, associated species, and damage from human impacts.
To find out more about this expedition, check out their website. And to find out more about Living Oceans, you can go over their website. Living Oceans
Living Oceans Society is Canada’s largest organization focusing exclusively on marine conservation issues. We are based in Sointula, a small fishing village on the Central Coast of British Columbia.
May has been a really hectic month for me, and June promises to be an even hectier one. But I want to keep the continuity of the Vancouver Bloggers Meetup and thus I decided to go ahead and hold the May one on Thursday, May 28th, 2009 at 6:00pm at the St. Regis Grill & Bar (the downstairs room is separate from the actual restaurant). For those of you who might have gone there for dinner or a pint before, it used to be called Anducci’s and it’s located almost at the corner of Granville and Dunsmuir (directly outside the Granville Skytrain Station). So, I fulfilled three requests I often get – accessibility in terms of transit and transportation, access to food/drinks and downtown location.
Previous meetups have had small speeches and lots of conversation. This time I took a chance and (responding to the feedback of many participants in the Vancouver Bloggers Meetup group) I organized a panel with Lorraine Murphy, Shane Gibson and myself as speakers, and Colleen Coplick as the moderator/fourth panelist. I think the model of the fourth panelist has had a lot of success lately. When Jay Piddy, Shane and myself participated in the panel for Amuse Consulting, Tris Hussey contributed greatly to the conversation as the liveblogger and fourth panelist.
I really look forward to this VBM, as the months of June, July and August are going to be a bit crazy for me. In June, Tanya and Monica, Shane, Steve Jagger and myself are joining forces for the Meetup of Meetups, Summer Edition and the remainder of the summer will probably be light on meetups.
I’ll start by saying that I’m not a Trekkie. JT is, though, and I am SO glad that I got to see Star Trek (the JJ Abrams opera magistra) with him. I have watched some of the various Star Trek films and TV series. And since I’m not a trekkie, I don’t feel comfortable asking whether the film’s reinvention does fulfill the requirements of traditional Star Trek canon. But if you want my opinion, this was a superbly executed film. Star Trek made me feel as though the impossible is possible (corny as that may sound).
The chemistry amongst all the movie stars is palpable. James Kirk (Chris Pine) and Spock (Zachary Quinto) are so perfect in their performances it’s almost magical. I hope not to sound trite or too gushy, but really each character (Scotty, Uhura, Zulu, McCoy) were instrumental in the development of the movie. While relatively centered around Kirk and Spock, Abrams does a superb job of giving ample space for other characters to develop their own storylines.
Of course, there were moments where my whole skin got goosebumps. For example, when Spock goes down to Vulcan to try to save his parents and he commands to be beamed, I remembered my childhood watching some of the Star Trek episodes… “ENERGIZE”. Overall, my experience with Star Trek was fantastic, and I would definitely watch it again.
If you have seen Star Trek, what did you think of it? And if you haven’t yet watched it, do you plan to? Are you a Trekker (or a Trekkie)?
If you’ve been reading my blog for long enough, you’ll know that I’m a big supporter of small business, eclectic shops and in general anything that has to do with Mount Pleasant and the Main Street area of Vancouver. I live here, and I’m blessed because I get quick access to anything I may possibly need, or within a very quick bus ride. Anyhow, in my previous explorations of Mount Pleasant I had come across The Regional Assembly of Text, but had never remembered to write about it.
I was recently reminded of this cute store, founded in 2005 by Brandy Fedoruk and Rebecca Ann Dolen because I walked by a couple of days ago. The first time I visited was with my friend AF. We both thrive in writing letters the old-fashioned way. I think I’m a natural-born writer, despite the fact that when I was little I never felt competent to write stories. I never thought of myself as a storyteller. At least, not until now that I’ve been blogging for over three years.
