Accept' Don't Ever Give Up. -Bruce Eriksen
gallety gachet
Accept THIS! Gallery Gachet Members Show 2017 Exhibition runs: Nov 17th-Dee 22nd Gallery Hours are Tue-Sat 12.00-6.00 pm *The 2017 annual members show will be the first exhibition mounted at our new location at The Beacon, 9 West Hastings Street.* Gallery Gachet is an artist-run centre located in the downtown eastside neighbourhood of Vancouver. Providing a creative refuge for culture-building, education and advocacy, we believe social justice and mental health are critical elements of a healthy society. Our practice and participation challenges social marginalization while strengthening wellbeing and community.
Special Feature
Artists
in Conversation
Saturday, December 16, 2-4pm Come join us for a casual afternoon with current exhibiting artists. They will be on hand at the gallery to walk you though the Members Show Accept THIS! Artists will talk about their work and process as the tour moves through the gallery.
Accept This! - Is our spirited invitation to come and see us in a new light. The exhibition features personal and political expres'. sions of acceptance from 14 artists engaged in the struggle to keep creativity alive in their lives and communities. The tranquility suggested by the practice of acceptance is rendered starkly against its close but less serene cousin resignation. Artists: Sharon Burns, Stella Castell, d. June Conley, Edzy Edzed, Lara Fitzgerald, Karen Irving, Pierre Leichner, Mary O'Toole, Heather Pelles, Tchavdar Petkov, Bill Pope, Bruce Ray, Rebecca Slattery, Zola Curated by Carmen Ostrander. The idea of acceptance in spirituality, therapy and recovery promises a kind serenity, if you can master 'letting go'. But for those of us actively engaged in resistance, in hanging on and hanging in, there is another kind of acceptance at work, the kind that doesn't let go. The kind that welcomes you in and holds you close. The works featured in this exhibition straddle a precarious time in the gallery's history where the future loomed uncertain and survival meant change and upheaval. The collective expression of this transition encompasses a spectrum of tension and harmony, centered around a revitalized understanding of our role in this community, our basis of unity and continued commitment to culture building as a human right.
"Art is a means for survival" Yoko Ono, 2001
No God, No Soup
3
With a rumbling tummy I sat in the Union Gospel chapel, circa 1999, listening to the painfully familiar tale of Noah's Ark when I realized this gormless preacher is actually telling it like it's verifiable history, that this wild and crazy apocalyptic allegory of a closely-knit family of zoophiles who build a massive boat to shelter and save millions of gender binary beasts from perishing in an unprecedented - and divinely orchestrated - extreme weather event is a real historical happening, veracious and true. So up goes my hand. "Yes, brother?" ''It seems to me," I began hesitantly, "that what God is saying to Noah serves as a confession, of sorts, that He God, I mean - is NOT omniscient or omnipotent and perfect, which of course God's supposed to be." Canine-like, the preacher cocked his head. "I don't know what you mean." "He didn't see what was coming?" "Who didn't see what was coming?" "God." Was this guy really stupid or was he play acting? I continued: "God knows everything that's going to happen. Nothing surprises Him. He's incapable of error. He's all-powerful. Then why didn't He see that giving Man free will would inevitably result in having to wipe out Mankind with the flood? GOD dropped the ball here, not MAN. His all-knowingness failed Him terribly; His putative perfection abandoned Him completely." A crap-eating grin had formed on the preacher's kisser. "I think you're misinterpreting the text." "How many people were there back then? Say, what? Ten million maybe?" "We've no way of knowing," he said with a shrug. "But the number you suggest sounds reasonable." "Okay, then," I said, feeling a little sorry for the guy now. "So in any population often mil, there are plenty of kids. Tiny children. BABIES. Under two years of age. Little babies who cannot conceive of God and thusly can't reject Him, like their parents have done." The preacher's features went slack, the colour drained from his face, his mien a mask of perplexity; so utterly distraught was he that I truly regrettedbursting his holy balloon. Then suddenly a fellow ne'er do well, evidently in the throes of an epiphany, leapt to his feet and shouted "Hallelujah! God kills babies!" He was sixty or so, toothless, a real hobo's hobo, I swear he even had a bed sheet tied in a knot and wrapped around the end of a wooden pole where, presumably, he kept all that he owned. And, man, could he DANCE. Indeed, he was doing some kind of old timer gold prospector's jig, reminding me of Waiter Huston in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Some idiot in the front pew started clapping, "Go Mr. Bojangles! Dance! Dance!" "God kills babies!" the hobo cried, as the free soup-seeking crowd clapped rhythmically to his fancy footwork. Then the bum turned on the terpshercorian afterburners, stiff-Iegging up and down the aisles reminiscent of Cagney as George M. Cohan in Yankee Doodle Dandy. "God kills babies! God kills babies!" Finally, the church bouncers arrived and chased him around the chapel. He raced onto the stage and grabbed the microphone. "God kills babies! He's a baby killer, He is. He slew the innocent children strictly for convenience. Oh, what an awful God He is! Why do we bother with Him, ladies and gentleman, what with his terrible proclivity for infanticide!" And as they tossed him out the door, he implored "Jesus Murphy, begorra, I'm not the bloody maniac killing all them babies!" The preacher shook his head in disgust. "Well, the Demon Rum has a firm grip on him." And he looked down at me and intoned "Sir, you must leave as well." I did a double take. "What the hell did 1 do?" "You're entirely responsible for the hullabaloo," he claimed. "Leave now please!" The bouncers sidled up to the pew's edge. "But I, I, I ... I didn't do anything," [ sputtered. [ didn't ... ah, forget it." I rose from the pew and trudged to the exit. "That's right, that's right, go on your devilish way," the preacher mocked. "No soup for you!" When I got outside, the dancing man had vanished. Truly, I shall never forget that sublimely blasphemous, nimble-footed hobo. Third place. By Eric Blair
BAH HUMBUG! IS BACK!! The Ghosts of Dickens' A Christmas Carol meet the Hearts & Souls of Today's Downtown Eastside SFU Woodwards, Fei and Milton Wong Theatre, 149 E. Hastings Street Dec. 7-16, 7:30 evenings, plus 2pm matinee on Saturdays Tickets: at door or www.sfuwoodwards.ca. Directed by James Fagan Tait, featuring, among others: Jim Byrnes, Renae Morriseau, Stephen Lytton, Mike Richter, Tom Pickett, Sam Bob, Jenifer Brousseau, Savannah Walling, St. James Music Academy Choir and the animated art work of Richard Tetrault. Music Direction by Bill Costin. With over 30 musical numbers, including among others, HOTEL, with lyrics by Patrick Foley commissioned by Bah! Humbug!: WE LIVE DOWN HERE ON HASTINGS STREET IN THIS SRO HOTEL YOU KNOW THAT IT AIN'T NO HEAVEN, 'CAUSE IT'S RIGHT NEXT DOOR TO HELL NOW, WHEN IT GETS CHILLY AND COLD, THE LANDLORD TURNS OFF THE HEAT AND IF YOU'RE EVER LATE WITH THE RENT, HE THROWS.YOU OUT ON THE STREET AT NIGHT YOU CAN HEAR THE RATS, SCRATCHING IN THE WALL, BUT IT'S WHEN THE BEDBUGS BITE, THAT IS THE WORST OF ALL YEAH, YOU MIGHT BE DOWN AND OUT, OR SOMEHOW LOST YOUR WAY YOU COULD BE ONE OF THE LONELY ONES, AND FEEL YOU GOT NO SAY
WE LIVE DOWN HERE ON HASTINGS STREET IN TIDS SRO HOTEL YOU KNOW THAT IT AIN'T NO HEAVEN' CAUSE IT'S RIGHT NEXT DOOR TO HELL NOW, WE KNO~ HE'S GOT A STASH OF EMPTIES THAT THE OLD BASTARD STOLE FROM ALL THE POOR RESIDENTS HE EVICTED FROM THIS HOLE BUT TONIGHT WE'VE COME TOGETHER TO EVEN UP THE SCORE WE'RE GOING TO TAKE ALL THEM EMPTIES WHEN WE BREAK DOWN HIS DOOR I'LL MAKE IT BUDGE WITH MY SLEDGE I'LL GET IT AJAR WITH MY IRON BAR I'LL BREAK THE LOCK WITH MY BIG ROCK IF YOU PLEASE I'LL JUST USE THE KEYS An annual fundraiser in support of the DTES Heart ofthe City Festival. Produced by SFU Woodwards
Cultural Programs in partnership
and in association
with Vancouver Moving Theatre
with Full Circle First Nations Performance.
