Been there, done that, or thinking about it... another word for a journal!

My Olympics

2010-03-28T17:55:00.002-07:00

Olympics being a distant memory now, I wanted to record in some way what the most memorable moments for me her in Vancouver 2010.

Going into the Olympics, the excitement and conversations that Vancouverites were having was boundless... everyone was impacted by the event in one way or another. All businesses had been putting together contingency plans for the eventual traffic nightmare that it was going to be, some places, like my office, were not even going to have access to their parking lots because of the closure - not to mention the new constructions - the Olympics was on everyone's mind. It was even more significant for me as I had quite a few friends who were going to be working during with VANOC as organizers. I myself was was a candidate for a two jobs with major overseas sponsors.
Every conversation leading up to Feb 12th was about what they plan to do with during the Olympics, what sporting event to see, which ceremonies they got tickets for, which houses they wanted to visit, what their beef with the Olympics were...or which city they were escaping to.
By December, I was sure not going to get any of the two major jobs with the visiting sponsors, so I was starting to think what I wanted to do to make this experience memorable. I hate being a spectator to large events, being in a stadium of 30K+ plus people fills me with a feeling of void. Not sure if it's the sense that I am better than everyone else, or my myopsy which makes watching a show an anything farther than 100 meters makes me opt for a seat infront of the TV in my living room. Plus, given the large number of connections I have in this city, I should be able to score a sweet deal - which is why I rarely pay for movies anymore nor stand in lineups for cultural events.

But the Olympics were on a slightly larger scale especially given the high security that was everywhere. Getting a guest/staff pass into venues to watch the show from the green room or sneaking into the tech booth was out of the question this time. I had not planned to buy any tickets from way earlier on to the events or the ceremonies, and it was too late at this point to get anything decent. I did not want to completely miss out this once-in-a-lifetime-event because of my "agoraphobia". I still wanted to have "One Olympic Moment" that would be so powerful and meaningful that it would be emblazoned in my memory for ever - like what I was doing during 9/11 (visiting a 13th century church in the middle of Armenia with a few cool paysans and my dad).
...well I ended up having about 4-5

The following set of essays will be the recounting of "My Olympic Moments"

Avatar

2010-01-01T20:48:00.004-08:00

My friend Tara, who had just seen and loved Avatar, was upset that the Avatars were so dumb!
She could not beleive that these brilliant beings had no action plan during the final battle scene -the Avatars just went straight into the battle facing the enemy head. Even the Ewoks, she said, had better strategy when fighting against insurmountable odds. The simple and cute, fuzzy little creatures really prepared for their battle, they organized, they made flanking moves to trip the machines, built traps. As much as I hated the Ewoks in the Star Wars ROTJ, because they got in the way of what I was really interested in - the development of Luke's Jedi powers, Lucas still had orchestrated a battle scene that showed how resilient nature can be when fighting against machines. The comparison between Lucas and Cameron will go on for ages I think, it will be a rivalry for the sci-fi geeks, who are the next generation of filmmakers. Essentially they are both great storytellers, who changed storytelling irreversibly. Comparing them is a bit of Apples and Oranges though. One thing is clear that Cameron's interests are - rather two dimensional, even in 3D. The avatars were a pretty backdrop to a good-ole smash'em and bash'em movie - only bigger... the biggest!
I myself hoped and waited for our hero to check out what was under his loin cloth - that's what I'd do! what with all the jumping and leaping we should have gotten a glimpse of what's under the hood or a boob or something. all the bodies looked the same even those of the elderly matrons - where are the sagging tits that we see among indigenous populations?
Again, Cameron did not want to venture into that territory ...he wanted pretty blue creatures.
It goes without saying that the film far surpasses expectations of prettiness - it was spectacular - while setting up a low standard for story...somehow the beauty numbs the receptors for intelligenc - just like the buddhist say!
Even for me who has such an allergy for bad plots and predictability - I only looked at my watch once during the 3 hours! Unlike the Transformers movies which had me resenting every minute I was in that theater.
With enough distractions thrown at me, I was able to hold down my usual urge to purge at what was essentially a very, very, very mediocre story. There was nothing new to this movie, except the visuals.

All films require a certain level of suspension of disbelief - you can't really be asking how did that mustang become a robot all of a sudden - you have to supress your brain's natural inkling to object to what it is seeing and buy into the story. I think that many films' failure is caused by the way certain quotes, or plots or imagery, shake the spectator out of that state of acceptance and start questioning.

The more solid the suture the less likely you'll hate the movie: this is the foundation of Brechtian Cricital Aesthetics: Art, which is a product of its culture and economics and politics, is an opportunity to improve Life, by being a torch bearer...enlightening us about society, economics, politics...as opposed to being pleasant waste of time.
Avatar, wether Cameron meant to or not, is smack dab in the middle of this ongoing dialogue between those who believe that art's purpose is to propose new ways of seeing the world and help society, and those who believe art is about creating a distraction from the troubles of the world...This discussion will go on for ever, and many may refer to Cameron and Lucas as polar opposites, but one thing for sure, Cameron will influence the next generation of filmmakers, though few people will talk of the relevance of Avatar in 5 years!
and now, I'm going to stop talking about it.

The Scale of the Universe

2009-12-08T23:45:00.005-08:00

This is a part II of a previous bit I wrote about the Scale of the Planets: Astronomical size and distance in the Universe and light speed

Attached is a lovely video about time as we know it...Carl Sagan
s Cosmos series, dated but worth it, it should be in every household.

The best thing about this video is that it's so short.
enjoy the "aaaaaah"

Viken's Verdict of V

2009-11-29T21:01:00.014-08:00

V is not what I call "Good TV" Part 1
...and I don't think it's gonna get any better.

Even though I'm a huge fan of Elizabeth Mitchell,
the re-imaging of the old show reeks of mediocrity: the story lines they are following are predictable and weak, while the characters are straight out of a soap opera, this verdict is similar to what I said about Heroes, it's not badly done ... it's just cheap!

I was a huge fan of the original five part mini-series V which was aired in 1983.
It had the best marketing build-up ever, they started advertising it months ahead - just like this time around. V had everyone deep in anticipation, especially for Sci Fi fans, who are always desperate for good Science Fiction on prime time television. Luckily for everyone, the mini-series was a breath of fresh air, it was very edgy, slick and long enough to carry a full story through over 10 hours...V was a hit!
Who can forget the first words of the half-ling
"Pretenama,...it means peace" -it still gives me chills to this day when I hear it. That was the closing line of the series.

I think fondly of V the original series. It was a good story, with a good build-up that did not disappoint. It also had some great gadgets and it ended on a positive note for humanity.

Unfortunately for humanity, NBC producers quickly pulled together a TV series called "The Final Battle" that was a sad, sad thing. It was not a very successful show, and ran for only a little while...

I don't have much of a prediction to make about the fate of V, just a reminder of historical fact.
V has already burned out all its fuel.

I really wish they would stop trying to revive this old show. I ask the TV gods:

Please Let V Rest In Peace!

Peace Out ;-)

Writing in the movies

2009-11-29T00:14:00.008-08:00

Since I got my PDA, I've been writing my thoughts and immediate reactions to movies I've watched on my PDA, at the theater or soon after. The intention was to rework them on to this document and post them; however, my PDA and my computer don't get along too well, so a lot of these reviews I've been carrying around in my pocket for almost a year now.

I should apologize for the selection of titles I'm writing about. One of the reasons these reviews will seem like a mix bag of movies with varying degrees of importance is because of this gig I have where I do exit polling for movies on opening weekend. I don't get to choose the movies we survey, but I've seen some great movies with this work. This is one of the greatest things about the company I work for - sometimes I can't believe I'm getting paid for doing this job but I can't divulge any more information here because of client confidentiality and all...so, enough said!

Transformers Return of the Fallen
In one sentence: lots of moving parts, but no intelligent design is behind this movie. These fancy machines definitely impress with how seamlessly they maneuver, but they lack a real purpose or as we human call it - a soul.

It is even more lame than the first one in terms of story and narrative. Oh and it's SO loud!
I'm not even sure if it's safe to expose people to these kind of decibels.

The CGI is also excessive, which is really sad; because Transformers the movie franchise is all about the graphics baby.

The "transformation" from cars/planes/boom-boxes into bipeds is masterfully executed, but the problem is that once they are transformed into these human figure machines, but the fascination ends there, because once transformed, they're quite hard to watch.

The transformed figures are a mash of mechanical parts that all move and react like a robot - nothing like their cheesy cartoon predecessors of 20 years ago. Today's CGI counterparts are marvels of animation. The latest versions of the transformers are a mass of machine parts in grays and black - like the contents of your "junk" drawer stuffed into a Ziploc bag. Unfortunately, these over-mechanised figures can end up looking the same which makes the scenes very hard to follow..especially when these machines insist on working out their million year old feuds with hand-to-hand combat a la Crouching Tigers.

What Transformer ROTF is really missing is a good use of color and sound. Don't get me wrong this movie is bad in MANY other ways too - it was not a very successful blockbuster, but I'm thinking here of how well color can be integrated into the cinematography in blockbusters a feast for the senses like Luc Bresson did so well in the Fifth Element...sigh

All The Single Ladies

2009-02-18T11:21:00.007-08:00

Recently, and completely by random, I came across Beyonce's All The Single Ladies video on Much Music.

I was mesmerized from the first second I saw it and did not blink till it was over.

Couldn't believe what an AMAZING video this was: this was dancing at an Olympian level. It is shot in black and white in a studio with no props or sets. The video features Beyonce and two backup dancers doing some of the most athletic and energetic steps for 3 and half minutes. Dressed in beautiful black one pieces with a distinct retro cut, great big 70's hair and the loveliest 7 inch Mary Jane (ish) platform heels. But, the true star of this video was the choreography -which was ingenious...and got me thinking of how much we have reinvigorated dance culture in the last few years with shows like So you think you Can Dance and yes, even, Dancing with the Stars...I was shocked to realize how far the art of dancing must have advanced to even consider making this kind of video - which is pure dancing.
Instantly I fell in love with this video.

this BTW is part of my compulsiveness. when I'm taken by something I'm all in - I should note that I have very hight standards for arts and am rarely wrong.I remember how the one time I heard James Blunt, whom I'd never heard of previously, playing on late night TV and said "this guy is going to be a hit, he's amazing." and he did...

anywhooo...

So I found it on YouTube and watched it over and over and over, told all my friends about it, and THEY told me that this was the number 2 video on the charts. But I did not stop talking about it for a few days longer to a few more friends.

When I showed it to David, he told me, yeah I know, it was based on a choreography by Bob Fosse who was one of the foremost American musical theater and movies directors Chorus Line, Cabaret and All That Jazz fame . He had produced this piece for his wife Gwen Verdon who was a dance Icon who had performed it on the Ed Sullivan Show!

Well that explained everything!

This video is amazing NOT because we are in a renaissance of the art of dance, but BECAUSE it is a reincarnation of a classic piece of modern American dance. When you look at this one video put up by a fan of Fosse, who juxtaposed the original choreography with Beynce's moves you see the inspiration and the imitation. If you look closely enough, you will even notice how the dancer on the left is slightly off beat, just like in the original... It's uncanny!

This video is an homage to one of the greatest choreographer of our times - wether it's imitation or inspiration or just a product of the times, I say KUDOS for Beyonce keeping the art o dancing alive!

The Wire

2008-02-25T21:34:00.003-08:00

I think I found the best show on TV - it's called The Wire by HBO.