In my quest to find more about the Regional Assembly of Text I found this post by Sophie Munn who mentioned she’d like a store like this in her region (I think she lives in Brisbane). One of MANY really cool features of this cute little store is the Letter Writing Club. There is no cost and everyone is welcome. From their paper advertisement:
We provide paper, envelopes, typewriters, tea, cookies & encouragement
The Letter Writing Club takes place every first Thursday of the month at 7:00pm. I seriously hope to attend the next one. If you want to find out more about the Regional Assembly of Text, please check their website or drop by (it’s located near 24th Avenue and Main Street).
This week has been filled with nostalgia. I’ve been cleaning up my apartment and sorting out papers, business cards, etc. Every time I do this, I remember the time when I was nearing the completion of my MBA/MEng degree. A handwritten letter from my Mom (yes, there was e-mail back then but my parents have managed to maintain the long lost art of writing letters, as have I) asked me the question “why don’t you go straight for your PhD?” At the time, Mom was referring to issues of funding (supporting Masters’ degrees in Business Administration or Technology Management was not a priority in national research councils’ budgets). But I could recognize why I didn’t want to go straight into a doctoral program: I wasn’t sure if I could ask the right questions. I knew that I loved doing research, but I didn’t know if I had enough work experience to move forward in that direction, one that I had never explored.
Which brings me to the second installment of my series on whether it was worth it for me to do a PhD. This post briefly explores the issue of asking interesting questions. As a disclaimer, it’s not my intention to provide guidance to anyone who wants to undertake doctoral research. In many ways (as many of my posts are) it is just a reminder of why is it that I put myself through. Doing a PhD is NOT a walk in the park (I have other 3 PhD-holders in my family in addition to myself so I can attest to the fact).
When I was beginning to work with my former PhD advisor, he suggested that I look at a problem first, looked at what the data was telling me (yes, storytelling!) and then apply various techniques to analyze the data and discern which theoretical frameworks would be valuable. Lucky for me, my advisor’s approach is very much like mine. I’ve never been one for using just ONE theoretical framework. I like integrating knowledge and insights from various realms to inform my research. I’ve borrowed concepts from anthropology, sociology, economics, geography, planning and political sciences in most of my research work.
So, in answering the question – was it worth doing a PhD? The answer again is yes, as my PhD training was rigorous and led me to dig deeper into the ways in which I had been using theoretical and analytical frameworks to examine problems. Doing a PhD honed my research skills and gave me additional tools to analyze problems. But more importantly, it gave me the opportunity to ask the right questions. I’m no longer interested in water per se. I’m interested in how we can make water more accessible to people who otherwise would not have access. I’m interested in examining issues of water poverty that place the debate right at the intersection of social justice, equity and water management. I’m interested in many other questions, but more importantly, I believe that now I’m much better at asking (and more interest in) the right (and more importantly, interesting) questions.
The past couple of days in Vancouver have been absolutely glorious. Today (Saturday May 23rd, 2009) is not an exception. My apartment (while still a ground-level suite) is filled with sunlight, and while many people think I should be out and about hanging out with friends, I’m delighted to be re-learning the phrase “puttering around”. I’m cleaning my apartment, working on applications as well as a journal article in cluster theory. I’m also folding laundry, doing dishes and will probably try to squeeze a walk out (possibly to do some grocery shoping).
So, what are YOU doing today with this glorious day in Vancouver (or if you’re not in Vancouver, with your day overall)?
When I first started blogging, I had rarely thought about the future of journalism and newspapers. I blogged for fun, to keep my friends up to date with what I was doing. In the past year and a half, I’ve attended a number of events with media accreditation and I’ve also befriended numerous journalists from the Vancouver Sun, the Georgia Straight, the CBC, etc. I have also been invited to participate in think-tank-like roundtable discussions (such as the New Media Round Table) to provide my academic viewpoint.
In the past few months, I have been thinking more about the evolution of journalism, the challenges facing newspapers and the future of media itself. At the NMRT I mentioned that my view of mainstream media was that it was not declining or dying but it was evolving (a point that Kirk LaPointe reinforced a few weeks later in a very good editorial for the Vancouver Sun).