'
SEASON'S
GREETINGS
COMMUNITY
MEMBERS! The Carnegie staff would like to welcome you all to enjoy the many wonderful festive programs & special events that we'll be offering through the month of December. I urge you to pick up a Carnegie Program Guide and check out the bulletin board to make sure you don't miss out! Our goal is to always strive for a safe, healthy and vibrant communityfocused holiday season. As always, we will have extended hours of operation on Christmas & New Year's Eve, staying open until 1 am with lots of fun activities and treats throughout the night. We will also be opening early Christmas morning for breakfast & of course we will host our annual Boxing Day dinners - see information in the program guide about getting a ticket. I would also like to share the following important Centre Updates: The Carnegie Kitchen Renovation is almost ready to start. Work is currently scheduled to begin in January 2018, with completion date scheduled for late spring. The construction work will be to totally renovate the kitchen cooking space & concession service area. Dur ing the renovation, Carnegie's food service / cafeteria will be operating out of the gymnasium. One of the first tasks will be to set up the gym as a temporary kitchen. Therefore, the gym will not be open for regular programming effective December 15th. You will begin to see physical changes to the 2nd floor in January, including the boarding up of the existing concession area. Construction work will take place during regular daytime hours, so we can expect that there will be some noise. We will keep you informed via signs, posters and regular updates in the Carnegie Newsletter so stay tuned. Carnegie Centre will activate as a Warming Centre again this winter to complement the Extreme Weather Response shelters in the city. The Centre will open via an alert when the temperature reaches "feels like -SC," based on the parameters set by Environment Canada. This has been well received and well utilized by our community members. We have already opened the doors as a warming centre for 3 days in November. Information about warming centre operations will be posted throughout the building, and available at the Information Desk. New Washroom Signage has been installed on all of the washrooms in the centre. The new signage.has replaced the older symbols with Trans People Welcome
signage on Carnegie Centre's washrooms. There are [ varying signage designs for men's and women's sin- gle-stall and multi-stall washrooms. It is up to each patron to self-determine which facility is most appropriate for them based on their gender identity. Updating washroom facility signage is part of a larger plan,
Supporting Trans* Equality & an Inclusive Vancouver. If you have any questions about any of the above in formation, please feel free to pop by and talk to me. Sharon Belli, Director
Strive for uniqueness; Follow your passions for they may pass; Follow that light that guides you for it may dwindle. Try to have a balance between good and bad then you will find yourself and discover that beautiful sense of freedom that you only receive when you are not pretending to be anyone else but you. Maria Teixeira
Carnegie VOLUNTEERS Volunteers of the month- November
Gilberto Rivas, Weight Room David Aria, Weight Room Congratulations! ! Volunteer Committee Wednesday, December
6th @ 3:30pm, Classroom
2
Volunteer Dinner Wednesday, December
13th @ 4:30pm, Theatre
Volunteer Christmas
Party
Friday, December 8th @ 4:30pm, Theatre This party is for ALL our dedicated hardworking VOLUNTEERS. Let's celebrate together with good food, treats, gifts and more!!! This won't be a party without you! P.S The REAL SANTA is coming to see you. (I tok him you have all been good this year (I?') So hurry and get your tickets at the volunteer program office. HO,HO,HO !!
Christmas Decorating In the mood to decorate? Please come see us at the volunteer program office and the join the fun!! Mori the merrier. .. Sindy Bruno
Hastings and Main Whenever friends visit downtown Vancouver, they want to see Stanley Park, the shops at Robson Street. Water front, Yaletown, and Gastown - then they stop there. Even the Hop-On. Hop-Off buses coming from the south, drive through Main Street and then makes a left at Pender - avoiding the cross road of Hastings and Main - historic and humane Vancouver. Not all neighborhoods of Vancouver are gentrified. The same can be said for New York, Paris or London. Hastings and Main is what Vancouver is without J social cosmetic "makeup". As men and women play table games inside Carnegie Hall, street peddlers sell second-hands, and people of every race and color interact. converse on the wide sidewalks - one is assured - here there is, as the French would say. "liberty, equality, brotherhood" . Downtown Eastside or DTES is the epicenter of compassion and kindness in Vancouver. Where else in the city or for that matter the Lower i\lainla rd can you get a meal three times a day every day throughout the year at no cost or less than $ 4.00 a healthy tasty f IIing plate? . eed to learn computer skills for free"? A teaming branch isjust a block away. Feeling lonely? Busking performers will entertain you and Iift your spirits up. As I had my taeos and ground beefw ith sour cream and green. salad at $ 2.25 a plate, across the tabJe,f'llark in his late :2 0 s told me of how his need for shelter was quickly provided for by an agency at Alexander Street. Eve, a lady in her 50s next to me in the library, smiled as she related how live times a week, she would be in the area to get together with other women in similar situations - sharing and bonding. [ cannot forget waiting in the rain for a Thanksgiving Meal. The lines were long but we were assured it will be quick. And yes we were inside in a nippy - where we were entertained by a singer while seated, waiting for our turn, and treated with respect and dignity. My server was Global NeViS TV anchor Sophie Lui who talked with me like I was a colleague. Are you looking for a non-judging community - where what you wear, or how you look does not matter? I'll see you here - the palpitating Heart of the City. Lunch on the second tloor cafeteria - my treat.
