March 15, 2014, carnegie newsletter

C~rnegie C N E \i V S LETTER

401 Main St, Van6A 2T7 604-665-2289

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MARCH 15, 2014

carnnews@vcn.bc.ca carnnews@shaw.ca www.carnnews.org ..·.

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the best laid plans ...

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Silver Fox

take back space I was talking last week with libby davies, member of parliament for the downtown eastside of vancouver, and libby told of a star trek ep isode she'd seen - a futur istic s ituation in san francisco - an enormous wall had been co nstructed dividing poor people from everyone else .. and o uts ide this wa ll in super co nsumerist upscale society there was a lmost no awareness of who was struggling to survive o n the other side of the wall nor how wretched their living conditions were and libby said "that's not our future it's happe nin g right now" north america's anti-panhandl ing bylaws and other prohibitio ns against the presence of certain people in what was fo rmerly public s pace is a central o bjective in the global and local writ against the poor to put th is s ituation in perspective I'd like to quote fro m an excelle nt book "geographies of exclusion" by david s ibley; he says "power is expressed in the monopolization of space and the rel egation of weaker groups in society to less desirabl e environments .. the boundaries between the consuming and nonconsuming public are strengthenin g with nonconsumption being construed as a form of deviance at the same time as s paces of consumption e liminate pub lic spaces in city centres, processes of contro l are manifested in the excl usion of those who are judged to be deviant imperfect or marginal -who is felt to belong and not belo ng co ntributes in an important way to the shaping of social space it is often the case that this hostility to others is articulated as a concern about property values the urge to make separati o ns between c lean and dirty that is o rdered and disordered us and th em to expel the abject is encouraged in western cultures creating anxieties because such separations can never finally be achieved th is anxiety is re inforced by the culture of consumption in western societies the success of capital ism depends on it and a necessary feature of the geographies of exc lusio n the literal mappings of power relations and rejection is the collapse o f categori es like public and private and to be diseased or disab led is a mark of imperfection the fear of infection leads to erectio n of the barricades to resist the spread of di seased polluted others there is a history of imaginary geographies

which cast minorities .. imperfect people .. and a list of others who are seen to pose a threat to the dominant group in society as polluting bodies or fo lk devi ls who are then located elsewhere this elsewhere might be nowhere as when genocide o r moral transformation of a minority like prostitutes are advocated the imagery of defilement which locates people o n the margins or in residual s paces is now mo re like ly to be applied to the mentally disabled the homeless prostitutes and some racialized minorities" the downtown eastside of vancouver, where I live, is by any statistical measurement of poverty and disease a third world area besieged by upscale developmental greed of truly genocidal proportions the highest rates and numbe rs of hiv/aids .. suicide .. hepatitis c .. syphilis and tubercul osis in the western world and close to the lowest life expectancy and the s ingle question I am asked more than any o ther by media and concerned citizens is "where will they go?' where w ill the people go when they are driven from thi s area by gentrification/displacement? referring to sibley, I must conclude that the munic ipal provinc ia l and federal governments must have some imaginary geography in mind because there is nowhere for the people to go and in the downtown eastside the public space that has been available for drug addicts, mentally disabled, homeless, prostitutes is being seized from them shutters and grates cover doorways and stairwells where human beings who have nowhere else to go at least cou ld stand for awhi le awnings are removed from buildings so that cold rain pouts down on very ill people large private security forces in gastown and chinatown business districts enforce to the limits of th eir capab ility anti-panhand ling bylaws and harass poor and vuln erable people o ut of the ir areas .. away from tourists and businesses there is serious talk of establishing what is being called the carroll street corridor - a k ind of demilitarized zone between gastown and chinatown so that tourists do not have to walk through the defiled downtown eastside