At NMRT I also asked around for a summary of the challenges facing journalism and newspapers. Mostly, declining advertising revenue was indicated as the main factor. But recently, I came across Todd Gitlin’s excellent piece (Gitlin is a sociologist and the chair of the communications program at Columbia University). Gitlin mentions the 5 wolves that have arrived to the door of American journalism:
Four wolves have arrived at the door of American journalism simultaneously while a fifth has already been lurking for some time. One is the precipitous decline in the circulation of newspapers. The second is the decline in advertising revenue, which, combined with the first, has badly damaged the profitability of newspapers. The third, contributing to the first, is the diffusion of attention. The fourth is the more elusive crisis of authority. The fifth, a perennial – so much so as to be perhaps a condition more than a crisis – is journalism’s inability or unwillingness to penetrate the veil of obfuscation behind which power conducts its risky business.
A large portion of my research agenda (particularly the work I did while I was writing my PhD) examined the adaptive capacity of industries to external changes in their environment. I used the body of literature on adaptation to climate change to create a framework to explore how industries adapt to external shocks (I briefly mentioned this in a post I wrote on the gaming, electronic arts and tech cluster in Vancouver). My hypothesis in regards to the future of journalism, news outlets and primarily, newspapers, is that their survival and success will depend on a strong adaptive capacity to face the 5 wolves mentioned by Gitlin. I also posit that being able to properly harness new media/social media tools to enhance the content creation process will also strengthen said adaptive capacity.
I understand that one of the main worries of the news industry is revenue and profitability. That challenge, unfortunately, is one that I’m not sure how to tackle, particularly I haven’t thought about it in detail. Pay-per-view models seem to be working with sports events, but I think that the assumption that news should be free and universally-free-flowing makes paid-content revenue models challenging. That`s where I foresee the adaptive capacity of news outlets will be tested (particularly newspapers).
I am a faithful superhero fan, and an X-Men addict. I had always felt that, should I ever acquire powers, I’d rather have them by mutation than by a spider bite (yeah, it’s kind of less painful that way I think). Thanks to the kind folks of Marvel Comics, we have a whole breed of new humans with superpowers: mutants. I have been waiting for X-Men Origins (Wolverine) for a long time, given that several scenes of the series of X-Men movies have been filmed in British Columbia (some of them actually at UBC).
I had waited to watch Wolverine with JT as we have always watched the X-Men movies together. This one, while it had mutants, Ryan Reynolds and lots of action, didn’t blow me away like the other movies. There were a number of bloopers and errors of continuity. But overall, I enjoyed the movie. I would not say it was my favorite, but it wasn’t totally horrible.
This second clip offers an interview with Ryan Reynolds who plays Deadpool/Wade Wilson. Enjoy!
This post/comment may sound ranty. You’ve been warned 🙂
Joe Solomon (@engagejoe) is one of the very few “social media for social change” people I trust the most. Joe and I may butt heads on our approaches to how we focus our work in harnessing the power of social media to effect change, but we certainly agree on one thing: there’s a lot of promise for the social networking tools in effecting positive social change.
* Are you jaded about social media for change? How come; what happened? How does this affect your work?
* How can we address this and move from being unmotived to being on a more even (if not excited) keel?
* What are your reactions to some of the questions, feelings, suggestions folks shared above?
My responses below:
Thanks for this post, Joe, and for everyone who chimed in beforehand. As I said, I’m better at reacting at things (this comes from my academic training – I’m an analyst of issues and problems, and then I propose solutions). I can only speak from my two organizational experiences (VanChangeCamp very marginally, as I am no longer really involved and MentalHealthCamp).
Early on, Isabella Mori and I decided that we would be the only organizers instead of setting up a committee. This worked in our favor as we are hive minds. We think so much alike it’s unbelievable. We thought out and created a framework of collaboration within which participants of Mental Health Camp would work (presenters, volunteers, organizers). I think much of the success of MHC Vancouver was that we created a framework for openness, discussion, respect for people who shared their stories and the underlying desire to break down the stigma of mental illness and THEN we used social media tools to expand our reach and talk to potential attendees, speakers, etc.