It's about crime and corruption in Baltimore: it's rough and gritty and pulls no punches. The show revolves around the daily goings on of violent gangs, corrupt politicians, effective police depart and apathetic reporters. If you haven't noticed, it's the four pillars of urban living. The focus is on the little guy at the bottom of the heap trying to carve out a living doing his job and the big bosses on top, backstabbing - in some case shooting each other - to climb higher while dealing with budgetary setbacks and upstarts. This applies to the folk on both side of the law, except that the gang's major issue with money is how to launder it.

The Wire refers to the first season which was all about a wire tap that the police had put on a major high profile corruption deal. One of the seasons is about the Newspaper in Baltimore... it's West Wing on the East side: exceptionally well written and shot.
The cast is also stellar and diverse. It's almost exclusively African Amercian actors and almost exclusively male. But what acting! They're also all speaking in the urban dialects that takes a while to understand, can't imagine what it's like to act.

Jumper - the movie that was the pilot

2008-02-18T22:21:00.002-08:00

For all of you, like me, who are so excited about the special effects and exotic locations of this most dazzling movie, I am sorry to be disappointed.

The true shining star in this film's genealogy is it's director Doug Liman
of Borne Identity and Mr&Mrs Smith and Go, but the rest of the big wigs involved are known more for mediocre works. Screenwriter David S Goyer of Blade's and Batman Begins should give us some indication of the true direction of this movie - straight to video- or in this case to the Tube.
I am so sure that this film was made with the assurance that it was going to be picked up by one of the TV networks as a part of the prime-time supernatural shows that are slowly replacing the defunct reality shows of a few years ago.
It's got all the makings of a half-decent TV show, a young hero with an amazing gift, living amongst us mortals trying to do good, while being chased by a band of obsessive assassins who just want him dead for no rational reason. The hero has a beautiful girl he loves and some not-so-friendly friends that help him along his journey.
Those are the same reasons the movie falls flat: it lacks the Magic of Film making
Though the special effects are exceptional - you really never get bored of THEM, the story however leave much to be desired. The plot is pedestrian, and the script is just thoroughly lacking any sparks. As for the acting, well, leave it to the young Anakin to give the character a full second dimension. And I never figured out what Samuel L Jackson was doing in this - it's actually hard to watch him be so HAMMY.

I believe with all my being that this film was made as a pilot for a TV show that will go into production shortly. It's an ingenious way to recouping the cost of these mega productions - interesting phenomenon.

Revisting My Love of Montreal

2008-02-02T00:52:00.000-08:00

This essay is a one of a set of essays that I started to write six months ago on the plane on the way back from a trip to my old, beloved Montreal, in August 2007.

I always get very nostalgic when I’m in Montreal, as I think many do when visiting a city that was once called home. X-pats have a very special connection to their home town that is very different from that which most city dwellers have to their municipality. Unlike locals who are completely linked in to the fabric and the life of their city, ex-pats who return home have a more familiar yet tender relationship to their hometown- like an X-lover. Every part, every curve and scent is weighed with a fondness for the old beloved. I have previously invoked Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities once before in my blog of my LAST trip to MTL: the magical draw to a place that you once loved and left, which now lives in the world of ghosts.

This time my impression of Montreal hit me before I even set foot in Pierre Trudeau Int’l. I was listening to CBC On Board heard of a news report of Mario Dumont, the leader of the Action Democratic party, give a speech about limiting immigration to the Quebec. He said that Quebec has reached it’s capacity to assimilate new immigrants and needs to curb it’s intake of foreigners to avoid getting swamped by them. He said that the new arrivals need time to assimilate fully within their new culture so as to avoid being ghettoized and fortified within their own communities and live outside the laws and values of their newly adopted nations.

His word struck me, like a pie in the face. I was shocked to hear how the leader of a political party who was the head of the opposition party in the National Assembly could say such a racist thing. Then just as quickly as it came, the shocked passed and I got into my, “oh this is just Québec” tune. I remembered another such episode, back in 1995 in a nationally televised speech after the failed 95 referendum, when Jacques Parizeau, then head of the Parti Quebecois, blamed “l’argent et le vote ethnic” (money and the ethnic vote) for why the Québécois can’t have their sovereignty – their own country.

Six months after that referendum, I moved to Vancouver.

I sometimes do wonder who would live in a state that was run by such racists. I would think that people would be in the streets – but maybe not.

It was almost six months before my last visit to Montréal, in January 2007, when I did an unannounced visit to my parent’s house to surprise my mom who I hadn’t seen for almost two years. My mom loves surprises so I rented a car at the airport and arrived stealthily to knock on her door, one sunny afternoon, just to see the look on her face. It ended up being a very full 10 day trip; and having a rental car meant that I got to listen to a lot of radio. On the first day of my arrival, as I was trying to figure out exactly how far Laval had expanded, I heard of a survey that the Quebec gov’t had done about racism. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2007/01/15/mtl-racism.html They had discovered that 59% of Quebecois said that they are racist, compared to the 47% of people outside of Quebec. This was front page news and all over the talk shows.

“plus ça change, plus ça reste le même”

Racism and the Québécois, who have a rather dysfunctional view of a nation that borders on xenophobia and outright prejudice, have a very long history. Everyone in the rest of Canada - and many in Quebec - are quite aware of this history. It’s one of those many idiosyncrasies that Canada has allowed this unhappy province.

I certainly don’t want to chastise the good hearted Québécois for trying to keep their culture alive; because the odds are against them - in many ways. Yet they still thrive mostly due to a relentless pursuit of higher culture and Frenchiness. Racism is the darker part of a bigger picture that is the rather pathetic history of the French in Canada.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Vancouver has been my home now for 12 years, but despite that, many people, after having sniffed me out as a Montréaler, often ask why I left Montreal - a city that I speak so fondly of. I tell them jokingly that “I was tired of being called a foreigner in TWO languages”. I laugh when I say this, but I’m noticing more and more that many of my listeners don’t join in the laughter. I used to blame that on my comedic timing, but recently I’m realizing that maybe some people don’t think being a victim of racism is funny at all. Many people think racism is a horrible thing that a society inflicts on its people and should NEVER be tolerated. The Québécois, despite their worldliness, seem to be missing this point and it’s not funny anymore. I realized that having grown up in Quebec, I’d got accustomed to being the victim of racism and had always been using humor to deal with it, but when I learned how real the problem of racism is in Quebec today…well, it struck me like a pie in the face.

CBC's Prime Time 2008 line-up

2008-01-26T10:32:00.000-08:00

I have been more than patient with the new line-up of prime-time shows on CBC

Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the CBC, it's been and still is crucial in shaping Canadian culture, but this season they've produced four prime time TV dramas jPod, The Border, Sophie

MVP. leaves something to be desired.

These shows are Canadian through and through. They're part of a new generation of Canadian TV that is trying to compete with the hugely successful American shows - which are mostly made in Canada - the difference is very obvious actually. You can always tell Canadian filmmaking - right?

"Canadians have always been very good at producing comedy shows, but dramas have been a challenge."

This was the verdict that a Canadian study conducted by the CRTC a few years ago whose purpose was to find out how to deal with the declining audience of the CBC in the age of HDTV and satellite TV.

It was a battle that had long been lost by the CBC, the study said. The terms of the armistice seems to have been that CBC will focus on quality, heady, news television that document the culture of Canada as well as comedies but it is to stay away from fiction. This is a strategy that is shared by many national broadcasting television stations, like the BBC.
However, the survey said, if the CBC is to survive in the modern Digital and Satellite cable age and maintain it's mandate of promoting Canadian Content, it has to start producing dramas that rival it's American counterparts. This is why BBC created BBC4 the creative arm that has brought amazing programming to the world stage.

Lack of original fiction has not been an issue with Radio Canada the study said, because Quebec has a very strong TV culture with many successful shows that is supported by a distinct star system, this is due mainly to how their prime time slots are protected by the language barrier which exclude many other shows from getting a fighting chance at an audience in Quebec.
English Canada doesn't have any strong candidates in the war for rating against Amercian TV so it had been relegated to Broccoli Television status: it's good for you, but not so pleasant to watch. The study recommended that if CBC is to survive in the new media world, it has to produce more dramas.

So the CBC has been on a mission to come up with some prime time TV shows that are cool and hip and sexy to get Canadian audiences to watch Canadian content.

The first and greatest of disappointments is the J-Pod. It's all all the making of a classic CBC yawnfest.

J-pod prides itself on having a pot-porrie of characters that are all very eccentric and anti-archetypes. Centered around one young 20something (mistake number one) along with his coleagues in the J work pod are a slew of X-generation folk who barely working in the bowels of a successful video gaming company. Folded into this mix is a family who is not too unlike the characters of Weeds of Showcase - but on vallium. Though the show has some very strong pedigree - it's based on the Douglas Coupland's book of the same name, it's just too slow and self indulgent for anyone to care. AND it's not very original - sorry CBC.

I'll write a little more about the rest of the line-up when I watch them.

But YOU can watch all of these shows on the CBC.CA website. Full episodes are available to watch online - without commercials. That's one good thing that CBC got right, the trend of new media to take over TV...more on this later

Mounir's To 10 of 2007 List

2008-01-26T10:18:00.000-08:00

This is the annual entry of my friend's recounting of the best of Screen and Stage of the year's entertainment.

Hello there...

Before I start...I have to say that I'm sorry about the delay in sending the list but I just got back from Riviera Maya as I NEEDED a week off to start my year under the Mexican sun!!!

Now back to reality...

Another year is gone...and WHAT A YEAR...!!! Definitely some BLISS moments ... but a LOT of emotions too...

Sun tanning in El Salvador and sipping great coffees in Florence or Rome were definite highs ... But having to say goodbye to a dear friend of mine was definitely a low ...

So for this year... and for all the years to come ,I dedicate this list to you my dear Serge...and I'll live the magic for both of us!!!

AMONGST THE 70 MOVIES THAT I SAW AT THE CINEMA THIS PAST YEAR ... THIS IS MY TOP 10 (or 11...) :

10. Tie : ATONEMENT & AWAY FROM HER

9. THE LIVES OF OTHERS ( Das leben der Anderen )

8. CARAMEL

7. INTO THE WILDE

6. JUNO

5. 2H 37

4. LES TEMOINS

3. PARIS, JE T'AIME

2. LE SCAPHANDRE ET LE PAPILLON

1. L'HOMME DE SA VIE

HONOURABLE MENTIONS GOES TO...

(IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)

PAN'S LABYRINTH// 2 DAYS IN PARIS// EASTERN PROMISES//

LARS & THE REAL GIRL// AFTER THE WEDDING// KLIMT//

I'M NOT THERE// NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN// IL CAIMANO

CONTINENTAL: UN FILM SANS FUSIL// THE ITALIAN// LUST, CAUTION//

ROMAN DE GARE// SHARKWATER// LA MOME (LA VIE EN ROSE)//

COEURS//NOTES ON A SCANDAL// PERFUME// SICKO//

CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER//GOYA'S GHOSTS//GRINDHOUSE

PURE PLEASURE...

AZUR ET ASMAR

ENSEMBLE C'EST TOUT

PURELY BAD...

ROMEO ET JULIETTE

PARTITION

PURELY FUN MUSICALS...

ACROSS THE UNIVERSE

HAIRSPRAY

PLAYS ...

LA MOUETTE (Chekhov)

CONCERTS ...

SCISSOR SISTERS (Metropolis)

PIERRE LAPOINTE (Francofolies)

RACHID TAHA (Jazz fest)

SPECTACLES /DANCE ...

LA CLIQUE -JUST FOR LAUGHS FEST

CANTATA + LES 4 SAISONS-LES GRANDS BALLETS CANADIENS

DON GIOVANNI -OPERA DE MONTREAL

CONCERTO INTERPRETI VENEZIANI-Chiesa San Vidal-Venice

BODY REMIX / Les Variations Goldberg - Cie MARIE CHOUINARD

ART SHOWS . ..