Honourable
By Joseph T Lopez
mention.
Membership has its privileges ... 2018 Carnegie memberships go on sale December 1st. Get yours now -- it's a steal for only $1.00! Look at what it gets you: -- free phones -- computer access -- out-trips -- special seniors' events -- and you're a senior if you're over 40! -- and more .... That's not all -- the more members we have, the stronger our voice at City Hall, with MLAs and MPs - with government in fact.
Support your Centre •• buy a membership now! If you bought a card last year, it's now time to renew your membership for the 2018 year -- remember-you're part of a special group!
Membership does 'have its privileges! (message brought to you by the Carnegie
Board).
2572 E Hastings Street Vancouver, BC V5K lZ3 Tel: 604-775-5800 Fax: 604-775-5811 Email: Jenny.Kwan@parI.gc.ca
t
Jenny Kwan Constituency Office Now Open MP for Vancouver NDP Immigration,
East Refugee and Citizenship
Critic
Seasonal Decorations & Holiday Art Workshop Saturday December 9, 12-4pm, Drop- In. Free. All Ages. All Materials Supplied in 55+ Centre Britannia Community Centre 1661 Napier St Van
The passing of Stan Hudac, "The Piano Man." was a sad event. Friends and intimates offered condolences, and penned recollections of personal experience. One ' sharing memories, Stan's common-law wife Marilyn Tsinigine, felt hurt by what she termed inaccuracies in the memories of others, so to set the record straight: • Marilyn was not a" female friend" ofStan's but his common law spouse, and Stan referred to her as his wife. • Marilyn never asked Mike where Stan was. As his wife she knew where Stan was every day. • Stan was married to a Quebecois woman but that was a long time ago, and Stan said he was long divorced from that woman. • Stan's mother was a physician, not a pharmacist. Grief is not a shared feeling. It is different for each person and private beyond words. Peace. For the Carnegie Newsletter,
. black
on grey
"poor soul" the receptionist says when 1 ask for you steam & clouds making shadows in this still & sterile room & you don't recognize an old friend as I call your name & your eyes begin closing so I shout & my voice feels evil &a gasp from plastic tubing startles me swollen & scarred a hand floats toward nothing divine lightning saved an old man a mugging but minutes later the avenging thief returned for you & crushed your skull with a wooden club silencing your wild laughter & huge indignations & now your eyes open & the right one moves not the one blinded red & raw in the car crash that years ago started it all downhill for an "adonis" with a woman you loved & a job you wanted not scar tissue growing over steel plates making the thought of a drink an endless drunk you're only 40 years old & your shaved head sprouts tiny hairs like splinters driven-in instead of the black blaze of curls you wore with pride searching for life
r see • a machine breathing you & a machine tracing heartbeat in meas-
urable waves & lines & dots like your eye traces me-' traces nothing ice cubes melting shift whe~e a suction tray is constructed causing explosion in this stear~ SIlent room your blistered lips collapse together writhe once in awhile & I hear a distant intercom-muzak subdued laughter of nurses & suddenly panic wiping your sweat from my fingertips afraid of you whom I've embraced many times disoriented shadows tear the room apart a black glance reflects on gray television glass & I have hoped as all who come to see you say they do that one of us - the lucky one - will bring you back be: cause our lives are torments & we want to mean some thing vital & you ridicule our fantasies more than any painted corpse helpless r want to kill you I retch get angry & making my face a mask walk into the hallway where a nurse notices the room I leave & when our eyes lock our embarrassment is horrifying the sky outside is roaring blue wind bright autumn sun a falling leaf . r bust into tears & want to say it's for you alone I feel deep sadness but these tears belong to me who desires to call 'liars' doctors who say vegetables & I want to deny that anyone who speaks as you have of the strong spirit love is & of a yearning to make well all which is ill ~an ever be degraded like this though some people claim you brought it on yourself & is others implicate survivors who failed you but we only know you spent your last days laughing complaining & sharing what you had drinking cheap wine & sleeping in abandoned automobiles or on the riverbank eating from garbage cans walking shoe less banned from agencies becoming one less human to threaten anyone's holy resume "you're not going to fuck up my referrals!" a social worker explained kicking you out of a detox for the last time into the street where as you often said: "you can't wear out the sidewalks"
BUD OSBORN
.
Through MyChildren's Eyes Their unrestrained laughter and excitement permeate my heart as we play together. I'm learning to be less over-protective, less controlling of their every move. As they run carefree in the park I both admire and envy the valiant spirits they are. Their innocence and their simplicity touch a delicate chord in my soul. How can any mother harm or neglect her child? I'm mending from the pain and void I knew throughout my childhood. Those rather-be-forgot memories are being replaced with soulful love, laughter and friendship. The wounded child within me heals as I experience life through my children's eyes.
© Jacqueline
Angharad
Giles
NEED TEeH HELP? Friday Morning Tech Drop-In @ Oppenheimer Park Learn more about how to use: Android. iPhone • Tablets • iPads • Laptops Email • Social Media • Other Tech Questions Every Friday morning lO:30am -12:30pm oppenheime Park Field House The line-up went around the corner & into the rainy, cold, premature night, with dark clouds bullying the sun. Fourth day of heavy rain. Still, my clothes are damp, my feet wrinkled and cut. I haven't known any real warmth for over a week. The idea of the warmth inside and a hot meal give me hope. It's been spaghetti for days, but still, it's a chance to get inside. I'm living down by the railway tracks and at six o'clock there's nothing to do. The empty wet inside of a cold, leaky tent is not appealing. Saved by Spaghetti. Roger Stewart
HELP 1V'v
tV1e
DOWNTOWN
EASTSIDE NOVEMBER *52* 2017 Newsletter News (!) First of all, an updated and revised edition of Help in the Downtown Eastside, #52 NOVEMBER 2017, is out -in English, French & Spanish. The resource guide contains the names, addresses, phone numbers & a bit of info on what's available in food, clothing, shelter, ' medical aid & education. Agencies, organisations, drop-ins, peer-run & professional assistance, women's & aboriginal & users & those with mental or physical disabilities & seniors - all interconnect & overlap yet there is little redundant duplication. The best part is that one place can-give you information & contacts at similar resources. The funding to make a full printing (11,000 English, 1,000 each in French & Spanish) came from the UBC Library. They are now responsible for a complete archive of the Carnegie Newsletter since inception on August 15, 1986. Copies of the current edition of the Help booklets are available in 4 dozen locations throughout the DTES & at hospitals and universities. Ask for yours! In this issue are 2 more pieces of writing recognised in the Sandy Cameron Memorial Writing Contest: an honourable mention to Hastings and Main & 3rd Place to No God, No Soup. Everyone is encouraged to write -publication depends. on what is written. The Newsletter survives because of donations, putting limits on the space available & the amount of volunteer tickets for usable stuff. Writing can be articles, essays or poetry; artwork is published but only black&white printing. I look forward to reading your stuff Respectfully, PaulR Taylor, volunteer editor
/.