I am sharing these findings because those respond to the last point you made – can we find a target and THEN apply a social media toolkit to it? My answer is – Yes, we can. That’s I think how we ended up being so successful. The participants were engaged, but they were engaged within a framework of mutual respect, love, warmth and sharing. If you were attending MHC you knew what you were going to be in for. You knew that you would be hearing other people’s stories of struggling with mental illness and you needed to be open minded, and be respectful and sensitive to these stories, and react in ways that would empower those who shared their stories. I was amazed at the quality of participants and speakers, and truly honored that they shared in this effort.
The question you ask – ARE WE JADED FROM SOCIAL MEDIA FOR SOCIAL CHANGE? has a good answer that nobody is willing to give – yes, we are, but we aren’t being honest. We all want support for our event, yet we are reluctant or wary to support others events. What happened to “do unto others as you’d like to have done unto you”?. Many people from whom I expected at least a retweet did NOT support my efforts with Mental Health Camp. Many people from the actual social media for social change community, in fact. How does that make me feel? Jaded.
The fact of the matter is – our best bet for the use of social media for social change, in my opinion, is to be honest, respectful and forthcoming in what we expect from our application of online tools to effecting social change. In my view, Mental Health Camp was hugely successful, and there were many reasons why it was, but much of that was the support from the online community (please note that I said the community and not EVERYONE in the community).
I also think that it is important to be selective, strategic and focused in how we approach social media for social change. You can’t be everybody’s hero. Choose one or two projects. Go small and then scale up and go viral. And more importantly, remember the rule of RECIPROCITY. If you want support on your project, make sure that you’ve supported other projects. I had a really bad experience supporting a social media for social change initiative and then asking for support and not even getting a reply tweet back. Not the best way to get me to support this person’s next event, right?
I had also mentioned to Joe that I react very badly to pressure, and I have a policy of being selective. I choose carefully which projects I support but when I support them, I’m fully behind them. I don’t like being pressured into anything, and I’m sure many people feel the same way I do but don’t publicly disclose this. Gentle nudging and negotiation always wins (at least with me!)
One of the biggest challenges and people fail to realize this is – there are SO MANY PROBLEMS IN THE WORLD. It’s hard to get support from everyone. I think Beth Kanter asked in a post how to deal with so many causes (a while ago). One of the best ways, I think, is to re-direct. If you can’t help support a cause, why not get a friend (online or offline) involved? I didn’t know anyone in the mental health community, and now I do thanks to people who were in the MH community who introduced me to other people. Isabella and I got a lot of support from people who weren’t even online!
Overall, my bottom line is – let’s look at problems, create a framework to solve them and then engage the social media toolkit. Within that social media tool kit we should never forget to treat everyone in the social media for social change community with respect and interest. Otherwise, the likelihood that people will react favorably to our initiatives will be very small.
My 2 cents.
Steve Anderson, Kate Milberry and Rodger Levesque are three good friends of mine that I met through the Vancouver tech community. They are very committed to democratizing media and they are organizing an excellent event. It’d be great if you spread the word and/or attended!
Vancouver’s leading independent media makers lead a panel and discussion about proposed government bailouts of corporate media, the impacts of cuts to the public broadcaster, and exciting alternative models for media.
Featuring:
Charlie Smith, Editor, The Georgia Straight
Marika Swan, Interim Manager, Redwire Native Youth Media
Colin Preston, Library Coordinator & Canadian Media Guild Secretary for CBC Vancouver
and other special guests
Suggested Donation $7 in advance, $12 at the door
no one turned away for lack of funds.