L'UNIVERS BAROQUE DE BOTERO-Musée national des Beaux-Arts -Quebec

BRUCE NAUMAN (especially "One hundred fish fountain" piece)-MAC-Montréal

VIK MUNIZ -MAC- Montréal

CD'S...

AMY WINEHOUSE ( Back to Black )

THE PUPPINI SISTERS (Both Albums)

Song of the year:

RELAX TAKE IT EASY... MIKA

(5 times a day for 2/12 weeks in Italy!!!)

VOILA...

2 0 0 8 BISOUS ...

MK

The Scale of the Planets and the Universe

2007-12-27T12:41:00.004-08:00

I've often wondered - and written - about how big the planets are or how far apart they are from each other, or from other stars in the night sky and how big they must be shine ...

I can easily find out the technical terms of how many light years and how many KM across, but that doesn't mean anything to me. I mean, what can I compare 45 light years away to? How can I put it into perspective in human terms?
If you compare it to a football field, or the distance from your house to end of the block, maybe then you can get a sense of scale.

So here I am trying to fit the grandness of the universe in terms I can understand.

I tried to put that in perspective of something recognizable - something I can relate to as a person living on earth which measures 12,756,320 meters wide at the equator...
Below are some interesting comparisons.

Antares is the 16th brightest star in the nighttime sky

Below is a shot of space from the Hubble Telescope showing dozens of galaxies.

Below is a detail of one of the darkest parts of the above picture.

There is also a great talk by a rather funny German Physicist which puts all of this in perspective

Renate Loll on the Quantum Origins of Space and Time

National Leadership or lack thereof

2007-11-20T17:50:00.000-08:00

This is a little an exert of a letter I sent to the CBC Online

It's a rant about the government proposal to give a $60 billion dollars in tax cut and a reduction to the GST to 5% that passed recently in the House of Commons because the Liberals abstained from the vote which was a confidence motion.

I'm so thoroughly disappointed by the Stephan Dion's leadership of the Liberal party of Canada. Mostly because of the way he’s been playing a loosing game of chicken with the Tories - a party that did NOT win a majority at the ballot yet is still driving this country’s agenda day in and day out. The Liberals have become enablers in the conservative agenda – they are essentially propping up the gov't of Harper by not standing up to these confidence votes because they’re not ready for an election. What really goads me is that the Liberals don't have a vision of Canada as an alternative to the status quo.

60 Billion dollars is a windfall that was blown away in private and corporate tax cuts and the Liberals never even tried to offer an alternative to the cuts by proposing spending that could improve the lives of Canadians. A few hundred dollars in my pocket at the end of year doesn’t compare to 60 billion dollars collected from ALL Canadians which can make a HUGE difference with things like Health Care, the environment, city infrastructure, socials safety net, arts and culture or even the failing industries all over the country.

The real strength of a federal government is in the way it can balance the smallest contribution from individuals to make a huge difference that benefits all Canadians. Liberals showed total lack of foresight when they supported this last mini budget, they’ve resigned themselves to being the nagging party instead of governing from the positive – in the process they have become enablers to a conservative mandate which is dragging the majority of Canadians - who did NOT vote for that mandate - with them. I am thoroughly annoyed that this minority gov't is running like a conservative majority because the Liberals have no vision for a greater Canada. The Liberal party need to change direction FAST.

Holy Hollyoaks Lads!

2007-10-22T02:12:00.000-07:00

Recently, I was introduced to - quite by chance really - a cute little British prime time soap called Hollyoaks where John Paul and Craig have been having a steamy love affair/coming out story that's unlike anything I've ever seen on TV.
As I was browsing Youtube for a video, that David had put together in which I was a Latte Drinker - the show Hollyoaks - which has been a bit of a wank-fodder on Channel 4 for over 14 years now - came up on the side bar.
Boy am I glad for having clicked on it.

Hollyoaks is a soap opera about the young and the restless residents of a sleepy little village in England who are bursting into adulthood and bursting out of their underpants. We watch them growing up and having to deal with with life-issues (Pronounced with a very prolonged "sssss" sound; not a "sh" one - PS) that vary from the typical, class, race, theft and blackmail, arson, pregnancy and adultery to the more delicate ones like eating disorders and most recently a gay coming out.

There is something very refreshing about British TV cause they're able to produce daring shows that challenge the norm in a way that is unheard of in American TV while keeping it all fresh and sexy.

Hollyoaks was never quite "My So Called Life" but it has done a major turnaround recently which has seen its popularity go through the roof. The shows also been raking it in at the British TV awards recently ... all the better to them.

All this started last year when they introduced a storyline about a young man called John Paul McQueen , a 17 year old, bright, athletic and sensitive boy next door type who has 5 sisters, who has fallen in love with his best "Mate" Craig Dean which made him come out as a gay man in the most awkward of circumstances. John Paul has since blossomed into a role model for young gays across England and now globally too...

What's really striking is that his coming out story has been dealt with a surprising amount of candor, maturity and sensitivity compared to most soaps - they've made a point of it. Even Degrassi High never quite managed to pull off the narrative of Hollyoaks' writers, though that's more to do with the range [hear AGE] of the actors than the strength of the writer...

John Paul and Craig's story is OUTSTANDING in its' pacing, sensitivity and scope.

The writing and the acting of the story has caught England by storm and made the show into a major hit. I myself have been catching up to the show through vid-bits on Youtube.
(http://www.youtube.com/user/da3343 - Thanks mate) but got the bulk of the storyline of JP & Craig through some torrents that fellow gays have compiled into an 8 hour+ torrent.

I can't recommend the show enough! I've cried a many a tears living through the trials and tribulations of the coming out story and the maturing of John Paul and Craig. It's made me very melancholy for the earlier days of my youth when falling head-over-heals in love was a daily risk.

Hollyoaks' huge fan base has grown exponentially as the show has been covered all over the entertainment news in England. I predict it's going to reach across the ocean in no time fast - and as many of you know by now, my crystal ball predictions are rarely wrong (remember Jame Blunt, Heroes...). It has really captured my imagination; I've not been able to stop watching it since.
In the process I've developed a healthy crush on the actor who plays John Paul - James Sutton (http://gallery.jamessutton.org) a straight bloke that looks not too unlike a BF I had in my mid 20's called Matt. In the process I'm also developing a love for things English (their phrasings and colloquialisms, their fondness of "pints" and their particular mix of hip-and-square-ness - something I never liked before as I was a devout Francophile...hue donc!

Maybe it was the news of my friend Serge dying a few days ago, or the fact that I'm already something-something years old without a love in ...sigh...or maybe it's that I'm watching this amazing piece of TV that none of my friends can relate to because they've never heard about it which has made me feel ... who can say... it's made me very melancholy more than once...oye!

Look for and watch the show - you won't be disappointed.

Time and time again we hear the same chant - Creation and Evolution

2007-06-01T23:40:00.000-07:00

I don't want to dwell on this too much, but I was recently surprised at the number of groups about Creationism on Facebook.

Religion has always been an interest of mine as are most things that impact our lives as humans: economics, politics, history, geology, language, philosophy, psychology, biology and popular media... The parts of the whole of the meaning of life which is also a great concern to the creationist( who also have picture galleries of GW Bush on their sites. Just that fact should be enough to prove that these people have at best a tenuous grasp on reality when they venerate the current president of the US as a hero, as opposed to being, not just the worst president of the country, but also a real menace to world cooperation...but I digress).

Though science is often challenged in the creationist theory, few doubt the importance of scientific thinking which was always challenged by superstitious pseudo sciences like astrology. Much of our scientific thinking as it pertains to Astronomy only came about in the late 1500s mostly due to a man named Kepler who rejected the belief-based science - the norm since Aristotle's theories of perfection - to a way of making sense of the world that relied on precise and rigorous analysis that produced data that was irrefutable: "He was the first Astrophysicist and the last Scientific Astrologer (when he proved that the world was an orb that spun around the sun along with the other planets, a theory that a man in Egypt in 300 BC had surmised from looking at the shadows that columns cast on the longest day of the year which was how he figured out the world was an orb and measured quite accurately how big it was!...but again, I digress)

This is not a treatise on the political right of the US or on the erosion of Secular Humanism out of the public sphere. This is about how simple scientific explanations are often missing from our collective repertoire which make many people "misinterpret a passages from the bible" and start a new group (oh is there a time when one can NOT quote The Simpsons?).

Recently I watched Carl Sagan's vintage series Cosmos. It's a 10 part series on life, the universe and everything. Though a bit dated in look, the content is still solid and up to date. They really put a lot of the big questions like the beginning of the universe and the evolutionary process into a tight and accessible package.

These two videos are the most concise and clear explanation of the universe and time that I've ever seen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxoQTt-UiJw
This one has very brief and beautiful 40 second montage of evolution:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMHNnhAEDN4&mode=related&search=

Everyone should know about these facts - pass it on!

viken

If a Fish cries in the water, can anyone...?

2007-05-22T14:34:00.000-07:00

MelloYello was discovered dead today due to a tragic accident.

As u know, the Koi in my pond have been trained to do tricks like swim, eat food and every now and then jump out of the water and do a loop. Sometime this morning, MelloYello, the most ambitious of my little fish, was training for a big jump without supervision, and found itself stuck in a flower pot that held one of my aquatic plants by the side of the pond.

This is a tragic loss to the fish community, as MelloYello was a huge contributor to the life and Nitrate content of the eco-culture. He must have suffered so much while waiting for someone to notice him and flick him back into the water.

He must have tried to communicate with us, as we see him here trying to make a call on a cell phone, but was unsuccessful in maneuvering through the digital phone entries to reach for help when it needed to.
This is a sad and little known fact that nowadays with our telephone technology so advanced that we can have over 1000 phone number and addresses and multimedia applications in our phones; yet we still have to press 10 buttons before we can access the right menu, then sub menu, then search the name, then choose "home" "work" "mobile" to then dial, then finally switch to "speaker phone" to avoid getting cancer of the ear.

"We've tried to make technology so simple to use, but not simple enough - not for a fish."

Had MelloYello only known that an emergency number was programmed into the voice activated auto-dial system which could have saved him all the fining around wasting precious time and oxygen; all he had to do was press a side button and yell "HELP" into the microphone and the authorities would have been summoned. Alas, this was impossible for MelloYello to do cause my STUPID PHONE DOES NOT WORK IN WATER!

So, its cries for help were hushed by by The Man and His Machine ...unless one of you got a call from my cell phone this morning, maybe there was a message left on your machine of gasping breaths...

It seems that MelloYello's passing is just another case of a deranged narcissist whose cries for help were not heard in a society that doesn't listen to the silent screams of its' various communities in this global eco-society.

We all must share the guilt of the death of MelloYello, the fish that was not understood...that, or the fact that I hadn't filled the pond to the top after it had drained accidentally during the building of the second pond and waterfall feature. We'll never know the truth, but I hope Barbara Walters is listening, as I feel a tear coming on.