Carnegie Theatre Workshop
From the Library For artists and entrepreneurs there are some valuable free workshops being offered at the Central Branch "Inspiration Lab" on the 3rd floor. Consider registering (604-331-3603) for "Let's Talk About Personal Branding" (Sat. Dec. 2nd, llam) to help create portfolios and distinguish yourselffrom the crowd, as well as "Market Yourself: Business Card Design" (Dec. 12th, 2pm) with a hands-on component using Adobe InDesign. These classes may be especially interesting to all who applied for a DTES Small Arts Grant... good luck to everyone! Check out some new titles from the art world: After Andy: adventures in Warhol land (2017) by Natasha Fraser-Cavassoni. The author has an inside scoop on Warhol, having worked for him at his studio. This account reveals "behind the scenes" activity, from glamorous parties to his post-death art auction, and the global influence Warhol had. The Artist as Cultural Producer: living & sustaining a creative life (2017). After a successful book in 20l3, editor Sharon Louden follows up with this collection of forty essays by international artists. The testimonies are inspiring, heart-breaking, humorous and wise. Dig If You Will the Picture: funk, sex, God & genius in the music of Princ (2017) by Ben Greenman. An exploration of the mystery of Prince, by a music journalist and obsessive super-fan.
The Hard Light of Day: an artist's life in the Australian outback (2017) by Rod Moss. An artist's memoir about his connection with members of the Arrente Aborigine community, and the power of friendship to transform, nourish and inspire.
Identity Unknown: rediscovering seven American women artists (2017) by Donna Seaman. The painters and sculptors featured refused to be subjects of art, but rather makers of art. Learn about how seven women fought to be judged by their skill, not their appearance. Your librarian, Natalie
"Show thou Carnegie workshop Players"
We'll put our ideas together for-
"You're living in the Past, Grandma! A Christmas Pageant" " Remembering,
Imagining ~
Everyone is old; everyone is young, Everyone is middle-aged; everyone is twenty-one.
Creative sessions/rehearsals 1) Sat Dec 2, 1pm-4pm, Carnegie 3rd fIr classroom 2) Wed Dec 6, 6pm-9pm, Carnegie Theatre 3) Sat Dec 9, 1pm-4pm,
Carnegie 3rd fIr classroom
4) Fri Dec 15, 12:30pm-3:30pm,
Carnegie Theatre
5) Fri Dec 22, 12:30pm-4:30pm,
Carnegie Theatre
6) Sat Dec 23, 12:30pm-4:30pm,
Carnegie Theatre
Performance • Sun Dec 24, Christmas Eve, Carnegie Theatre
Free, everyone welcome, join in! For more info: Teresa 604-255-9401 thirteenofhearts@hotmail.com
Answering to the call of Creativity is like answering the call from the Divine. Both seem difficult, somewhat illusive or hard to describe, but both are greatly sustaining when we learn to live in them. Being creative and learning from other artists is a noble sort of thing. At least I think it is. I write, do music and art because without it something is missing in my life. We are compelled to engage in creative pursuit not from the position ofpontification, but from a much humbler place. I have a good musician friend of mine who insists that there are some people who simply don't have that creative inclination. But I beg to differ. I think we can all be creative regardless of race, age, gender, socio-economic status, or sexual orientation. I want to look at this thing called creativity and especially how it relates to suffering and the call from our Higher Power. Being creative holds at its seed the notions of inspiration, inventiveness, imagination and originality. It means we engage in a process of discovery, revealing to us that magical place of the inner child. It is more than just inventing new ideas or processes, but it is viewing the ordinary, in new ways. I have noticed that food and nature are two topics many great writers, such as Virginia Woolf, have explored and described in their story-telling. Her imagination and ingenuity take these everyday things, ordinary experiences, and presents them to our senses in original and, I might add, fulfilling ways. I am intrigued by that kind of thing. It reminds me of the Impressionist painters of the 19th century who broke from tradition and painted ordinary scenes of everyday life. To make a commitment to the Divine, we must make a commitment to the creative. Just as praying is a necessary and vital part of the religious life, so too is the discipline of working at our creative endeavors, a vital part of accessing the magical. Something of weight and value is needed by those who hunger for the spiritual and the creative. This too is the predicament of the addicted. What I mean to say is that just as the daily discipline of praying is essential in' our spiritual development, so too the daily discipline of doing'our creative work is paramount in producing and getting into a magical, creative space. qarvers carve. Painters paint. Sculptors sculpt. Thinking about writing is not going to make you a writer, just like thinking about playing an instrument is not going to develop the muscles and coordination it takes to play an instrument well. Both creativity and prayer use our capacity to imagine. If suffering often is the spark that leads to a desire to communicate with our Higher Power, so too is it the trigger for the artist. Artists suffer and use their suffering as provender for creative projects. It is through suffering that some great lessons and creative work is actualized. I believe that anybody can learn to be more creative and indeed everyone is creative because everyone suffers in some form on this planet. Depending on which lessons one is given here on earth, they often mirror the creative work we have been called to do. Just as prayer takes faith, so does the creative process lend the artist a certain confidence in herself without which to reach and engage in making art is impossible. Not only do artists have something to say, they must believe they can say it. If we think we are dumb and awkward, we will manifest that with never picking up the pen or brush to practice our art. Renoir painted 6000 paintings in his life time and started out at the age of 13 to do relief work on porcelain. To me that is really amazing. I guess the very process of creation in the Divine is what makes the act of creating art sacred. But let us not just look at 'great works' as the measurement of the creative. Baking lemon pies is a creative act because it is making something out of nothing. Having that motivation to create is one of the ways we imitate our Higher Power. We make things out of nothing. That is what the Creator did with us. We make things because we have the seed of creation within us. A mustard seed is the 'smallest seed there is, but look at the great tree it becomes. We need only a mustard seed of faith in our creative abilities to make something glorious. By RUBY DIAMOND
The National Housing Day of Action Vancouver, Coast Sal ish Territories - After more than three decades waiting for the delivery of a comprehensive national housing strategy, Canadians' hopes were deflated when the news finally arrived, last Wednesday. At a close reading, it sounded more like the Liberal party re-election strategy than a national housing strategy, as the strategy urged Canadians to wait for ten more years.
