ALASKA HIGHWAY NEWS
THURSDAY, JUNE 30, 2022 | ARTS | A7
East Coast art form beginning to make its way west Dave Lueneberg sports@ahnfsj.ca Fort St. John’s Eliza MasseyStanford is known for her stunning photographs and paintings, but like many artists she’s always looking at expanding her creativity. Last month, a new form of her artwork received the attention of judges at the Peace Liard Regional Juried Art Exhibition in Tumbler Ridge. “I went to art school in Nova Scotia and that’s what I studied – painting and photography,” said Massey-Stanford. “But rug-hooking caught my eye a few years ago when we went back for a visit and I thought, well, I could learn how to do that.” With the encouragement of a friend, a tapestry artist, and some online videos, she was on her way. Her speed, Eliza admits, has picked up a great deal. “When I started, it might have taken me a month to do a small 12-inch circular creation. Now, I can do that, depending on the design, in about ten hours.
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Fort St. John artist Eliza Massey-Stanford spreads out all of her recent work in rug-hooking on the sundeck of her home. She was recognized in May for one of her pieces, Beach Rocks.
“The big piece in the juried art show took me about 100 hours.” While it’s well-known on the east coast, it’s relatively new as a discipline out west. Ontario, Quebec, and the
Maritimes, it seems, had the market cornered when it came to rug-hooking until almost recently. “I think it really originated from people’s desire to reuse everything. So, when a coat was no good anymore,
they tore it up into strips and it became a rug.” At some point, rugs were put on the wall as artwork and a concept was born. While Massey-Stanford was recognized with a distinguished award at the
Peace Liard show for her entry Beach Rocks, there really isn’t, at least for now, a category for works like hers. “There could possibly be a future one for textile arts in the juried arts show,” she said. “That would make sense because there are a lot of quilters, weavers, who would love to show off their work.” Like any piece of artwork, the canvas or in this case, the weaving, is entirely up to the artist. Massey-Stanford said, by and large, most rughookings from the east coast feature landscapes. For her, though, it’s all about her fascination for rocks. “They’re just so beautiful and I can’t stop picking them up and bringing them home.” With a response like that, I couldn’t help but ask what her partner (Edward) thought of the growing collection of art objects in the house. “He’s in on it too,” was Massey-Stanford’s response. “…but don’t put that in your story.”
ALASKA HIGHWAY NEWS
A12 | NEWS | THURSDAY, JUNE 30, 2022
Global journey aims to reach 1M potential organ donors Matt Preprost editor@ahnfsj.ca Would you take a kidney transplant if you ever needed one? What if a friend, relative, or stranger needed one; would you be willing to donate? Worldwide, tens of thousands of people are waiting every day for a kidney donation to save their life, says globetrotting humanitarian Anil Srivatsa, who on Thursday brought his Gift of Life Adventure to Fort St. John to encourage residents to consider becoming donors. No one should die having to wait for an organ, he says. “If you want to take one, someone’s got to give it to you,” says Srivatsa, who has driven through 44 countries over the last seven years with the aim of reaching and inspiring up to one million potential donors. “There is a donor in every family, there’s a donor in every community, town, and city.” For Srivatsa, from India, organ donation became personal eight years ago when his brother, a neurosurgeon, was in need of a kidney. His decision to donate was easy, and a decision he says should be easy for others too. “It shouldn’t be that we wait for something to happen to us or the people we love to start recognizing the idea that this actually
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Anil Srivatsa was in Fort St. John Thursday as part of his Gift of Life Adventure encouraging people to consider becoming organ donors.