My marathon to the Oscars

2007-02-23T00:34:00.000-08:00

I've decided this year to try to watch all the movies that have been nominated for the 79th Academy Awards...

u can of course get the list of all the films online http://www.oscar.com/nominees/, this is something I've always wanted to do and though only Mounir in Montréal could ever get a chance to see all the movies - if he weren’t such a film snob (which I totally understand, cause who really wants to see all the crap) but with the help of internet and a comet I've been able to watch about 17 of the 58 movies...and I'll try to supply u with my predictions... So far I've seen some amazing films...my favorite is still "The Queen"

an amazing portrait of a woman who is an institution, a political turmoil and some good tabloid ...Helen Mirren kicks royal ass. It's a great film all around....yet it looks so demure. I mean it is the queen of England in pajamas to some extent, but it is also about a woman who has been living in this strange bubble of power and privilege and tradition in a stratosphere above everyone else who suddenly realizes she is out of date - and not in a good way. It's a brilliant portrait of a woman and a time...totally worth seeing and I'm sure this film will get its share of Oscar nods. Some of the other noteworthy films that I've seen throughout the year are:

Volver - a great comeback from Almodovar and Carmen Maura. Almodovar seems to make one good and one bad movie after another...I'm so happy he went back to his roots, making "women's films" about the sex he loves and adores. As for Penelope Cruz - Wow...can she act! and somehow she blends into an Almodovar heroine so easily.

Little Miss Sunshine

- a beautifully disturbing film with some amazing performances from all the cast.

Borat - of course, I likah vewry match!
The Inconvenient Truth - for tell all the environmentally unconscious people to wake up or die a slow miserable death.

Jesus Camp is another amazing doco about the very disturbing indoctrination of kids in the ways of Evangelical Right Wing Christianity that is sweeping the United States...a warning I've been yelling out since the late 80's.

Marie Antoinette - for being so thoroughly hollow, another great portrayal of a queen, unfortunately it is so hollow people will always ask the question "why make the film at all". And I saw Curse of the Yellow Flower on my trip to Montreal - another hollow epic with great visuals.

Oh and I saw Superman returns...I think he could have stayed where he was.

Now my Marathon will start as I watch the rest of the movies.

Happy Valentine

2007-02-14T23:40:00.000-08:00

A simple evening this was, my night at Tops and Bottoms Valentine edition.

All my life, with few exceptions, I have found Valentine's to come at a very bad time, I never seem to have someone that I can share all those sappy senitmentalities with in Februray...and frankly when I did have a boyfriend to share it with, I kept missing the deadlines for it.

anywhoo...tonight I was helping out David with his special night of TanB where the guy that I've had a secret cursh on for years was bound to be there...well maybe my crush for Philip is not so secret, I've never been very good at subtelty...it's just not my forte

...well the good thing is that Valentines comes just at the cusp of spring when the first bulbs start to bloom. My favourites Gallanthis (Snow Drops - start to bloom on Feb 3rd) are the first things to bloom in my garden...they are the first of a whole barrage of bulbs that bloom beatifully until June.

Happy Valntines' day everyone

Invisible Cities

2007-02-01T20:28:00.000-08:00

On my last trip to the bilingual city I once called my Montreal, I got one of the red-eyes so I could arrive in the morning and surprise my parents at home. Plus, as always, I can't sleep before leaving on a trip, so I thought I might as well use that time to roll in the miles instead of fidgeting around the house as I always do before.
Anywho... on the way there, I got to fly over the country at night...the cities look so beautiful at night, I took a few pictures, but it was very hard to take a good picture with my camera, something about the shutter speed setting and flying at 1000k/hour...

The cities looked so beautiful in their nightlight, you can almost make out shapes and patterns, but you can’t have any sense of which city it is…it’s almost magical. It made me think of Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities, where Marco Polo describes to Kublai Khan the wondrous cities of his empire the MP recently visited. The book is told in short vignettes with each chapter describing one detail or a characteristic of a particular city. What we get is not a surveyors description of a city, or much less a travel guides’, but it impressions of a place - a memory, that fleeting sense of the past...it's a very personal telling of Marco Polo's Journeys after having left his beloved home of Venice told to a man who has left his beloved village to conquer the world.

They see the world in very different ways, one sees it full of possibilities and wonders, while the other sees them all filled with loss and nostalgia. In the end it turns out that Marco Polo is describing only one city to the Khan - Venice. He is only thinking of his city as he wonders the world searching for his sense of home, describing it to the man who doesn’t relate to his sense of loss...

Going back home was an amazing experience.

v

Mounir's Top Ten 2007

2007-01-21T00:40:00.000-08:00

Here is the latest list of this year's best and worst of Movies, Concerts and Plays (in Montreal) from "my friend the party animal".
This makes a very good wish list of movies to rent the following year, as well as a good bet for the Oscars.
....enjoy!
v

Throughout the year I have what I call BLISS MOMENTS...

... the picnic this past February at the beach in Cape town (sunset, wine and Noella included !!! )... or seeing Joan Collins and Linda Evans on stage together last September.... etc...

But the greatest moments of all are the ones that I spend in dark theatres, holding my coffee and absorbing the MAGIC!!!!

AMONGST THE (record breaking !!!) 76 MOVIES THAT I SAW AT THE CINEMA THIS PAST YEAR ... THIS IS MY TOP 10:

10. AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH

9. RECHERCHER VICTOR PELLERIN

8. VA, VIS ET DEVIENS

7. QUINCEANERA

6. CONGORAMA

5. VOLVER

4. LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE

3. THE THREE BURIALS OF MELQUIADES ESTRADA

2. OMARET YACOUBIAN (THE YACOUBIAN BUILDING)

1. CONVERSATION(S) WITH OTHER WOMEN

HONOURABLE MENTIONS GOES TO...
(IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)

BABEL // THANK YOU FOR SMOKING // LE TEMPS QUI RESTE //
THE SCIENCE OF SLEEP // LE PETIT LIEUTENANT // THE BLACK DAHLIA //
STUPEUR ET TREMBLEMENT //MATCH POINT // LE COUPERET //
CACHE // TSOTSI // BREAKFAST ON PLUTO //
LITTLE CHILDREN // THE QUEEN // SHORTBUS // MARIE-ANTOINETTE //
STRANGER THAN FICTION // RUNNING WITH SCISSORS //
THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND

GUILTY PLEASURE...

THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA
BORAT
JE VOUS TROUVE TRES BEAU
THE HOLIDAY

PURELY BAD...

DUO
TRUST THE MAN
THE DA VINCI CODE

PLAYS ...

LA PROMESSE DE L'AUBE
LE PROJET ANDERSEN
...AND OF COURSE...INCENDIES ( for the second time)

CONCERTS ...

GEORGE MICHAEL-25LIVE (EARLS COURT-LONDON)
MADONNA - CONFESSIONS TOUR (BELL CENTRE -MONTREAL)
PIERRE LAPOINTE
LOTFI BOUCHNAK (PLACE DES ARTS)
GORAN BREGOVIC (JAZZ FEST)

SPECTACLES /DANCE ...

MARGARET CHO -Juste pour Rire fest
MATS EK & JIRI KYLIAN -LES GRANDS BALLETS CANADIENS

ART SHOWS . ..

ANSELM KIEFER-HEAVEN & EARTH

CD'S...

AGNES JAOUI : CANTA
GOTAN PROJECT : LUNATICO
PIERRE LAPOINTE : LA FORET DES MAL-AIMES

VOILA...
2007 BISOUS ...
MK

New Year long time coming

2007-01-01T23:12:00.000-08:00

I hope this message finds you all in good health.

This is my first annual message of peace...I thought I'd give a little summary of my last year. Sometime in June I started working on what ended up being the job that consumed my life. I'm the team lead of the Starbucks Mobile Sampling unit.
The summer I spent giving away thousands of Starbucks goodies at various festival and public event with a wonderful team. With the job, I got to go to every event around town - and beyond: The Abbotsfor Berry Festival and the Air Show, Tour de Gastown, Golden Spike festival, Vancouver International Film Festival, the Writers Festival...the list goes on. I even got to take the mobile unit to such cool places as Kamloops, Kelowna and Vernon...though I spent more of the time under the Van than inside it, working this job has been a huge treat. I have learned a lot as well as got to know some really wonderful people - didn't get too many dates out of it, but I got a lot of shopping done.

But it wasn't always like this... in August I got to go on a road trip with Craig through the Kootneys... as well as my annual pilgrimage to Widgeon Creek on a Canoe.

The last two months have been particularly eventful as I was involved doing samples inside the Safeways of SBUX products. I was so busy with it that I hardly had any time off, so my apologies to all my friends for having missed dinners, Birthdays and Births!
I hope the coming year will be a little easier on the schudule so I can catch up with you all.

Hey this is a good place for you to make your wish for the coming year...and if you post it on this page in the comments section - you know what they say, if you write it down, it is much more likely to come truecome true.

Hugs and kisses all of you...

Viken

Proud old man

2006-10-28T03:36:00.000-07:00

This is an excerp of a letter I just sent to the CBC about a Fifth Estate piece I saw in late night TV. This is in light of having chatted recently with a friend about a mutual young acquaintance who seems so far from ever becoming a noble character that I saw in Bob Edmonds the hero of the documentary.

I just watched the piece about clerks who steal from lottery winners, I was so thankful that you brought such an important case forward. You are right, it could have been me or anyone else who has been cheated out of the winning ticket…really makes you wonder why this report has never been made before - good work!
Though I have to admit that what got me to write this note was actually not just a pat on the back of the great people at the CBC (you guys always have my support and I am sorry I don't say it more often to you...but alas such is the modern world) What impressed me most about this piece was Bod Edmonds himself.
He struck me as a genuine 'good guy' a concerned citizen, a man with a good heart and a strong sense of right and wrong. He is an old man from an older time where virtue was still a practice not just a value. It broke my heart when I heard how much he had to go through with his OWN family who doubted his conviction to correct this wrong. I felt what this man had to go through to get this story on the air was truly a feat fit of demigod...what I'm getting at is that this man seems like a hero to me, a real Canadian hero. He demonstrates and lives by a very strong code of honour (he could never put a mother of three children behind bars no matter how vile she behaved towards him). What really makes him a hero is his sense of modesty. In Bob Edmonds, I see a man who took on Goliath and won, who had his conviction tried and tested but did not brag about his accomplishment.
I hope I can grow up to be a man like Bob Edmonds one day.
Keep up the good work CBC in profiling our great Canadian heroes in the most obscure part of this country, because often great Canadian Heroes are the one who sit by us in the bus not just the high profile personalities that no one can live with. They are genuine and humble and want only what is best for everyone, and they keep their demeanour even in the face of great adversity.
Bob Edmonds, though I can't be of comfort to you during those moments when even your children doubted you much less one of our Crown Corporations - I am very proud to be living on the same planet as someone has your genuine honest goodness. If you were up for a Canadian Hero award, I would vote for you!
All the best to both of you (CBC and Bob Edmonds) for showing us how we can all be great people and citizens.
Viken mekhtarian, a very proud Canadian.

Heroes and Studios

2006-10-02T22:04:00.000-07:00

...the new TV season is upon us and I have found a few good things.

As you know I am not much of a TV watcher, what with my irregular schedule and swimming - which takes up prime time – along with my intolerance of mediocrity, I rarely spend more than a few hours a week in front of the Tube. Though I have, like many of you, had TV as my unpaid babysitter as well as my English tutor when I was a kid, I have outgrown that need and rarely watch live TV for anything more than the news. Except of course for my favourite shows: The Simpsons (inevitable), The West Wing (now defunct), Lost (which I'm looking froward to), most things on CBC - especially the specials - and sometimes the Friday night Anime Line-up on YTV though not so much anymore.
West Wing was by far my favourite and I was very sad to see it end last March, that's why there was an opening for some good TV - something dramatic, smart and cutting edge...

I found two new shows that I think are noteworthy this season.