j
In Vancouver, our response was loud and clear: Our homes can't wait. Housing advocates from OCAP - the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (Toronto), and, FRAPRU, the Front d'action populaire en reamenagement urbain, Montreal had been working with members from Our Homes Cain't Coalition in Vancouver, to plan a national housing day of action. The goal was to ensure that we speak in unison in reaction to Ottawa's national housing strategy. ln Vancouver, the announcement arrived on welfare cheque issue day, instead of holding our day of action on Wednesday, we moved it to Saturday to coincide with the Vancouver Tenants Union convention day. We were honored by the partieipation of housing activists from Toronto, Los Angeles and Seattle who were in Vancouver to participate in the convention. Three decades of austerity policies, that have gradually altered the understanding of housing, not as a human right but a commodity, have created a passive acceptance of this new norm. In British Columbia, we are witnessing the highest levels of homelessness, the likes of which we had not seen before. According to BC Non-Profit Housing Association, the homeless count in Metro Vancouver is over 3,605. In Vancouver, we continue to observe a galloping homelessness count, more than 1,200 in the DTES alone, zero vacancy rate and the lowest welfare rate in Canada at $710/m to make Vancouver the most expensive city to live in in Canada. There is nothing in the national housing strategy to end homelessness fast. Since last year, we have been calling on the three levels of government to build homes that are affordable and dignified for people. We argued that modular housing could be a temporary solution, that gets people out of the rain and brutal winters into decent housing units, while the three levels of governments put their heads together to build homes for people to live in. The bureaucracy has gotten in the way and it looks like the homeless will have to be patient & wait till next spring There is only a vague promise of cutting homeless shelter users by 50% in 10 years. "This is a criminally slow target. Homeless people have half the life expectancy of housed people. Too many precious lives will be lost by
then", said Jean Swanson of the Carnegie Community Action Project (CCAP): The national housing strategy talked about $40b over 10 years and the money was to be divided up among all the provinces and territories. While 40b may sound like a lot of money, it falls very short when you hold it against the massive need created by austerity measures of the Mulroney, Chretien and Harper administrations. Advocates demand that the Trudeau government prioritize social housing, as a fundamental human right to seriously address the housing crisis that affects thousands of people across the country. There is an urgency to enact housing as a fundamental humanrlgfiI-P-allure by the governments to provide dignified housing to the people could enable the homeless & underhoused to sue governments that renege on this responsibility. It's immoral that the DTES was allowed to deteriorate into a third world style ofliving; where slum landlords have continued to get away with murder by charging too much and failing to deliver on the services. A place where city administration has failed to enforce its Standards of Maintenance By-laws to the extent that buildings like the Balmoral Hotel are condemned and 170 units are lost, in a neighborhood where residents are constantly priced out of their communities and several become homeless because of the failure by the three levels of government to build adequate affordable housing for low income residents. This is not acceptable. During his recent visit to Canada's poorest postal code, Miloon Kothari, the former UN Rapporteur on Housing stated that the Downtown Eastside should apply for foreign aid to build adequate housing for people since all levels of government have failed to do so. It is ironic that things have deteriorated to this level where the DTES is compared to a third world country that deserves official development assistance. Shame! If the government of New Zealand, a small country with 4 million people, can allocate $40b to its national housing strategy, a richer and bigger country like Canada that has ten times as many people, with remarkable wealth should most definitely allocate more than $40b towards its people. Come on Ottawa, put your money where your mouth is. By LAMA MUGABO
Vancouver Tenant Union Holds First Official Convention and AGM - Vow to Fight Against Landlords and Developers Tenants from across Vancouver converged on Russian Hall last Sunday, November 26th, for the Vancouver Tenants Union (VTU) inaugural convention. The organization of nearly 1000 Vancouver renters elected a steering committee and passed a constitution enshrining a fight for tenants rights and affordable housing. The hectic convention included organizers brought from Los Angeles, Seattl~, Sc.arborough and Northern BC who participated In skillsharing sessions and forums over the course of the weekend. The VTU has four demands: 1) Real Rent Control 2) Eviction Protections 3) More affordable housing 4) Better incomes for all. Tenant organizers and legal advocates have been working since April of this year to regain power from landlords. The VTU defines tenants as "people who do not own property, people who rent, people who do not have stable housing, people who are homeless." With encroaching gentrification, rising
rental costs and more people homeless than ever before, it seems that Vancouver is close to reaching its boiling point. A march for the National Housing Day of Action kicked off events on Saturday afternoon, with demonstrators walking from 58 East Hastings to 105 Keefer to call for more affordable housing. At a speech during the march, Jean Swanson was highly critical of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's 10-year national housing strategy, which was announced last week at Woodward's. "Social mix projects are not what we need. This is a national gentrification strategy and we reject it," Swans on said to the crowd outside of the Chinese-Canadian Memorial. At a VTU forum titled "Protecting Affordability, Culture, History and Community" at Red Gate later that evening, out of town organizers from the L.A. Tenants Union, L.A. Poverty Department (a theatre group & activist organization) Chinatown Community for Equitable Development (L.A.), People's Defence (Scarborough), Tiny House Warriors (Northern BC), Affordable Seattle, as well as local activists from Chinatown Action Group, Powell Street Festival & Culture Saves Lives, spoke about organizing victories and defeats. Dont Rhine of the L.A. Tenants Union was one of • who spoke about the value the speakers at the forum of sharing strategy from city to city: "Capitalism is not very inventive. We hear the echoes of the same lies from city to city, the lie of affordability, of mixed use, the lie over and over thatsomehow our needs are being met by more displacement." More than 200 people attended Sunday's official convention and annual general meeting. Morning workshops held throughout the Russian Hall included sessions on "Bad landlords: Dirty Tricks and how to stand up to them" and "Getting Repairs Done & Landlord Backlash." The VTU has been fighting for Vancouver's homeless residents as well as SRO residents in the Downtown Eastside, pulling support from the SRO Collaborative and participating in Jean Swanson's recent city council campaign. Childcare was provided and hot lunch was served at the convention. VTU Committees reported their victories over the past 7 months: legal advocates winning cases at the Residential Tenancy Branch, tenants fighting against renoviction, and new policy to protect tenants being drafted, as well as increased awareness about tenant power across the city.