and in the midst of the downtown eastside the police have established a red zone for prisoners released from jail. meaning you could be arrested simply for being found on a certa in block and vancouver city council has recently invested time and money in an attempt to circumvent the charter of rights and freedoms naming the downtown eastside specifically as the target of thi s action to loosen even more the search and seizure regulations there are no-go zones in new westminster several block areas where you can be charged if you are deemed an undesirable just for being there and that is basically in response to drug addicts driven from the downtown eastside to new west by police but there is resistance. I know there is here in victoria and in vancouver not long ago activists protesting the anti-panhand ling bylaw invaded city hall and occupied city council chambers the sophistication of the system we are opposing is such that the presence of panhandlers in business areas of vancouver has been greatly red uced without the police having to change a single person yet thus the system is ab le to avoid a public legal challenge and public space continues to be seized to put this in a theo logical perspective I'll briefly quote from a book e ntitled "money and power" written by jacques ellul, who fought in the resistance in france during the second world war and engaged in many social justice struggles throughout the remainder of his life. e llul says "ultimately the rich seek to kill the poor this happens because fine rich are exasperated by constantly being路 called into question by god through the poor - and this is the real reason for the amazing prob lem that in all societies the rich have detested the poor and why when precisely the rich are the powerful the superior the strong do they set themselves against the poor? we can find of course all the psychological and sociological reasons we could want but none of these reasons is definitive none really explains but they all relate to the fact that the poor are a temporal reOection of god" to resist today is to take back space but when we are few in numbers and have no money or political power, what do we do?

the question I finally asked myself is not which cause, which new assault on the poor should I take on? anti-panhandling bylaws? the health care system? housing? the legal system? racism? unemployment? the theft of children from poor women? welfare? but who are the defiled? the ones who don't belong?

- the human beings who are re lentlessly ehumanized? those who are victimized by this social cleansing?

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in the downtown eastside as well as throughout the province of british columbia it is the drug addicts who are homeless, diseased who are excluded, marginalized, pushed out, vilified abandoned arid destroyed arid it is the impoverished drug addict on whom the entire system bear's down every institution of law education business hea lth and religion the degraded s ituation and circumstances of drug addicts is one issue that affects or will affect everyone in b.c. and is the only opening, the only breach in the system I have yet seen during my activism in the downtown eastside the horrendous condition of drug addicts has forced government, the system, to yield resources it never would have otherwise I believe that in the downtown eastside to defend the entit'e community of poor people the best way to do it is to defend and stand with and for those who are most defi led and excluded the drug addicts a year ago several downtown eastside activists invo lved with the drug situation held a protest we blocked the corner of main and hastings and distributed a pamphlet describing the horrendous situation of overdose deaths and disease we planted 1200 crosses in oppenheimer park to commemorate the number of people who have died as a result of drug overdoses in the past 4 years and then as a member of the vancouver/richmond health board representing the downtown eastsid e '" I introduced a motion which passed declaring the hiv/aids infection rate among injection drug users vancouver's first pub! ic health emergency these events brought international media attention to the predicament in the downtown eastside and since drug addiction and its consequences affects

all areas of our live including massive hea lth care costs the media has the story from one perspective or another ever since, in such a w idespread and ongoing manner, that libby davies said she has never in all her years of activism seen anything like it at approx imately the same time as these events a nn Iiv ingston and myself he ld meetings with drug addicts in the downtom! eastside hundreds of ad d icts and listened to them say over and over that what they most needed was a p lace to go a p lace. some space to be safe and rest and have the use of a te lephone and a shower and a restroom common ame nities de nied them for even the commun ity centre in the area is off limits from th ese meetings a campai gn developed for a 24-hour resource centre for drug users and that coinc ided with the federal government the libera ls conn ing forth wi th a mi ll ion dollars to deal w ith the public health e me rgency and it's been de cided that the federa l go vernment will initia lly fund thi s reso urce centre for addicts a co mmitment wh ich wo uld have seemed impossible unthi nkable and absurd a year ago the re's c urrently a batt le over where this facility will be and there are those ins isting it be located a nywhere elsewhere nowhe re but it w ill be in the downtown eastside: and it is space taken back because if anything can be said to be an anti-gentrification proj ect, it is this o ne and the health board in coope ration (of a ll things) with other m ini stries and b.c housin g put togeth er mo ney not marked for any other hous ing ventu re and purc hased 2 hotels in th e dark heart of the emergency - the block where the red zone is located the block most peo ple in business w ish was gentri fied and the addicts expe lled as soo n as possible and these 2 hotels w ill hou se menta lly disabled dr ug ddicts. many of whom are infected w ith hiv/a ids thi s initia ti ve is an important signa l that a commitment has been made to house "undesirab les" in the downtown eastside and most dramati cally of a ny proj ect so far is a drug users' organization a lso funded by the vancouver richmo nd health board it's called vandu -vancouver area ne twork o f drug users . sibley says in his book "there is a lways th e hope tha i throug h political action the huma nity of th e rejected will be recognized and the images of defi le menl discarded"