1 - Heroes – Mondays at 9 on NBC: this show is about a few average folk who develop supernatural powers. One of them can fly, the other can see into the future a third is indestructible – you get the picture... Set in modern urban America, it has a very multiethnic cast - including one guy in Japan who can teleport (but the first place the teleports to is New York! sure saves money on location huh?). Heroes also has that mysteriously eerie narrative which had become quite popoular now: it's a bit of a trend recently for TV shows to work in the realm of the supernatural and esoteric storylines where the audience is never told exactly what is going on but is pulled along on a wild ride: just like LOST - my other favourite show - though I am getting quite upset that they don't have any queer content in it AT ALL, I mean what are the odds of not having any queers among 45 survivors on a flight from Australia?. Heroes is quite captivating and has some WOW moments, though I am afraid that their characters are sketched a bit weak. Unless they beef up these characters, the show will go by the way of CSI franchises...all show and no content.

2-Content is what Studio 60 which follows on Mondays at 10pm on NBC, ...a behind the scenes of a late night comedy show - a thinly veiled Saturday Night Live - where the writers and producers have to put on a new show every week – very post modern really but not as self reflexive as the Garry Shandling Show. It stars Matthew Perry as the head writer who along with a new brilliant and ballsy babe network president and an executive producer, who is a recovering drug addict played by Bradley Whitford of West Wing - see the connection?... are brought together to run this TV icon right after the show's previous producer has a breakdown in front of the cameras ( he goes off badmouthing how shallow Television and all of America have become...you know the speech: the struggle of money and art, the self depecrating stupidity of Reality Television...). The show is a sexy behind the scene of the Hollywood elite wherefast paced corridor chatter (very much like The West Wing) over the top glitz and a stellar cast of guest appearances – Rob Reiner, Felicty Hoffman are de rigueur. The only weak poing with Studio 60 are some of the supporting actors - though the stars of the show are amazing, the stars of the make believe show leave a lot to be desired: I can't beleive them to be stars actually.

My bet is that both Heroes and Studio 60 will live to blow the candle on their second season cake though I am more interested in seeing what happens with the latter. I fear Heroes is going to go by the way of cheesy television like the CSI franchises: cookie-cutter short shallow mysteries. The writing is weak, the characters are just a bit too two dimensional and the scenes are not constructed for their dramatic maximum…but even with that it will be better than most of the mediocrity on the air nowadays. That having been said, I am even more fearful of Studio 60's future even though the writing is very strong and potent while the characters are very complex. I can't see how far they can take that kind of intense drama within this format. I'm afraid that audiences will tire of it quickly or just not get it at all. It would not be the first excetptional TV show that got cancelled - remember My So Called Life? The amazing show about a young verbose and self-reflexsive teenage girl’s growing angst that got cancelled in the early 90’ (but not before it set Claire Danes, Jared Leto and Wilson Cruz on to the world stage - check out the site created by fans http://www.mscl.com/hallway/index.phtml?layout=low still going even after 10 years) or that other most funny of all shows Arrested Development which is still on the brink of demolition.

In either case, it's always good to see high quality programming in the TV line-up, hope you get a glimpse of it too.

Back by Popular demand...or maybe just by a demanding person

2006-09-27T21:23:00.000-07:00

Thank you David for continuously reminding me to update my blog. You are truely a muse for amusement. BTW folks go see David's Tops and Bottoms perform at the Jupiter (one of my favourite venues in town) on Wednesday nights - you will have a great time.
I've always enjoyed David's improvs and despite the fact that I've seen the hand game more times than I count on on four hands - I still can't be at one of his gigs without bursting out in laughter. Check out his site
http://www.davidcjones.ca/flash_opener.html and if you follow the right links, you will bet a big booby surprise.

A word about David - known as David C Jones. On the card it says "C" is for comedy, but I think "C" is for caring, or maybe compassion - I've known David for about 4 years now. He was the Volunteer coordinator at the Comedy Festival, for those of you who have read this blog earlier migh recognise that festival as the one that launched me into the not for profit /Arts and Culutre and Event Managment path. David was so much fun to work for, we became good friends and I cherish (another "C" word) his companionship greatly. Just wish we could hang out more.
You see the last few months have been a very, very busy one for moi. I've been working for a VERY famous coffee company as their mobile marketing unit where we hand out free samples to people in various places. It's a HUGE production that takes a lot of time and requires many logistical thingys...but more on this later - I swear.
For now let me just say how happy I am that at least one person looks forward to reading these entries and much I missed writing them.

viken

Best Coffee Shops in Vancouver

2006-05-19T14:55:00.000-07:00

May, it seems came and is now almost gone, with not one entry of my fabulous tales. Not to say that there have not been any fabulousness - or tail, but it's time that has escaped me.
Time to write, time to ride.
I have been so busy with the Office people, then there is Bingo which has now gone weekly, a part time job with Cannon and a little bit of work for Out On Screen.

Between all these responsibilites, somehow I managed to score two days for a visit by my oh so lovely cousin Tristan, who was visiting the Mainland as a part of his apprenticeship to become a java guru. He has started working for a cafe in the trendy downtown core of Nanaimo where his boss has been encouraging him to learn more about the passion of coffee.
So we spent those two days going from one coffee shop to the next, he had a list of 10 to which we added a few. I was simply a tour-guide in this coffee bar-crawl, but Tristan, had to sample all the espresso which by nightime he was not well for.

We started the trip with Artigiano's.
A Vancovuer hot-spot where my friend Dejan works. It is the most popular cafe around and the company is growing like a baby strabucks. Apparently they just opened 55 stores in Korea... but I digress. They started in a small store in Cappuccino Lane on Hornby St across from the lawcourts a few years back. There were three novelty coffee shops right next to each other - talk about competition...unbeleivable really. Two years later, Artigiano is way ahead of the pack, it is now synonimous with classic good coffee with all the fancy designs. It has HUGE lineups all the time, which means that it's not the place for a quiet cup. However, the energy is very rich and tasty with fancy artwork to boot. You're paying for the quality for sure, but are taxed heavily for the design.

Next was Joe's Cafe on Commercial Dr.
... a kind of an East Side tradition - though I still don't understand why frankly. It certainly has no atmosphere or anything that is remotely Italian; unless of course lack of atmosphere or design is still considered to be one. It's a huge hall with pool tables, arcades and a large bar where mdiocre coffee is made. The clientelle is undistinguishable with a smattering of leftovers from the days Commercial Drive was the italian district of Vancouver. Now it just has the reputation of once having had a reputation: I guess that' the definition of tradition.

Another Commercial tradition is Callibria's
which is the antithesis of Joe's. Callibria slaps you hard with atmosphere even from the street... with its white colums, Greek and Roman statues and its stucco painting of - you guessed it - scenes from the sistine chappel, it is a sight for your eyes. And just to make it totally memorable, every now and then - when it strikes his fancy- the owner or one of his three sons hits a chord and belts out a tune. This is not a regularly scheduled event, it's more like a lottery. We were lucky NOT to have been serenaded so, which meant we could leave the place eariler and the beverage barely drunk.

I was totally going to give up on commercial Drive, when we walked into Continental Coffee and met Mike. Not only was he the cutest barrista we had met so far (though the prize for cutest goes to the fiercly photogenic flamer at Joe's caffee) but absolutely passionate about the prodcut. We learned more from that short coffee than we had the whole day....and boy was that coffee good, it was heavenly: smooth with a medim body and a clean finish that lingered like caramel. He made it with such attention and pride! He then pointed us at a few other places whose coffee needed to be sampled, but we had to leave that for the next day.

Lovely Little Lyricisms of Language

2006-04-17T21:27:00.000-07:00

Every now and then when I’m leaving a message on a friends’ answering machine, I catch myself - albeit too late - suddenly start rhyming my message, like:

Hey Brian
How you doin’
Sorry I missed you
Just wondering what you were up to...

I don’t really write them down or anything, it’s kind of automatic; but I do get a kick out of doing this - though I'm not sure how my friends appreciate it. I have left quite a few of these messages over the years, and given the fact that they are most definitely NOT being archived, I must be repeating myself by now. It is, however, sure that I am leaving excessively long and rather meandering messages. I just like the way the words sound - though some might argue that it's the sound of my voice that I like. I predict many think it's the latter but I beg you let me make my case before you judge.

I have always been fascinated by the way a language sounds: each language has a distinct range of sounds that are made with the throat for each word as well as the way these words are strung together in a phrase. For someone who has learned 9 of them by now, I have obviously developed a special relationship to them that might not be common among monolinguals.

Picking up a language has always come easy for me, but learning the rules has always come last. This is the case with most people I predict, but it seems extra easy for me to start imitating the sounds than learning the reasoning behind it. My challenge with German has always been that: I can read the damn language so easily, but I can’t get past level II when it comes to composing comprehensible phrases. Language is sound essentially (though the deaf might challenge me vehemently on this - I take their gesturing in silence) and I have always been fascinated in the way making different sounds makes a language. I notice this even when I’m writing – like a few of the entries in this Blog: I compose with the sonic scales in mind.

You see, one of my all time favourite passages in literature has always been the opening lines in Lolita by Vladimir Nabakov.

Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo.Li.Ta

...wow, the words haunt me every now and then. I can't get over how beautiful this passage sounds – he clearly composed these line for it’s orchestral track - it’s a symphony in T major. Just look at the number of times the letter “T” appears, it’s almost in every word. What’s more “T” is used in all of its phonic variations: soft T, hard T and the “th” T. It is so palatable to read that you almost have to read it out loud so you just to give it credit. It’s lyrical, poetic, logical and self referential…this is ART folks, at its finest moments.

Nabakov is well known for doing these kinds of constructs. His stories often precisely provoke an image, or a sound or a state of mind as well being full of mysterious riddles that intrigue and linger in the mind. He loved words and language - he spoke at least four of them and wrote in just as many. He loved writing AND he loved chess: he was a master tactician. Like an expert chess player, he planned all of his moves down to the minutest detail with mathematical precisions on little cue cards, before he started writing. When you read his work, you are invited into a world that is so complex and rich in texture and history that you can get hours of entertainment deciphering one paragraph. As in chess, the more you get to know the game the more you start to see it as more than just a hunt for the king by a band of disabled soldiers, but a dance of innumerable combination of moves and strategies that are played out like a well rehearsed tango. All the moves in chess are archived and named after long-gone players; once you learn the moves, the game becomes a historical saga constantly referring to itself as a construct. Nabokov’s books are often layered in imbedded in meaning in its construct. This is all very Roland Barthes esque, it’s just too bad that Nabokov hated Semiologists - in fact he hated everyone from what I can tell, just not one of the popular kids at school I suppose... I guess that goes with being a Russian aristocrat.

Anywhoo…

Reading Nabokov has taught me to read literature and appreciate lyricism – I find I am much more aware of the way words are written and sound since I read his books. Unfortunately this kind of awareness sometimes makes one sound a tad eccentric. Alas!

First there was the word, and the word was ...overused

2006-03-22T21:30:00.000-08:00

I was treated to another lovely evening with Craig - whom many of you remember as my partner in crime for daring art experiences, who had just returned from a Kayaking trip in Cuba with a few sexy little Cohiba cigarillos and tales of corruption and bureaucracy in the Caribbean - grace a Ken Hammlin, the sexy young publicists for Prodigal Son, the Sean Macdonald play about one man's struggle to commune his Catholic upbringing with his gay life. We were in good cie as other local celebs had flocked to this performance of the play including Pam Gill, Kevin Simpson, the Boca de Lupo crowd and a few of the usual theatre-going suspects....all minor stars in their own right

...too bad the play didn't shine like the audience did.

Now we all know that the young gay man is going to come to terms with his religiosity at a crucial moment of redemption when his dad is on his deathbed ready to accept his long lost son...well you know the story of Prodigal Son from the Old Testamen...don't need ot repeat it? It seemed that the Mr Macdonald felt he needed to. So all the actors go on talking about God, God, God, as if he was your neighbor, your principal or your el presidente. I can't even count the number of times God was used in the dialogue- wasn't there another passage in that same book that forbade the number of times you could take that word in vain?