Snacks will be served
bus tickets available
Free childcare available onsite with advance request
Seating is limited! To save your spot, please R.S.V.P. by net, phone, or email:
to register online: http://moneymedia.eventbrite.com/
by email: naava.smolash [at] gmail.com
by phone: (604) 875-8455 (please leave a message)
My good friend Monica Hamburg writes, as I’ve mentioned before on my blog, a really funny site called “Your Dose of Lunacy“. Seriously, I have no clue how she comes across so many wacky things. Well, it seems this one is destined for her blog: an emergency room that allows you to only have an emergency between the rather accomodating hours of 8:00am to 8:00pm. Yes, this is the hospital that is nearest to me, so should I have an emergency at say, 10:00pm, I might need to be transported to St. Paul’s Hospital. I remember walking around my neighbourhood and wondering “… hmmm… I so hope I will never need to use this hospital!”. Anyone have ideas as to why this emergency room is only open at those hours?
Admittedly, Vancouver is such a multicultural place, there will be tonnes of places for worship. We came across this church while walking east on 19th Avenue and crossing the Cedar Cottage Greenway, and I think it is slightly surprising that in a relatively residential area there were so many churches. This particular one, St. Mark’s Evangelical Lutheran Church is located at the corner of 18th Avenue and Fleming, relatively close to Clark and East 16th. I also found it rather interesting that this church offers worship in both German AND English. I know that some Catholic churches offer services in Asian languages and even in Spanish, but this was surprising to me. Also, bear in mind that I don’t really know much about other religions other than Catholicism. It’s a beautiful church and I really enjoy coming across beautiful construction while walking around the neighbhourhood.
There’s been a lot of wondering around the Twittersphere on what exactly are the FOX Network producers thinking, since Dollhouse is being renewed and Sarah Connor Chronicles is being axed. Last night, while I didn’t watch the pilot of Fox’s new proposed show, Glee, I saw a flood of tweets (so many that they started trending). I decided to do a quick search for the pilot and associated videos on YouTube and after watching the pilot and the scene where the Glee Club sings “Don’t Stop Believing”, I was almost moved to tears. Yeah, I’m cheesy like that. And also, don’t forget, I have nieces exactly that age.
Below, the extended trailer.
And the rendition of “Don’t Stop Believing” by the Glee Club.
There’s a brief intro to the show on the Fox website:
About The Show
From Ryan Murphy, the creator of “Nip/Tuck” and “Popular,” comes GLEE, a one-hour musical comedy that follows an optimistic high school teacher as he tries to transform the Glee Club and inspire a group of ragtag performers to make it to the biggest competition of all: Nationals.
Will Schuester, a young optimistic teacher, has offered to take on the Herculean task of restoring McKinley’s Glee Club to its former glory. Everyone around him thinks he’s nuts. He’s out to prove them all wrong.
I’ve also noticed that TV networks are harnessing the viral power of social media. They are on Twitter!
You all know that I’m the Organizer of the Vancouver Bloggers Meetup. No? Well, where have you been, Mars? It’s like, the first thing I brag about! I am the heir to the Vancouver blogging throne bequeathed to me by the always wonderful Isabella Mori. Anyhow, I digress…
As the organizer of VBM, I am technically your go-to guy when it comes to local bloggers. I pretty much know, well, a heck of a lot of them. Many of them have become good friends of mine, and I am always willing to lend a helping hand. So when Mandy and Terra suggested to Shannon that I could be of some help in spreading the word about the upcoming Vancouver Pre-BlogHer Meetup, I was all giddy and excited. After all, I’m honored to be friends with some of Vancouver’s (and even Canada’s) top mommy bloggers (including Kerry, who already has written her blog post over at Wet Coast Women promoting the Meetup).