VTU members then voted to pass their constitution and elect a 12-member steering committee before turning to case studies in organizing strategy from across North America. "The convention is part of how we fulfill our goal of educating people on their rights and resources so tenants feel like it's possible to fight the causeless evictions and landlord intimidation in this town," said steering committee member Sydney Ball. "We're trying to get across the point that we can't rely on electoral politics to do what is best for tenants if we don't get organized and make demands." By Josh Gabert-Doyon
:oor Bashing in Canada's Mainstream News On Saturday, November 25, hundreds marched down East Hastings St, protesting the Liberal governmen~'s National Housing Strategy, released three days earher on the National Housing Day. Reporting on this rally and protest, Globa~ New.s Ty released a pointed and biased commentary m which It accused the protesters of "inspiring class conflict", zooming in on a a fairly clever "Eat the Rich" sign carried by one protestor. . During the video, the reporter asks the question of whether "the lifestyles of the poor in the downtown eastside is also part of the problem", while the camera zooms in on a still shot of a solitary discarded needle in what looks to be a back alley in downtown eastside -- but really, could be anywhere. The-interviewee, Vincent Tao, one of the speakers at the rally, responds rightly to this "poor bashing'.' question with "no, it's actually the lifestyles of the nch that's part of the problem." It is a classic trope in Canadian culture to blame the poor for being poor. The systems ~hat.oppress us need to justify that the oppression they inflict ISdeserved. A still photo of a needle which could have been take~ anywhere, becomes 'evidence' of 'deviant' behaviour, which then justifies lack of housing for people engaged in this kind of behaviour. . ? But what about deviant behaviours of the nch. One would be hard pressed to find a critical mainstream report on the indulgence of upper classes in psychedelic, hard drugs, even though it is fairly comm?n. There has never been a call to expropriate any nch
Membership for the Vancouver Tenants Union is 1$. You can become a member on line at tenantsunionvancouver.com and find out about volunteer opportunities or join/create a working group by emailingtenantsunion.yvr@gmail.com. General meetings are held monthly at Four Sisters Housing Co-op.
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person of their means of survival due to addiction to drugs. As Vincent says, the rich have more problematic lifestyles than the poor. Look at the outpouring of the testimonies in the recent weeks against sexist and misogynistic deeds by powerful men in the entertainment industry. Look at it as only the tip of the iceberg. Poor people, & homeless people especially, are only trying to get by within an economic system that pushes them into the margins; a system that is satisfied by nothing short of theh disappearance. Discarded needles, a metaphor for addiction, are not the "cause" of homelessness. Rather, drugs offer a way to cope and survive living rough on the streets, exposed to the elements and to police violence. I would like to hear the Global News reporter's opinion on drugs after they've tried sleeping outside in the pouring Vancouver rain for one night. Poverty exists not because of poor people's "questionable lifestyles", but because the economic system we live under discards people after it uses them. We need to reintegrate caretaking into our economic system. We need to re-learn that no one is disposable. That housing is a human right, regardless of what the image of a discard needle implies or not about Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. The housing crisis persists because poor bashing has become the norm. By blaming poverty on the poor, the levels of government can absolve themselves of responsibility. We need to stop blaming people for miseries that are inflicted on them and start holding governments accountable.
By Sara Sagaii
pleasant thing -bells&phones telling us what we must do now- you can fuck right off before a baseball bat makes your ?ead ring imagine a future not starting because o~ policeman error, like a law-abiding catholic ped?phile giving thanks for not being the centre of attention at a prison-held "Let Us Help Those We've Saved Fr~m Scum like him" throw in looters&rapists you hav~ Ju~t brought t? a boil a kind of soup only sold during I~Ulnane times I am talking right now abso!ute like the failure of so many people where I live usmg gadgets but not a single poppy worn Hey we're all from other countries but we're in Canada now so tear out those fing earplugs & give thanks to where you we.re born does "Lest We Forget" come in shades of vamty screw humanity I guess no one feels the need to care.
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A Future beginning to end Always building & destructing then constructing we in the present build mountains out of stone, many futures have passed nothing good seems to last another space isyours to call home, like the States growing up on a bowl of bullets each day liberties kept bodies bulldozed out of the way a land of rotting sunshine that shall always be, like a terrorist tourist State Park with obliterated faces carved into stone lovely dead flowers their bloom has blown what comes first selfmurder or another century? The department store is buying your kids clothes & bedtime uniforms I remember nitemares simply because I would not conform being in society's debt is a reality no one should keep locked up ~ their heads, like does the writer really know the end good or bad that is the truth we can always depend on the fact the strong like the weak need their meds! Like a retarded child pushing around a square at his or her school bullies&realtors unfortunately thrive when they use force to prove they are so fucking cool if crucifixion were to ever come back in style let's begin lining them up one-by-one, the rich usurp the poor the good-looking watch the not-so-muches get thrown out the door if god&satan exist this is an extremely horrific set of so-called rules (I guess some have to pay for other's fun ... ) I do not count on the afterlife of Vancouver to be a
My Scottish grandpa did himself right as soon as he met my grandma then she was murdered by cancer & I never got to see her - he fought in WWI then moved to EastVan. He's just an average man but godalmighty he truly believed in their children but times was tough (yes Mister Officer it seems nothing was fair), like being brought up to believe in not believing anything I did believe I swept under the carpet an interestingly meaningless life oh well does god invite satan over to discuss the rules that are never followed following a 'newer better war (Hey chemicals) take no prisoners shake hands then time for more war! Now I was taught that when the end was in sight your nitemares&paranoia could fight off depression&isolation instead the answer spawns a billion questions I can't fight -this future is yours I am so sorry you take care, if this isn't hell truth be told that is part relief yet how many think of an earlier death .. the best question deserves the most awesome answer lemmings lead all other animals up&over mountains & cliffs us humanoids follow suit off rooves of buildings someone just won a lot of cash betting on our demise (it need not be cancer) - some feel that the good thing about life is that there is death so when grim&sad&horrible times arise there truly is a way out of there. By ROBERT McGILLIVRA Y "I wish I could walk for a day and a night, and find me at dawn in a desolate place, With never the rut of a road in sight, nor the roof of a house 'nor the eyes of a face." -Edna St Vincent Millay
first wife's name is lost to history. In September 1867, former riverboat pilot John Deighton arrived on the south shore of Burrard Inlet, beaching the canoe just past Hastings Mill. Along for the ride: his Indigenous wife, her well-muscled cousin as designated paddler, a barrel of whisky, a couple of chickens, a yellow dog, $6 in cash, and two rickety chairs. Within minutes of landing he was ladling out dippers of whisky to thirsty sawmill workers, idly mentioning that ifhe only had someone to help him build - why, he could have a saloon right here. In less than 24 hours a crude shack had been erected, and with his two rickety chairs and a rough plank bar the Globe Saloon was in business. In a primitive lumber town filled with single men, where the only recreational activities of note were drinking, gambling and fighting, Deighton's saloon prospered. He earned the nickname 'Gassy Jack' for his willingness 'to gas' which in the jargon of the day meant he was a man of many, many words. The alternate explanation - that Deighton suffered from excessive flatulence - continues to amuse. By 1870, the newly incorporated city of Granville bounded by Cambie, Water, Carrall and Hastingsmapped a road tight through the Globe Saloon, and Deighton was forced to relocate. The newer, grander enterprise he named Deighton House offered lodgings, a veranda for idling, and of course the saloon. Not long after Deighton House was erected, his un-