Here's my beef with the play. When you are dealing with religion, you need to find new ways of describing what is essentially a very very old idea. You can't just keep pounding the word of God in, expecting a change in our understanding of it.

Generally we are uncomfortable with religion being talked about publicly - vestigal remains of secular humanism I fear, like democracy. We, as Canadians, are particularly uncomfortable with it. The story is set in Montreal in the 70's - a place that just broke out of the Duplessi's religous yoke of with the quiet revolution -and promptly began a cultural one. There is no need for tabooing the subject from the public sphere, except for the fact that religion, which is such a powerful personal experience, can get very righteous, and damn right hypocritical when it's yelled over the soap-box. We seem to cringe when we hear God being talked about like a righteous, powerful magician patriarch as he is in the OT.

The playwright was obviously attempting to shed light on this malaise we have about religion, particularly for the homosexual clan, who have a huge stake in this unholy matrimony. But subtlety is key in these delicate matters, and this production just did not pull it off. I blame it mostly on the layout of the stage at Pacific Theatre which weakened the great theatrical tools - hence the powerful message - at play. Pacific Theatre is a tiny stage at the bottom of two opposit sets of risers in a church basement, where you are always seeing the faces of the audience across from the actors... You get a very different sense of intimacy in that space, which does not lend itself to fancy lighting or mis-en-scene to tell your story - which this play was quite heavily dependant on. Essentially the church-space was sabotaging God's message...oh the irony.

...and did I mention the writing could have used a little more work? The story of a young man who leaves his home to go on a quest/search to commune with nature, to fight evil and learn about the truth, to find peace and god and bring it back to his people... is the oldest story in the world. It's everywhere from Homer to Star Wars... Joseph Campbell, in Hero of a Thousand Faces, says it's the essential human experience story that is shared by all... myths retell the story by keeping it alive - and vice versa.

Anyway, Prodigal Son, the play, was NOT the next installment in the Hero Myth...It's a way too preachy, just like Catholisism - as this review is starting to become. So off I go.
Don't bother to see it, rent Breaking the Waves by Lars Von Trier instead.

Moments in Memory

2006-03-20T20:09:00.000-08:00

As I was walking back home from my latest temporary assignment today, I was thinking back on the last two years and the things or moments that I really enjoyed and cherished, specially seeing that so much of my time has been spent NOT collecting wealth or building a resume.

One of them was producing Jumpin' Jack by Lyle Victor Albert for Theatre Terrific Society which had a 10 day critically acclaimed run at Havana in Nov '04. I was dealing with an actor who had MS, a director who had lots of BS and an SM who had...all I got from her are X es and O's. They were such a lovely bunch of people to work with, I have only good memories when I think of those three months of my life, despite the fact that I had NO IDEA what I was doing ... But the energy was great, and though I couldn't have done it without the help of a stable of volunteers, I am very proud of my accomplishments and think it was a real turning point in my life.

That enthusiasm and fearlessness might have something to do with the fact that I had just returned from a month long holiday driving across the country in my pickup seeing all the wonderful things that only other people who travel across the country ever get to see.

The time I spent in Dinosaur Park, in the Badlands of Alberta, and the day and night in beautiful Winnipeg and that loooooong drive across Ontario, and that feeling of being home when I hit the Laurentians... and then the Kootenays...sigh.
Intermittent amongst the stunning stoic vistas of this country were moments of sheer fright when a rigg whizzed by whacking my car with it's turbulence, rattling and shaking my hood - which had been busted quite seriously by an X whose divorce settlement this car was - that only hung there by a thread for 7 years - both hood and x. It was particularly scary when I was riding at night, in freezing rain with a freshly broken headlight (from a pebble that had smashed it) in a truck full of Louis XVI antiques threatening to overthrow the rain tarp that was flapping in the wind at 130+K/Hr ... what a ride!

I was lucky enough to have made a little bit of money on the stock market with some day-trading that allowed for all this distraction...though I fear I have been paying for it since, and will do so for six more years...alas. I now have to earn a real living to continue doing things I want to do, but I am very proud of the things I have done so far... hope I don't forget that. Which is why I am writing these thoughts down I think so that the 2-3 people who read this will...oh what the hell, I just hope I don't get sued for liable for writing these.

Microcosmos - Life in a CoOp

2006-03-19T11:41:00.000-08:00

Hello to all people who are living or plan to be living in CoOp Housing.

As you may already know, I live in one of the nicest homes in the worst part of town: the MauDan Gardens CoOp on Jackson Keefer and Jackson, a gated community that takes up a whole city block full of huge trees and birds - two blocks from Main and Hastings.

To get an idea what CoOp Housing is all about, check out some of the local and federal housing bodies http://www.chf.bc.ca/pages/about.asp that fund and oversee the units. By definition CoOp's provide a product or service at the best prices to its members - in this case housing. To take advantage of this price break, you will need to be a member of the CoOp which, due to demand, often means having to qualify through a stringent set of criterias and wait lists. There are many such rganisations, so make sure you are well informed on the process 1. Getting into one could be very time consuming, what with wait lists, and interviews, and selection commitees, but you might as well get used to the pace of decisionmaking, cause being patient with the process is essential to understand and live well in a CoOp.

Once you become a member and move into your new home, you are quickly bombarded by requests to join this committee or that activity. Participating in the governance of a CoOp is an essential component of CoOp living, so picking and choosing the right compatibility between your skills and the CoOp's needs will make for a long, productive and harmonious relationship in your new community 2. Given that most of the work is done on a volunteer basis by members. Motivation is essential in manitaining good participation hence good productivity in the managment of the little village that is the CoOp.

Because essentially the CoOp is a little village; a group of people who have to live and work together to accomplish things that are necessary for theirs and their community's well being. Wether it's a small block appartment with 20 people, or a large housing block of hundreds, the structure and needs are the same: collect money, keep the budget, maintain the infrastructure and common areas, accommodate and solicit members and deal with changes and emergencies, while acting within the law ...if you get all this done, then you can plan for some fun and festivities. Essentially it is resource management.

These are pretty much the needs of all societies or cities or countries or even empires: Taxes, Natural Resources, Civil Engineering, Population Growth, Political Structure and Arts / Culture. What is needed is good accounting, fiscal responsibility, good planning, a cooperative attitude, a functionning process, but most importantly it needs the people with the right skillsets to make it all happen.

The issues that come up in CoOps are the ones you read about in the newspapers - only at a smaller scale. The first and foremost is the need for money - are we making enough from the housing charges to cover the running costs as well being albe to do all the things we need to accomodate amortisation and emergencies. If there is a shortage of this one resource, then the strain will ripple down to the other parts of the organisation as people not only have to choose what to spend the money on, but often have to compensate for money with volunteer time. Who gets to choose which things are a priority and which requests are adressed or ignored. This is the starting blocks of all human governments, which is always cluttered by ideology, red-tape, power and influences, corruption and a largely inactive and incohesive population whose needs the system must meet. As you may asertain by now, this scenario is also the cause of most conflicts - a natural result of discrepencey between needs and resources.

I feel this describes in essence the factors at play with most organisations though I feel I would need a volume to be able to draw clear examples, which I hope one day to do, if it has not already been done to death by anthropologists.

Anyway, my chronicles of the events in my CoOp will follow this model: using situations and relationships in the day-to-day managment of our little village to reflect on the events and situations that we deal with as a global village. If enough of the variables are the same, then the analogy would be a very helpful one in understanding the issues we have to deal with as a society in Vancouver/BC/Canada/ North America/... and so on.

One example of such comparative analysis has always been the film Microcosmos http://imdb.com/title/tt0117040/. It studies the lives of insects and plants and the relationships they manage in going about their life cycles. The one big difference of course is the influence of individuals in the direction and outcome of events. Though we can't say everyone is the same, there is a long standing tradion started in the Human Sciences that looks at how most people react to most situations in similar ways. In that generalisation lies the diversity that is human existance - which can also be studied scientifically when you take into consideration, gender, race, wealth, intelligence, background, mental health and ideology. The key here seems to be to identify the behaviours and dynamics of events and issues in the group to mirror it's similarities with larger groups.

...Still not sure where this blogg is going, I am attempting to make a comparative analysis of human behaviour in a small cooperative with society at large: the Macro and Micro of existance. But I'm not sure of the structure of this blogg...will have to revist this later I think - thanks for reading this far (comments are welcome)

The Fine Print
1.These wait lists are managed by the membership committee who look at applicants based on a set of criterias that are set by the governing bodies and/or the CoOp membership itself. Criterias are usualy based on the number of people in the household, the financial situation and maybe some compatibility or demographic needs of the CoOp. The applications are reviewed by the commitee and their decision is then reviewed by members of the CoOp Board of Directors who are the elected body of the membership. Once you get through the application process then you have to buy a share of the CoOp to become a member. This shareprice is set by the CoOp governing body and/or the members of CoOp and can vary from a few hundred to a few thousands - this fee is refundable when your membership is terminated.
2. The decision as to how to participate in the managment of the community will greatly influence your and your community's future, so think carefuly and act accordingly - because things can easily get unharmonious and down right nasty if there is a bad fit.

Elections and Dictators - Firsts and Lasts

2006-03-07T21:28:00.000-08:00

This weekend, I got to see the opening performance of Titus Andronicus and the closing show of Clown Elections.
The first is one of Shakespear's earliest plays which is rarely produced, the latter is an original play by the very prolific local Bil Marchand, whose film and TV credits speak like the who's who of Vancouver arts scene. Both a treat to see, but one ages better with time than the other.

Clown Elections has all the makings of a hit play

Great plot: two wannabe gay artists have run out of money, booze and drugs and are trying to pass the time brainfucking each other as they avoid work.
Great premise: we are in the living room of the two poor souls as they go up and down the emotional scale from masochism and sadism in their armchairs in a small theatre in the round.
Great poster: the actors are blond and brunette versions of mid-twenties' hotties who spend the whole play in their tattered underwear, jumping and bobbing across the stage.

The actors are unmistakably talented, one more than the other and the dialogue was very clever - and with a little refining, this play will be a huge hit. If it is ever remounted - which I hope it does, as not enough people got a chance to see this.

Speaking of remounts, just when you though there could not be another Shakespeare being produced...ENTER Titus Andronicus: one of the least mounted plays.

This production is rumored to have been a west coast premiere, which might have to do with the extreme violence depicted in the story as well as the fact that ...well, it just is not the best bit of the Bard.
United players is an Artist's CoOp which means that the actors are professionals and can handle the lines. Which they did, though it seemed a little hurried.
Relevance: remounting Shakespeare always seems to beg the question "why this now?" There were some hints of American Imperialism with Gitmo and the Goths being a stand in for the Arabs...but really a weak connection, one that never blossomed.

I was glad to see both of them, but I found Clown Elections had more of an impact hence value, whereas seeing another Shakespeare play sometime just ends up being that - another Shakespeare play. Don't get me wrong, I love reading them, as the words are quite lyrical and powerful, but they can easily get lost in a theatre production - unless of course that's your thing. But like Socrates in the Platonic dialogues, I often feel that he is writing just to hear himself speak. There are moments of great lucidity and insight, and the rhythm is unmistakable, but it can go on sometimes!

Clown Elections also goes on for a while, but it is the first time you are hearing them! Though a bit reminiscent of Who's Affraid of Virginia Wolf and the early works of Kassavetes, it is an original attempt at portraying a very specific time and headspace.

more on the value of focus and intention in art later.