Before I paste Shannon’s email, I just want to take this opportunity to remind everyone something that Kerry mentioned on her post and that I’ve been emphasizing (or trying to, anyways) over the past year, since I took over the VBM (something that I know Isabella also tried to explain to people): the Vancouver Bloggers Meetup is open to EVERYONE who has an interest in blogging. You may blog about theatre (as does Simon) or about wines and food (as does Russ) or about fashion (as does Shallom) or about yourself (as do I, because, well, we all know that it’s ALL about ME). Vancouver Bloggers Meetup is open to EVERYONE. And so is this Vancouver Pre-BlogHer Meetup (technically, if your estrogen content is higher i.e. if you’re a woman, it’s a little bit more up your alley, but heck I’m a guy and I’m planning to show up).
So here is Shannon (aka MrLady). I’ve heard great things about Shannon so can’t wait to meet her. And I’ll do everything in my power to help. Here is without further ado:
Hey kids!
Elisa at BlogHer has asked me to be the “host” for the Vancouver area bloggers attending the conference in Chicago next year. That means that if you have questions or need help with the conference, I am your bitch *ahem* go-to girl. The idea is to ease the anxiety that many newbies have on the first night, when they walk in and don’t know anyone’s face. Basically, I’m tour-guide Barbie.
Now, along those lines, BlogHer has asked each of us regional hosts to organize a pre-conference get together in our areas. What we’re shooting for is a way to get us all together and met, so that we have even more support at the conference. Also, there are so many bloggers who can’t go due to economic constraints or personal situations or to the fact that the freaking conference sold out so early, that we all thought it would be nice if the people who weren’t attending could still come to a smaller-scale event. One they don’t have to cross international borders for, you know?
This is by no means limited to people associated with BlogHer. This is just for bloggers in general in the Vancouver area. Most of those people I will know and contact are associated in some way with the conference, but you are more than welcome to bring friends and family and other bloggers you know.
And so here we are. These things are rolling out across North America on either June 6th or June 13th. Besides that, we can kind of do whatever the hell we want. I have absolutely no budget at all to work with, so here are our options:
We can do a potluck in a park somewhere
We can use the space my husband has offered us in his restaurant for the night.
Basically, do you want to come and do you want to bring your kids? If we do the restaurant, we’ll have to get food donated or brought in, because there’s no way we can afford what he charges. We could do Saturday day or night. If we do a park, we all just bring something, but drinking gets a little hard, what with that whole “public lewdness” clause they have.
What I’d like to know is A) if you’d like to come and B) how you’d like it to go down. The group on BlogHer is right here. If you join it, you’ll be automatically approved and you can then go into the forum and add your two cents. If I could get everyone to steer that direction, that would be great. I’ve had to just accept that my inbox has become unmanageble. I’m currently taking offers for Higher Powers who I can pass it off to. 🙂
i really hope you can all make it, and I hope you can bring some friends with you, too! We always get left out of crap up here; I saw we show them we’ve got numbers.
Thanks,
Shannon
Shannon (aka Mr Lady) in her own words:
An illegal alien (it’s more fun than Phil Collins would have you think) at Canada Moms Blog {dot} com-
Gets patriotic on the politics channel at Blog Nosh {dot} com-
Pretends to be cool at Mamapop {dot} com
Doles out terrible advice at Stark Raving Dads {dot} com and-
Makes her children contimplate emancipation at Whiskey In My Sippy Cup {dot} com
I had been wanting to try Nando’s for a long while and finally JT and I ended up going there for dinner. I knew from the advertisements that it was Portuguese food, and I also knew that I would be interested in the decor (simply because if it is Portuguese-themed, it will be easy for me to read, as I speak the language).
We ordered a special consisting of a side (in my case, spicy rice) and a quarter chicken breast (BBQ with a special sauce, not too spicy). I thought it wouldn’t be enough food for each of us, but quickly realized that I was wrong. We used one of the Entertainment Book coupons and dinner for two came to $ 20 (drinks included). Not a bad deal!
I definitely would go back to Nando’s, and thoroughly recommend it. It’s not very “restaurant-like” but more along the lines of Splitz, where you pick up your burger in a sort of conveyor-belt kind of assembly line (if you know what I mean). I won’t complain, it was fun and tasty.