helps save lives,” Srivatsa says, adding of his brother, “Him saving lives everyday, well that was a life worth saving other than just for my love.” While people can donate organs after they die, they can also become living donors for those who need a kidney or liver today. But Srivatsa says many don’t because of fear or unanswered questions, or sometimes even religion. He says science is waiting, but society isn’t catching up to those who need help. “Usually when we hear about cancer and other things, we’re trying to
collect enough money to fund the research and the pharmas to find a cure,” he says. “In organ donation, it’s the other way around. Science is waiting, come on in, no one shows up… it’s a very small number. If it was not true, 100,000 people waiting just for a kidney wouldn’t be sitting on dialysis staying alive.” Srivatsa says it’s important for people to hear from donors about their experiences to help dissuade their fears. Of kidneys, he says, “don’t be possessive.” Speaking of his own recovery, Srivatsa says he started walking
four days after his surgery, and running after 10 days. Today, he competes for Team India at the World Transplant Games, where he’s won gold in athletics, and plans to compete again in Australia in 2023. At 54, Srivatsa says he can still run marathons, climb mountains, and drive 18 to 20 hours a day to bring his story to communities across the world. He says he’s reached 130,000 people so far, enough to help save at least 30 other lives by encouraging others becoming donors. “When you hear from someone that’s been there
done that, it’ll give you a little more strength, OK it’s not so bad, which is what I’m doing,” he says. “Telling my story, showing people that I can live a better than normal life with only one kidney.” Of the liver, he says, “They take piece of it and give it to someone else, and they can live off that piece while your own liver grows back within 10 weeks, 12 weeks, to its original size, nothing lost except a scar. “But I call that a medal,” he says. “A scar says you saved somebody and you live now two lives: theirs and yours.” Srivatsa, also the Charter President of the global Rotary Club of Organ Donation, is continuing his journey up through Northern B.C. and into the Yukon and Alaska, meeting with Rotary clubs and others along the way. From there, he plans to travel back down south to Argentina, and then overseas to Australia. “We’re capable of doing something that’s scalable on a global level. We showed that with polio,” he says. “Thirty some years ago, this guy dreamt that he could eradicate polio from the face of this planet. He may have been laughed at… but look at it, 30 years from now, it happened. “Can we live in a world that is coming up sooner than 30 years where no one dies waiting for an organ?”
Smart Money: Taking things out of context BRAD BRAIN
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ccasionally I have been asked how I come up with new material to write about every week. Coming up with ideas is usually not too hard, I just write about whatever is on my mind that week. But sometimes I have an idea for an article, and I will push it to the side for a while, usually coming back to it later. This is one of those times. When I started thinking about the material for this column, Bitcoin was trading around $50,000, down from its peak of about $85,000. Now that Bitcoin is about $26,000, the article takes a different tone. When I started writing this, I fully expected that, in time, people would see exactly where I was coming from. I just didn’t expect my point would be proven before the article was even finished. But this article isn’t really about cryptocurrencies. It’s about taking things out of context. So, here’s where all this started. Warren Buffett is, of course, widely known as the World’s Greatest Investor. He is also insightful and witty. His commentary is widely followed and often quoted. But as brilliant as Buffett is, if you twist his words, if you take them out of context, you can get unpredictable results. Here is what I mean: Following the Bitcoin price plunge from $85,000 to $50,000, I came across a video on social media where a crypto enthusiast was quoting Buffett, saying “The time to be fearful is when others are greedy, and the time to be greedy is when others are fearful.” And certainly, after watching their investment lose about 40% of its value, there would be Bitcoin followers that would have been
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fearful. What Buffett means when he says “be fearful when others are greedy” is to beware of trendy investments that are trading at unjustifiably high prices. When he says “be greedy when others are fearful,” he means to embrace the opportunity to acquire high quality investments when they are temporarily available at distressed prices. It’s another way to say “buy low, and sell high,” and the wisdom is self evident. So, following the 40% price decline, when the crypto guy quotes Buffett saying the time to be greedy is when others are fearful, what he is saying is that you should be buying more crypto, and buy a lot. Be greedy about it. But here is the logical fallacy. Buffett never said this in reference to cryptocurrency. Buffett is a value investor. Indeed, he is the king of value investing. And fundamental
to value investing are ideas like buying high quality businesses at a discount to the present value of their future cash flows. Good luck determining the future cash flows for crypto. They have none. In fact, Buffett hates cryptocurrency. There is no ambiguity about this. He famously called it “rat poison, squared.” Along the same lines, at the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting in May, Buffett spoke about inflation. The crypto community seized his words, using them lend legitimacy to crypto’s viability. But at that same meeting, Buffett also said that he would not buy all the Bitcoin in the world for $25. It’s absurd to quote Buffett as a rationalization to buy crypto. And yet people do it all the time. But taking words out of context is no assurance at all that you will get
the result you are hoping for. Sure enough, only weeks later after I saw that crypto guy’s video saying to be greedy when others are fearful , Bitcoin has lost 50% of its remaining value. Here’s the point. Financial planning is not as simplistic as just finding a flashy catch phrase and basing your planning strategy on it. Even if the flashy catch phrase is from Buffett. Especially if you take the flashy catch phrase out of context.
Brad Brain, CFP, R.F.P., CIM, TEP is a Certified Financial Planner in Fort St John, BC. This material is prepared for general circulation and may not reflect your individual financial circumstances. Brad can be reached at www.bradbrainfinancial.com.