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named wife took sick; before dying she asked Jack to marry her niece, Qua-hail-ya whose 'White' name was Madeline. Within a year Qua-hail-ya had given birth to a son, Richard. The kid was a popular little guy, nicknamed the 'Earl of Granville' and described as a "dear little fellow" with "a broad Indian face." Single White women were a rarity in Granville and the other lumber villages scattered along Burrard Inlet, and although 'marriages' between White men and Indigenous women were fairly common, as social historian Robert RJ McDonald states, "Europeans never fully accepted such liaisons as normal, particularly after more White women arrived." It was always the same: once the White wives arrived in numbers you were either 'respectable' or you were Other. To be respectable meant you were "pious, sober, honest, industrious, and selfsufficient," that your demonstrated hard work ethic provided "tangible evidence of material progress" (read: you aspired to the upper classes) but above all you had to be "White and of British or American background." There was a definite social hierarchy at work in Vancouver very early on in the city's history. The self-styled 'upper class' consisted mainly of mill managers and their snooty wives, the middle class were managerial staff and owners of small businesses, the lower classes were everybody else. Although 'respectability' was the main yardstick by which social status was measured, it also served to cloak the underlying racist reality. By the late 1880s it was no longer considered acceptable for White men to marry Indigenous women, and Vancouver's racist social boundaries were cemented in place. I did not expect to find much on Qua-hail-ya, so imagine the thrill of discovering early archivist Major JS Matthews had actually interviewed her in 1940. The delight was short-lived: Matthews was a paternalistic, condescending, racist piece of work interested only in what she could tell him of Jack Deighton. He described her house as "a sadly dilapidated and untidy shack" filled with "a litter of household material, not one piece of which was of value." Although he concludes the interview with his observation that she was of "undoubted intelligence and character, gracious and kind, who in her earlier years [had been] .... perhaps prepossessing" his earlier racist bullshit is just poor-nography (thank
you, Jean Swanson) that negates any positive observations. His excitement at meeting Qua-hail-ya had more to do with fame-whoring, with touching the hand of the woman whose only legacy (in his eyes) was that she was the widow of Gassy Jack. Eightytwo at the time of the interview, she had survived first her husband (Deighton died in 1875), and six months later the death of her young son, the Great Fire of 1886, both World Wars and the Depression, was driven to live in enforced poverty on the Squamish reserve, treated with disdain (and worse) by the ruling powers, and all he wanted was to shake her hand? He asked nothing about her own life.
What little I could find out was that she married a man named Williams, had at least one other child, and that poor little Richard is buried in Stanley Park, at Paapeeak, now known as Brockton Point. (There are a lot of bodies in Stanley Park, and that's just the ones we know about). Deighton's estate totalled about $300, but because "women of Native descent .... were denied the right to inherit property from their dead, White mates," she was cast adrift. That money might have changed things for the better, financed a real life, maybe even bought medicine to save the life of her first-born child. Deighton House was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1886. Qua-hail-ya died in 1948, age 90. The names of the wives are too often left unsaid. Say her name. Sources include: Vancouver Sun files, the Vancouver Archives, and Making Vancouver: Class, Status and Social Boundaries by Robert AJ McDonald.
HOME FRON THE HUNT I came, I saw cockroaches, For two weeks, Then the war started; Them against me and my RAID (kills without chemicals) Cockroach Traps. Within days the roaches disappeared. The traps had worked, And I felt cold-bloodedly relieved. Alas, the lifetime of the traps Was only about six weeks, And soon little miniature cockroaches Were sighted scouting the roach trails. So off I went to the Army & Navy, More than willing to break budget And spend 4 and a half bucks On a new set of cockroach traps.
Being a boycotter of XMAS, I ignored tl Question and went to an underground M Where window-shopping is considered ~ Serious offense against the Capitalist system. Gripping my walIet tightly I raised my hands in surrender And walked into a pharmacy that was Disguised as an overevolved Canadian Tire store. Within minutes I found a whole stack of Raid roach traps, and with a smalI urge To sing the American National anthem, I purchased one. I walked home with my weapons And laid them on the battlefield; Wiping out a new generation of roaches Within days.
But the A & N was out of stock, To Nature, whom I consider the Master Which caused me to wander into Landlord, I say: Wasp territory in search of the coveted traps.¡ "It I s either me or the cockroaches Who will exist in this cubica1." I started at Woodwards Therein lies the philosophy of War. Where the only staff attention I could get Skid Row John Came from a talking Christmas tree (Published in this Newsletter January 1, 19: : Who asked me what my name was.
Six months of s~t"enity, a welcome change from despair. 1 as victimized, scrutinized and lies were labeled upon me; then discharged (false arrest after false arrest). "Do you know why you are here?" Loaded questions with cockney answers: 1. You threatened the landlord's life. 2. You set fire to your apartment. When things I thought were real are gone and change occurs, what's the message? There is no recovery from life. There is no better life than your own, so live it up! DrewN
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Angela Davis Inspires The Battered Women's Support Services presented Angela Davis at the Orpheum Theatre on Wednesday November 29. I was excited to see Davis because I admire & join in with her struggle for a society that respects the rights of women who have been colonized and discriminated against because of their race, gender and sexual orientation. It was an inspiring and moving nigh for me. The program notes read Imagine a World with Freedom and Justice and I felt like there was kinetic energy in the room with all of these activists and feminists meeting and talking about social justice. I felt empowered. Through her activism & scholarship over decades now, Angela Davis is deeply involved in movements for social justice around the world. Indeed, building communities of struggle for economic, racial and gender justice has always been her goal. But I was disappointed. I was disappointed because there was no mention of women who have been labelled mentally ill. Indeed, this group is often marginalized, stigmatized, forced to undergo treatment & restrain-
ed against their will and is in my opinion the most discriminated and vulnerable group in our society today if not in the world. Indeed, even feminists and women's groups have often not accepted women who suffer from mental illnesses, as an oppressed group that needs attention within the context of race, gender and capitalism. Women who suffer from schizophrenia are the most marginalized & misunderstood group in our society today. Angela Davis is a champion of social justice, but when I am in hospital, against my will, my rights are taken away. I remember wanting to get help from a women's organization as an alternative to the hospital, but the treatment I received was staggeringly appalling. And some women centers I approach-' ed just turned me away. That was what women who talk about solidarity did to me & I will never forget it Angela Davis does some amazing work. The persistent theme of her work has been the range of social problems associated with incarceration & the generalized criminalization of those communities that are most affected by poverty and racial discrimination. The groups she mentioned were indigenous women, black women, Muslim women, transgendered and the LGBT community and as much as I felt inspired by her talk there was this hole in my heart because I felt invisible. t felt that after 17 hospitalizations and the horrific' treatment received in mental hospitals that are historically informed by an appalling use of torture towards its citizens, I wanted to be heard too and represented. So I left the evening early and went for a walk and thought, I can stay quiet or I can do what I always have done which is to write about my experience. Indeed, Davis had some wonderful points and she talked about living in a society where we don't need prisons anymore. I agree. I want to live in a society where we won't need mental hospitals anymore. I think they are dismal places for those who are addicted, poor and perhaps physically ill. But just as white feminists cannot ignore Indigenous women and women of colour, all feminists must stop ignoring women who suffer from mental illnesses who live, work and love among us. The day we give empathic understanding to people suffering from schizophrenia is the day I am hoping will come soon. It will not come soon enough. By RUBY DIAMOND