I was looking for the song “Falling Into You” (by Celine Dion) on Blip.fm and came across the Canadian band “Turn Off the Stars“. As you all know, I am a big supporter of indie musical bands, and more so when they are Canadian (well, I live in Canada and consider myself pretty much a Canadian, so I should encourage my fellow Canadians, hehehe). Besides, I loved the song. Courtesy of YouTube and Curve Music Artists, I present to you “Falling Into You” by Turn Off the Stars. What do you think? Like or no like?
I met Nancy Zimmerman at the Vancouver Podcaster’s Meetup a year and a half ago, approximately. I never figured out we would become such good friends. A part of me left Vancouver when she moved to Yellowknife, but the magic of Twitter allows me to stay in touch with her all the time. And as she mentioned, I’m only a Skype phone call away.
Even though this post is late for your birthday, Nancy, I do hope that you know how much you mean to me. Your friendship is a treasure and you’ve taught me a lot. You’re an inspiration and it’s an honor to call you a friend.
I had been wanting to try pho (phở) for a long while now (I’ve attended some of John Chow‘s DotCom Pho events but never actually had the Vietnamese soup itself). When I was little, I used to ask my Mom to add very thin slivers of beef (fully cooked) to my noodle soups. While not exactly pho, there is some degree of resemblance between both versions of soup with beef, and I thought that it would be good for me to have a food adventure with a good friend.
So I asked Lorraine to join me at Hanoi Pho (a little restaurant located near Hastings and Main). I knew from conversations with Lorraine herself, Colleen and the folks at Invoke that this place was great, and it didn’t disappoint. For $ 8.00 you get a really huge bowl of soup (they called it a Special Spicy Soup) with lots of vegetables, some shrimp and slivers of well-cooked meat. I did finish it only out of discipline (my GrandMa used to say that “we had to eat all our soup and veggies”, so that’s why I mention the word ‘discipline’). But frankly, I would have been ok with a small bowl. I ended up having to walk all the way from Hanoi to downtown and back because otherwise I would have felt incredibly full.
I would thoroughly recommend Hanoi Pho, it’s inexpensive, it’s tasty, the restaurant is clean and guess what – for all of you geeks around, it has free wi-fi! The owner has a very warm attitude and he was very friendly (and you can tell he knows that there are geeks around, because his network is secure and he changes the password regularly, hehe).
To start you on a Monday morning, here is an easy Bloglines quiz – what should your superpower be? Are you surprised that mine is manipulating electricity?
Your Superpower Should Be Manipulating Electricity
You’re highly reactive, energetic, and super charged.
If the occasion calls for it, you can go from 0 to 60 in a split second.
But you don’t harness your energy unless you truly need to.
And because of this, people are often surprised by what you are capable of.
Why you would be a good superhero: You have the stamina to fight enemies for days
Your biggest problem as a superhero: As with your normal life, people would continue to underestimate you
I take Sunday afternoons and evenings off almost as a ritual. JT and I enjoy spending time together on the last day of the weekend and have an opportunity to relax. Given that today I was dog-sitting, we went for a rather long stroll towards Trout Lake, and we ended up walking along 20th Avenue, going down to 19th and finally, crossing the Cedar Cottage Greenway around 19th and Fleming.
The Cedar Cottage Neighbourhood Greenway transformed the unopened 19th Avenue road allowance into a park-like connection between the neighbourhood and Tyne Elementary School. The greenway follows west from Fleming Street to the adjacent lane. Its design features a winding red brick path, a gazebo with seating, donated perennial flowers and pedestrian lighting. Public art in the form of pebble mosaics are set into the garden area along the path.
This greenway was initiated and built by the community, which continues to maintain it with assistance from the City. Since it was completed in 1994, a community notice board has been added and other improvements to the landscape have been made by residents. This greenway was funded in part by a Parks Board grant and the Public Art Program.
I was pretty marvelled by the greenway. As I have mentioned in previous posts, I am always in search of something that will amaze me, and I wasn’t disappointed.