Bingo Galore

2006-03-01T21:05:00.000-08:00

Second and Forth Tuesday of the month at the fabulous Oasis Lounge on Davie st. http://www.friendsforlife.ca/gaybingo.html Hosted by Joan-E and Justine Thyme, and a few of the regulars drag queens for whom this is the first stop of the evening (which really is the afternoon for them) Gay Bingo at its best - or worst.
As usual, the we are treated to great entertainment ... which gets more entertaining as the host gets treated to more and more alcoholic treats on the house! Joan-E is one of the funniest performers around... and she is building quite the reputation as a thespian - but don't ever call her that to her face!. She was recently featured on the Collector, where she plays the devil in drag - but truely, she is an angel!
It is a pleasure working with her...oh yeah, I am the newly minted prize coordinator for Bingo For Life - Formerly Gay Bingo. Though my job description is a bit mercurial at this point, I am enjoying all the work- which is just like shopping. I collect items/donations from business and organizations that we, in turn, give away as prizes for the winners of Bingo... Joan-E has been nursing this event at various locations across town for a few years now. She has raised over $150 000 with it and it is going strong. We hope to make this event a weekly event, but there is lots of work that needs to be done first.
So come on by and play some Bingo - that's were I will be every other Tuesday! See you there.

SketchFest Vancouver

2006-02-23T19:47:00.000-08:00

Been a bit of a busy week for me this week, so I haven't had a chance to rave about the great comedy I saw at SketchFest Vancouver last weekend, produced by Pink Vixen Productions - Morgan Brayton's baby comedy show.
But small is one thing this show ain't... it is filled with BIG talent! Blackout Broadcast is a Vancouver staple of sketch comedy. Their whole bit is three announcers reading the radio program...then came Bucket: a recently formed comedy duo of Paul Bee and Charles Demers. They sure make use of that liberal arts degree ...to get laughs. Very smart, great delivery...and even some wonderful physical comedy. Bucket really kicked ass, just hope that Charles doesn't kick the bucket, seeing as most funny fat sketch artists die in their prime (their line, not mine!) I expect we will see a lot more of these two ... hope so!

Then there was Killing my Lobster all the way from San Fran! The four of them packed up to make the long journey North - very international! They seem to be getting quite the reputation as funny folk. They do some great physical comedy and a great song bit about High Heels.
But you haven't seen physical comedy until you've seen Cody Brian - another international sensation, this time all the way across the wandafuca (?) Bellingham! I would hate to have been a stage hand after these guys though...they fling water, clothes, food and a whole slew of objects as well as themselves all across the stage with each sketch. They have a keen sense of props and make belive...They are a treat to see, but don't sit in the first row!

...oh those poor stage hands - what could we do without those volunteers. Sketchfest is all volunteer run, under the guidance of our lady of the Pink, and whomever she has recently snagged. Morgan is great at picking amazingly talent and putting one hell of a funny line-up. She was the Manager of the Van Int'l Comedy Festival in 2004 - which was my first not-for-profit-gig, where I met some of the coolest people I know.

No doubt one of the greatest joys of volunteering for these events are the people you meet. They really make the show - in many ways. Our volunteer Coordinator was Rebecca Hales - what a Dynamo! Sure we will be seeing her on the red carpet at some point. She is a writer who works at the Vancouver Film School and is able to manage a whole slew of projects and volunteers with a chipper manner in 6 inch heels. Good luck sweets in all your endeavors.

Nowadays I have become a full time volunteer again!. Jut got on the Board of Directors of Out On Screen. I am also the Prize Coordinator of the Bingo For Life at Oasis. More on that later.

A Simple Curve

2006-02-12T00:36:00.000-08:00

Craig and I just attended a Canada Screens evening which is a new program being run at the Vancity Theater of the VIFF Centre where they spotlight one Canadian film every month www.canadascreens.firstweeendclub.ca. Check them out! They are doing real good work. Despite the great reviews and awards, the film is in limited distribution and might not make it on the screens for long, it just got pulled from Toronto but it is breaking records in Nelson, BC.

We saw A simple Curve: a belatedl coming of age story of a young man who lives in the last hippie heartland in Canada - and maybe the world. Set in the majestic mountains of the Kootenays in south-eastern BC where small towns are beaded along the valley highways that were once so popular among the fleeing US deserters in the 60’s and are still popular today with self absorbed young granolas and counter culture folk who congregate there to live off the land and the grid. It’s a very mature and funny portrayal of rural life in a very special part of the world.

Caleb, played by Kris Lemche of Joan of Arcadia, a 27 YO guy still living at home, is contemplating his future in the economically stagnant backwater town where he and his Vietnam draft dodging widower father, who had pitched his commune tent there once, operate a non-lucrative woodworking shop. Their financial hardship is only heightened by his fathers’ idealistic approach to the craft that defies business sense and economic realities. They live a meagre but wholesome lifestyle but Caleb is faced with the challenge of carving out a living so he can start his own family in his native town.

As one retiring captain of a cross-Atlantic ship said to a young couple emigrating to BC from Scotland: “You can’t eat the Mountains!” Making a living in the country can be difficult, but the high fibre diet of nature is quite good for the soul.

Enter rich developer uncle. A renounced-hippie who rekindles the alpha male head butting of the yesteryears with the father who challenges our young hero to make his Sophie’s Choice.
With a witty and well written script, and a great cast, the film depicts the wonderful relationship of father and son who each have something to teach the other as they reach across age and cultural gaps that separate the older hippy from the young Gen Xer.

Huge stunning vistas of the rolling forrests and valleys also add a flavour to the film that is unique. Life in the Kootenays is very special indeed, not only can you have all the sexual partners of you ever had under one roof at one time, but it’s a place where time stands still, where mountains, lakes and forests murmur the wisdom of the ages, where teeppee dwelling urban-expats congregate to commune with nature and live the simple life.

Your urban-narrator was once such a pilgrim in the late 90’s, and to this day I remember the effect that landscape had on me. I noticed on my return trip from Montreal in 2005 where the sight of the once familiar skyline filled me with nostalgia and charged my batteries. Apparently everywhere that this film was shown, there has been someone who was from the Kootenays who attested to the authenticity of the movie…a great backdrop for a beautiful story of people who have to leave their home and loved ones to be able to find peace.

I think this film might make a great TV series though. Given the desperate need of the CBC to marry tender dramas with CanCon, coming of age stories in obscure Canadian locations are de rigueur nowadays ...which can be made even more dramatic were you to add the rednecks and pot growers, who were absent from the casting call, into the equation. However, the filmmaker, who is originally from the Slocan Valley, thinks that it would be stretching the story too much; but overstretching a thin story down to an even thinner veneer is a not-too uncomfortable reach for Hollywood producers, which means that we might see a carbon copy of this film, specially with the recent attention that the deserters of this current war are getting.

Great and Small

2006-02-05T14:25:00.000-08:00

Last Saturday I was treated to a view of Saturn by one of my neighbours who had set up a telescope in the Co-op grounds (apparently you can borrow a pretty fancy telescope from any of the astronautic societies when you become a member -what a deal). What I saw through the little lense was a miniscule grey orb surrounded by those unmistakable rings (just like this pic)...fleeting out of the viewfinder at a steady speed. When I saw the planet, I started getting nausea as if I had vertigo... it looked so real, and so far!
I have always been awed by the stellar bodies of outerspace, but I can't quite get a grasp of their proportions. I am fascinated by the sheer size and number of these things that live in neighborhoods whose addresses require whole blackboards of equations and a few PHD's to pin point - out there in the unimaginable emptiness of space where even light takes decades to travel. I never really can get a real sense of scale on them - I mean, how do you visualise millions of light years?
Though I am able to pick out a few of the planets and constellations out of the night sky, nothing compares to the sheer number of lights that can be see when you are out of the reflective light of the urban centres. When I was living in the country, I was amazed at how bright the night sky was with its shimmering of lights from worlds that seem to go on forever. Looking up at them, sometimes I would feel like I was going to fall down...
I don't take much notice of the stars nowadays as I go on in my day to day; I forget their greatness in my routine. But what an impression they make when you see them live...really adds a sense of perspective to life. When you think of their sheer vastness, how can you not help but feel small - and insignificant!
In Douglas Adams' Restaurant at the End of the Universe, there is a torture machine which can break even the strongest of wills by simply showing the torturee the huge size of the universe in comparison to them. When compared to how unbelievingly huge the universe is, one person's will just doesn't stand a chance - the survivors of this torture machine end up as vegetables.
I do wonder how come I felt nausious as I saw the little planet - it must have been a kind of circuit breaker - meant to self protect (though I could easily have fallen and hit my head on a planter) It was a very visceral reaction for sure and it was different from seeing a picture, that little image had a scale that I could grasp. Well check this out for size.

"A handful of sand contains one millions grains of sand, one thousand handfuls make a billion. there are one hundred billion individual stars within our galaxy, and there are at least 50 billion galaxies in the universe...there are more stars in the universe than there are grains of sand in every beach on earth" - The Planets, BBC. (NB: they are reffering to stars, not planets!)

Check out "The Planets", it's an 8 part series done in 1999. It's very thorough and informative, and there is no shortage of "whoa!" moments in it ...and great graphics.
or check out the NASA site...http://www.nasa.gov/home/index.html?skipIntro=1
- if you have read this far, then I might be able to get you copies of the Planets - just ask
...more to follow - I smell a sequel!

Brian Jungen at the Vancouver Art Gallery

2006-02-04T16:11:00.000-08:00

Last Tuesday night, Jody and I treated ourselves to an evening of culture at the VAG. I was dying to see Brian Jungen's work for a while now, and a rainy night was as good an excuse as any to visit our Art Gallery. His use of modern matertials to recreate native artifacts is awesome. I was having an experience - communing with art and history... Jungen's use of everyday items like plastic chairs and sneakers to create objects that reminisce about history, art and native culture is nothing short of amazing.
In the main foyer of the Gallery, you are greeted with a huge white sculpture reminiscent of a Dinosaur skeletons hanging high above you, made from plastic lawn chairs. There are a few of these sculptures, all paleontological in reference though the creatures look more and more mythical.
The other things that caught my attention were the native masks made from Michael Jordan Nike sneakers. The craftsmanship is exceptional and simple at the same time - some of the sneakers had been altered so little to look like a Haida mask that it really makes you think... or the two storey Tepee made of Italian black leather couches...The whole exhibit is very thought provoking. The juxtaposition of materials and products charges these items with a meaning that transcends their conventions. When you consider that the dinosaurs who ruled the world 300+ million years before humans were on the planet, are now nothing more than bones and fossils of which plastic chairs are made by the millions which in turn will survive humans for another 300 million years ...Wow!
There are a few ways of approaching Jungen's art, there is no shortage of meaning that can be ascribed to it, which is what makes his work great art.
I think it was Jean Luc Goddard who once said (Art is the process by which objects acquire humanity. I don't think he was thinking of A.I, but rather that old idea that the physical world has its limitations in which people transcend when they are effected by love, music, compassion, spirituality - a la Plato and Wittgenstein.
Hope you can see this exhibit - it's worth it.
More on the greatness of life and the insignificance of being later as we visit Saturn

Berkinhead and Back

2006-01-30T23:05:00.000-08:00

I have learned a few more things about effective blogging on the internet since my last entry from a grumply old man who has always kept me in stitches: Wes Wesling! He is a very insightful and avant-garde kind of guy, who makes it his business to know everything. We had a long conversation about how to write, and not to write blogs, including key words as well as interesting ways of making money with the internet - a whole whack of it too, check out http://milliondollarhomepage.com/.
Wes was so inspired by my blog that he has started his own - I am just proud that I was the motivation that inspired him to start sharing his thoughs - some people are inspired by greatness others by mediocrity! Whichever it is, I can't wait to read the blogs...look for his instructions on the best ways to eat a banana.