The Yoga of Social Change Seven thousand years ago a great Yogi, Sada Shiva, brought knowledge to build a civilization. Art science, music, medicine, language, social norms, and most importantly the psycho-spiritual p.racti.ces ofTantra. Literally, Tantra means "that which liberates .fr?m . crudeness (ignorance} From the original holistic SCIence, involving physical & mental disciplines and spiritual practices, many separate schools branched off. You may have heard of some of them - Hatha, Raja, Bhakti, Kundalini, etc. Each time a piece of the original tantra was 'broken off it added to the western Idea that the practice of yoga means being caught up in your own self and your own life ... to the exclusion of social issues and social change. There is much confusion and frustration around the issue of spirituality. Many people question religions, whether they mean anything or say what the founders taught. Has something been forgotten? Have the original spiritual practices become empty rituals? Has faith become superstition? Has realisation become dogma? The need for a system of practices, physical, mental and spiritual, is not met with beliefs or theories that don't mesh with scientific discoveries or are not rational. What Tantra provides is a proven way to take one's self from ignorance to enlightenment... a revolu- . tion in conscious ess. This begins with commitment to a goal and changing your life. The Way of Tantra includes meditation, physical exercises, an approach to diet and health that makes sense, a code of cardinal human values ... it involves learning about yourself and the Infinite. The ultimate end of this revolution is to attain psycho-spiritual parallelism, where there is no longer any difference between you and your goal. Tantra is a timeless science - it's relevance in today's world is no less than in the past. Modem scientific research has expressed amazement that discoveries in all fields, including medicine, mental power & psychology, are often just repetitions of things revealed thousands of years ago. Tantra teaches that one must take It.
an objective look at everything in life and live positively. But wait - what about "social change?" When you decide to begin spiritual practice, you have an idea that the world is not as it should or could be. You decide to become a vegetarian, because eating meat makes it harder to do meditation or physical postures; you wake up to the incredible environment~l pollution and degradation involved in producing livestock for food. You decide to begin learning about learning, to clear your mind, and you begin to think about schools and education and teaching ... and you look at what is available for yourself and your kids (present or future) and it's not adequate. You see poverty and crime and injustice and exploitation and the politics of wealth and war and the breakd~wn ?f respect for each other and you wonder what s being . done .. what you can do. . Lo & behold, you don't have to reinvent the wheel. The ways needed to make for progressive change can be broken down to an essence, which can be called a theory. There are five fundamental principles to th~ Progressive Utilisation Theory, to Prout, listed below without elaboration right now: 1. There should be no hoarding of wealth without the permission of society. 2 There should be maximum utilisation of crude, subtle and causal resources of the universe. In addition, thedistribution of income and wealth should be rational. That is to say, it should satisfy minimum needs of all human beings on earth, permitting some but not excessive inequalities. 3. There should be maximum utilisation of the physical, mental & spiritual potentialities of the individual and collective organisms. 4. There should be a proper adjustment amongst the crude, subtle and causal; utilisations. This adjustment is designed to prevent air, water and space pollution. 5. Utilisations should vary in accordance with changes in time, space and person, and should be of a progressive nature. This principle is designed to keep Prout from becoming an inflexible dogma in the future.
"Dogma" is bad theory presented as truth. The first bond between these two parts of life, individual and collective, is simple - spiritual progress and social change. Tantra has been brought out of the mists of secrecy and false teachings - and forms the base for the renewal of education, political revolution and a true new world order. By PAULR TAYLOR
FUNNY!!! The Washington Post has published the winning subnissions to its yearly contest, in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for common words.
The Washington Post's Style Invitational asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing a letter, and supply a new definition. Here are this year's winners:
The winners are: 1. Coffee (n.), the person upon whom one coughs. 2. Flabbergasted (adj.), appalled over how much weight you have gained. 3. Abdicate (v.), to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach. 4. Esplanade (v.), to attempt an explanation while drunk. 5. Willy-nilly (adj.), impotent. 6. Negligent (adj.), describes a condition in which you absent-mindedly answer the door in your nightgown. 7. Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp. 8. Gargoyle (n.), olive-flavoured mouthwash. 9. Flatulence (n.) emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller. 10. Balderdash (n.), a rapidly receding hairline. 11. Testicle (n.), a humorous question in an exam 12. Rectitude (n.), the formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists. 13. Pokemon (n), a Rastafarian proctologist. 14. Oyster (n.), a person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddishisms. 15. Frisbeetarianism (n.),:The belief that, when you die, your Soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there. 16. Circumvent (n.), an opening in the front of boxer shorts worn by Jewish men. 'Came ie Users: :~ ~Because this place is a safe '. ..' spot for people trymg to stay \ clean, things like needles, wrappers, empty drug papers, and blood stains are not only banned but really disrespectful to those of us who are trying to stay~/ea~ . "~i<idscome here too. ~_
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1. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future. 2. Foreploy (v): Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid. 3. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period. 4. Giraffiti (n): Vandalism spray-painted very, very high. 5. Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it. 6. Inoculatte (v): To take coffee intravenously when you are running late. 7. Hipatitis (n): Terminal coolness. 8. Osteopornosis (n): A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit. ) . 9. Karmageddon (n): It's like, when everybody IS sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the E~ explodes and it's like, a serious bummer. 10. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you. 11. Glibido (v): All talk and no action. 12. Dopeler effect (n): The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly. 13. Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web. . . 14. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form ofa mosquito that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out. 15. Caterpallor (n.): The colour you turn after finding half a grub in the fruit you're eating.
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And the pick of the literature:
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16. Ignoranus
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Please try. It's more than question of getting caught.·
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(n): A person who's both stupid and
an asshole . Be who you are and say what you mean; those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind .
Telling Stories We need to tell our own stories. If we don't tell our stories people with power will tell our stories for us. And we won't like what they say. When we tell our stories we reach out to each other and build community. We share our pain. We share our hope. We share our laughter, and determination. When we tell our stories we draw our own maps, and we question the maps of the powerful. Each of us has something to tell, something to teach. We speak the language of the heart-here in the Downtown Eastside-the soul of Vancouver. Sandy Cameron
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