I wish more of these projects were taking place in Vancouver. I wonder how many greenways do we have in other parts of Vancouver. I remember there’s one around 14th and Prince Albert, near Kingsway and Fraser (though I don’t have photos of that one). Hopefully I’ll get to explore more of my beautiful neighbourhood of East Vancouver and will report back.
Things are changing around me so fast it’s almost impossible to catch up. I feel this is a sign of the times. Over a year ago, Tanya (aka NetChick) was inviting me to her house-warming party (current place) and now, she is the proud owner of a one-bedroom apartment just steps away from good friends of ours Gus and Russ and MJ and the J-Man!
I’m proud of you, Tanya… you’ve grown so much in the past year, and in so many ways! Congratulations and hey – I get first dibs on the carpet! 😉 I will bring the red wine! 😀
I heard this song through a friend of mine in Chicago. The version I love is this one, although I’ve heard a couple of remixes. Hope you enjoy it as much as I do.
This is a second version that I really enjoyed and found on Blip.fm and also on YouTube.
While the actual day is celebrated on May 15th, I thought I’d explain a bit the relevance of this day. Shortly after celebrating Mother’s Day (May 10th), Mexicans celebrate the Day of the Professor. Since in Canada, professors are usually only university-level, I have grouped all different educators, and I want to congratulate:
– My parents, both of whom have been university professors many times. My Mom is still a professor, and she’s actually Dean of Social Sciences.
– My brothers, in particular A and R who have been university-level professors in the US (A is still a full-time, tenure-track professor while R is an adjunct professor).
– Many of my best friends, including my brother, some of my great friends in Mexico.
– And of course, myself! 🙂
In the past few months I’ve read with horror the local news on how several gay people have been bashed while walking around or hanging out in the West End of Vancouver. It hadn’t really hit me hard until someone I love very much and care for was gay bashed last November. I couldn’t believe something like this could happen to him. While I know that he is doing better now, I still get a bit freaked out.
Living in a city like Vancouver, and being surrounded with amazingly open-minded individuals, I find it really hard to take that homophobia is still prevalent in Canada (and worldwide). Let’s not go further than our Southern neighbour, the United States of America. With the passing of Proposition 8 by California, I was more than appalled. Can you believe that one of the most progressive states in regards to environmental politics would be so retrograde when it comes to equal rights? Because, you know, sexual orientation is NOT a crime. It’s not a crime to be gay or lesbian, just the same as it isn’t a crime to be straight.
Keeping in mind how homosexuality is a universal fact and that borders cannot be forced on it, the 2009 Campaign is aimed towards helping these people to become integrated within their host society and to make ethno-cultural communities aware of sexual diversity issues. In addition, LGBT people and their communities will benefit from their own community’s improved openness toward their issues.
I wrote about the International Day Against Homophobia in 2008, making a point about how in some countries, being homosexual is still considered a crime. From the IDAHO website, I would like to point you out about everyone getting involved:
An International Day Against Homophobia belongs to no one individual. It’s about all people hoping for a prejudice-free world that can provide a place at the table for everyone regardless of their sexual orientation. Inspired by all world theme-days, the day set aside to fight homophobia needs to be appropriated by all of those actively involved in civil society: gay and lesbian community organisations, those organisations focusing on other types of sexual diversity, unions, employers, private businesses, governments, public administration, professional associations, and all individuals seeking equality.
Arsenal Pulp Books was kind enough to send me a complimentary copy of the Dictionary of Homophobia (very, very grateful for that) and I committed to help them out with their I.D.A.H.O.T. project. You will see some tweets and perhaps a blog post about it. I was planning to organize a brunch event, but as you all know, my Sundays tend to be dedicated to a close friend of mine so I’m just going to leave a few pre-scheduled tweets.
Please join us in the fight against homophobia. Visit the Arsenalia website and please spread the word. The fight has not been won but we are getting there.