Early Sunday morning (and I mean early! not quite the grace matinale that your humble narrator is used to on the eight day of the week) my good friend and confidente Carolina and her pack (that's her mom Judith in the pic) went to visit Berkinhead by Squamish to watch the Bald Eagles. Many tourist flock to the region to count the majestic birds feeding their young. In september, there are so many spawning Salmon in there that the river turns red! Sometimes hundreds of Eagles nest on the trees along the shores feasting on the salmon. We saw a few baby eagles that had perched on the branches... See how small their tail feathers are - cool huh?

It was a beautiful ride with many photo opportunities - just wish I had mastered the digital cameras I was borrowing. It's a great getaway from the city and a wonderful way to commune with nature. Just a few words of advice:

Go early! The birds do much of their feeding right at dawn before the place is filled with hikers and rafters. So leave Vancouver around 6 AM to make it there by 7 ish.
Make sure you have good directions on how to get there cause there are no clear directional signs in sight. http://www.straight.com/content.cfm?id=12749 The entrance to the park is righ through a half-descent residential area that looks only semi-friendly... so don't be stubborn, ask for directions before you get there - don't be stubborn now!
Bring something to eat, cause you will be getting back to civilization at the same time that most civilized people are thinking about brunch. Which means you will have to drive around a few places before you can find one spot without a huge lineup.
Don't ride backward on the Sea to Sky highway or West Vancouver, specially when you haven't had any food for 6 hours- even if the conversation in the backseats is enthralling. Nausea can really be a conversation killer.

That was my Sunday folks - oh and I swam 2.2KM in one hour.

an eastern addition

2006-01-23T23:20:00.000-08:00

Hi folks,

I should thank someone very special in my acceptance speech of your award of gratitude: my old friend - the one who will never grow old (as opposed to the ones who look younger every day - you know who you are!) and most endearing confident: Mounir (aka Mark, Manou, Minou...) of Montreal/Montmartre/Marash . I am very proud to call him my friend for over 15 years now. We met at Concordia studying French Cinema under Serge Lozic. I learned more from my chats over coffee with Mounir and his unbelievable regime of watching every foreign film that came to Montreal, than I did from the Great Lozic. I am only sorry that I can't do coffee with him every Sunday and enjoy his eastern ways in the in Jewel of the St-Lawrence: Montreal... missing you much manou, j'oublirais jamais ``La Pomme`` MT

Mark has been doing his yearly "best of list" for ages, it is something I look forward to reading every new year, and I would like to pass on a sampling of his reviews.

Folks, you should do what Mounir says (he told me to say this BTW)!

your humble midwife,

viken

A new year...and a new list!!!!

AMONGST THE 71 MOVIES THAT I SAW AT THE CINEMA THIS PAST YEAR ... THIS IS THE 10 OR 12 CHOSEN ONES ...
10. MILLION DOLLAR BABY
9. TIE: CAPOTE & CRASH
8. HEAD ON
7. PARADISE NOW
6. 2046
5. ME AND YOU & EVERYONE WE KNOW
4. HAPPY ENDINGS
3. BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN
2. TIE: LA MALA EDUCACION & MYSTERIOUS SKIN
1. C.R.A.Z.Y

HONOURABLE MENTIONS GOES TO... (IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)

THE SEA INSIDE// DOWNFALL// PALINDROMES// SARABANDE//
LA NEUVAINE// WHERE THE TRUTH LIES// 5X2// SIN CITY//
HOTEL RWANDA// LE ROLE DE SA VIE//STAY//
KING KONG// VIPERE AU POING// BROKEN FLOWERS//
ILS SE MARIERENT ET EURENT BEAUCOUP D'ENFANTS// SYRIANA

PURE PLEASURE(S)...

VISUAL FEAST: LA MARCHE DE L'EMEREUR
CHARLIE & THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY

MUSICAL FEAST:
MESDAMES & MESSIEURS

GUILTY PLEASURE...

CORPSE BRIDE, CRUSTACES & COQUILLAGES,
PODIUM

PURELY BAD...
BE COOL

PLAYS ...

ENLEVEMENT, SEQUESTRATION ET MISE A MORT D'UN HUMORISTE

CONCERTS ...
FAIROUZ (PLACE DES ARTS)
OMARA PORTUANDO (PLACE DES ARTS)
LHASA (CORONA)

SPECTACLES...
FEMMES D'ORIENT ( PDA)
LADY BUNNY @ JELLO BAR

ART SHOWS . ..
PINAKOTHEK DER MODERNE -MUNICH
GELLERT HOTEL & SPA IN BUDAPEST
AND ... 90% OF THE CITY OF PRAGUE!!!

VOILA...

2006 BISOUS ...

MK

Next installment ...Brokeback Mountain et al

2006-01-22T06:07:00.000-08:00

So here I am once again trying to put my thoughs on paper, or should I say in lights!
Thought I would follow up with some of the Arts & Culture stuff that I get so see. Sort of a diary of the good, the bad and the tearful... don't know if many of you are aware of my Multi-Teared Rating System where I rate the films I see based on how much they make me cry. Well I get to cry a lot in movies - but not just when the violins swell...But it's a reaction to the intensity of the emotions, and the complexity of the scenario: other people's brilliance brings me to tears. Putting aside the psychological implication of this reaction as it reflects on my own successes, I do find it's a consistent way of separating the good movies from the great ones: the boys from the men so-to-speak!

Speaking of self indulgent man-boys...Breakfast on Pulto by Neil Jordan with Cillian Murphy playing a whoop-di-do tranny in the 60's in Ireland is a rant of a movie. Chronicling the life of a down and out catholic boy whose mother abandoned him at the footsteps of the local church in the watchful care of the myoptic Liam Neeson and some chirpy sparrows as she leaves her home town for the anonymity of the big city - London. Patrick, who quickly crowns himself Kitten, grows up in the backwaters of Irish Catholicism in the hey day of Irish seperatism... The following narrative, supplied by Cillian with a wispy monotone ineffectualism that not a single drag queen I know would dare to get away with - goes along the daily task of surviving as an orphaned tranny with IRA ties. Well you see where this is going Neil Jordan (The Crying Game) once again shows his penchant for drag queens and explosions.
Tears? No, I couldn't shed a single one except tears of boredom! And to think I opted to see this film instead of a re-viewing of Brokeback Mountain. But a review of Brokeback I do have, and so will you my kittens.

What can I say... I was speechless like Ang Lee was at his acceptance speech on the Golden Globes (now don't get me started on that scham of an award show...But I heard the champagne is free flowing... Like rivers made of whiskey which in a cowboy's dream). Set in the wide and majestic rocky mountains of Alberta - standing in for Wyoming - Brokeback Mountain is is a real masterpiece. Dense and intense, a contradiction of realities that only love dares to reconcile. And love it is...the two men are so in love with each other that they live and die by the love. They come from similar farm backgrounds but they are very different in outlook from each other. Kind of archetypes of two kinds of cowboys: the stoic man of few words with good manners and a violent streak that has made saloon brawls such a staple of frontier flicks, played to a roaringly reticent perfection by Heath Ledger (everything you heard about his performance is true - he is the Hollywood bad boy of Brando and J Dean and J Wayne). His sidekick is the loud and gregarious rodeo cowboy Jack Swift whose Yee haw dazzles the ladies to a swooning . Beaten but optomistic Gyllenhaal plays the obnoxious cowboy to a sad second fiddle. They meet during a summer job as sheep herders, but what they share in the rough wilderness of the mountainsides one night as they are sheltering from the cold (guess counting sheep wasn't doing it) is a passion that burns in them for decades.
For the next 15 years, they stumble along with their lives along only to fall back into each other's arms. Both of them are the product of the harsh realities of cowboy life, but Jack, the showman and the one with more confidence in possibilities, keeps wanting to try a different kind of life, only to be stumped by the wall that is Ennis, whose childhood memory of the his dad's bashing of a gay cowboy keeps him in check with a reality that Jack is desperately trying to escape. Whence comes the great line:
"You are too much for me Ennis, you sonofawhoreson bitch! I wish I knew how to quit you." - Jack
"if you can't fix it, you got to stand it" - Ennis.

The supporting cast is as well kick ass! From the soft murmurrings of Anne Hathaway, the bleached blond heiress of a Texas farm industrialist ... to the impassioned martyrdom of the always pregnant Michelle Williams, the wives share the same frustrations with the men as the lovers do - just goes to show how in life the things that make us happy and the things that makes us miserable are often the one and the same. The one thing you can't run away from is the thing that always catches up to you: yourself. Really powerful and mastefully executed.
...so how many tears did this film gets? well it was beyond tears. When the last scene rolled around, I felt like throwing up. The emotion was so intense that I was having a visceral response like the one you feel when you are in love - you know that overpowering unease at the pit of your stomach - (like the one Ennis had after he leaves Jack for the first time).... so yeah, this films gets a good review from viken.

There is one more thing that I would like to plug shamelessly if I may - 'cause Bloggin is rarely shamless!

It's the latest play by Boca de Lupo called The Perfectionist http://www.bocadellupo.com/ . I have seen many plays in the last little while and have often left the theatre mid-way or wish I had. But it seems everything I have seen from this troupe has been nothing short of amazing. It's an experimental, multi-media story of a couple coming to terms with a turning point in their relationship/lives. The innovations that they intergrate so successfuly in the production is, well, ingenious. The use of light and shadows, repetition and renewal and all the elements of fire, earth, water smacks of Carl Jung's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Jung theories of symbolism and metamorphoses. Now you can take and leave Carl Jung, cause really everything in the world can be seen in Jungian terms, but there is a striking familiarity with the themes being explored here, about the two characters dealing with depression, the end of their relationship and the beginning of the rest of their lives. He becomes a compulsive cleaner trying to force neetness in the mess of his life and work, where he is a call centre agent working out of a cubicle, while she resigns herself to a sloppy existance of days filled with nothing to do but sipping large quantities of coffe while reminescing about her mother in Korea. The play is told as much with short dialogues as it is with dance, animation and acrobatics! it's a minimalist modernist play that is packed with moments of brilliance, great delivery and timing!
Cause "timing is everything" - Jay.
...specially if you are using wires and harnesses for a two person ballet on a stage which is already crowded with a back-projection screen in the already cozy proportions of the Waterfront Theatre. It's only running for a few more days, so all of you wanting to see something really special - go check them out quick, cause their last two performances had sold out!

enough said for now...more later. Tomorrow is the federal election in our lovely country and I hope all of you Canadians get to vote!

viken

Welcome, Bienvenue, Wilkommen, Pari Yegak

2005-12-29T00:32:00.000-08:00

Hello the World,

...don't know how to start a blog really. Do I thank my mother and father? the Academy? or begin with a brief bio of myself, a resume, my world view or maybe state my purpose with this venture... I want to make it easy for people who are reading this to have a starting point, a narrative so-to-speak... I guess you could read this like a conversation that you are overhearing in a crowded place...not knowing how it began or where it will go - like my favourite book conversations in the cathedral - where we jump around dialogues without any indicators of time, space, or subject ...it's just (hopefully) captivating your attention for a while.
Describing this blog as a conversation is probably not too far from the truth, as this will be a kind of random musing of the things that are peaking my interest of late. Also, many friends of mine will attest that talking to me is like listening to someone having a conversation with himself. Whatever... I am not quite sure how to begin, but it seems I am already off to a pretty good start.
This picture is one of my favorites' of me and Tess Starr Strewn - it was an evening of cabaret at the Communists. I did a thing with a Shirley Bassey song, and Patrick kept us all in stitches with his rendition of Zip Zip by Rita Hayworth. Patrick now works in the film industry - guess that explains the lighting implement in his hand....
well... this will be start of my blog. Thanks for reading.
viken