and that is what vandu has most powerfully begun to accompl ish the de-marginalization of those most marg inaliz.ed the most povverless and voiceless are finding their vo ices and speaking forth at meetings and conferences and on committees where they had never been seen or heard befo re it occurs to me regard ing activism in the downtown eastside that out of all ad vocacy effo rts and a ll the meetings and de monstrations around housing, while importa nt as acts of res istan ce, they have not yie lded one square inch of space taken back but the drug emergency has been truly hopeful a petiti on c ampaign was begun by vandu me mbers for safe injection roo ms in the downtown eastside more space for the lowest the least a nd the last and because of the horre nd ous number of overdose deaths, th is has become a possibility the 24-hour resource centre committee una nimous ly supported thi s petition and safe injection sites and th is committee includes a gastown bus iness leade r and an inspector of the vancouver police department a nd the chief med ical officer of be. john millar, in a report on the public hea lth emerge ncy, urges the government to yield resources with housing mentio ned prominently to he lp save lives of dnJâ‚Ź users out of this suffe ring of drug addicts and the ir fam ilies out of thi s exclusion, o ut o f this genocide, out of the enormous health care costs now a nd later out o f the monstrous market of internationa l drug trade against first nations people out of the wi ld fi re consequences o f the prohibition of illicit d rugs out of the disease, out o f the lives of the most execrated most written-off a nd hated hum an beings in our soc iety has come an opening .. a possibility for so mething new fo r change for tak ing back space and the e mergency is not go ing to go away problems assoc iated with drug use w ill only increase and worsen if real changes are not made for social acti vists this is an opportunity that may not ever come again you can ta ke o n the who le system from the side of a drug add ict this crisis is in victoria, it is in the comox valley it is on reserves throughout the province it is across the world

and so I urge political activists to organize with drug addicts - they are in the biggest mess there is their lives are the biggest messes and the c loser you are to them the more of a mess you get into but this solidarity is the only hope I see for actua l concrete c hange the downtown eastside is being crushed there are a million battles to fig ht I have never before realized the width a nd breadth a nd power of the system as I have in this advocacy because here is a real threat to the system, trying to save the li ves of those o thers would rather see die 1'11 c lose w ith another quotatio n from the best book I know on this whole debacle it's called "the corne r" the co mer being the drug comer, the drug scene. the authors dav id simo n and edward bum say "the corner is everywhere a nd we have swallowed some disastrous pretensions allowing o urselves a naive s incerity that even now assumes the battle can be restricted to he roin and cocaine limited to a self-conta ined cadre of lawbreakers when all a lo ng the confl ict was ripe to beco me a war agai nst tire underclass itse lf we can co mmit to the peop le of the corn er to th e noti on that they are our own, that the ir future is our future or we can throw the proble m back on them e mpathy demand s that we recognize o urselves in the ir faces, that we acknow ledge the addictive impulse is something more than simple lawlessness that we begin to see the corner as the last refuge of the truly disowned and connected ness ad mits that between the ir worl d and ours

the distance

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in human terms at least is never as great as we make it seem" Bud Osborn

mc;cne~aD~e 02

2014 muon art COif'

PACIFIC BLUEGRASS &

HERITAGE SOCIETY

A variety of bands playing Bluegrass, Folk and Country Music!

Wednesday March I9th, 7 路 9 pm Carnegie Theatre

see Wha-t Moves you in 2o1q.

Expressive Arts Workshop for Seniors Movement, pastels, music, poetry ...

Using movement and the Arts playfully to create New Year Opportunities and Learning

Wednesday, Mar 24th 2-4pm Carnegie Centre in Classroom 2

Facilitated by Jill Nowak For Info, Contact MARY ELLEN : 604-665-3005

Greetings Frotn the librarY Hello! My name is Elizabeth, and I work as the Carnegie Librarian every Monday and on alternate Saturday afternoons. I've had the pleasure of working at Carnegie Library several times before, helping to plan the annual Alley Health Fair in 20 II and again in 2013. I've really been enjoying having regularly scheduled days at Carnegie and getting to see the same friendly faces from week to week.

When I' m not at Carnegie, I work as a Children's Librarian across the Vancouver Public Library system. l also regularly volunteer just down the street with the Saint James Music Academy, an after-school music program for children living in the DTES .

Looking forward to seeing you in the library!

Also, we have another new face at the library this month, Devin Egan. Devin will be acting for James as the Carnegie Library Supervisor. James has been asked to help out downtown at the Central Library for about 3 months, so Devin will be with us during that time. Please stop in to say hello and give a warm Carnegie welcome to Devin !

'Dear ]ewe{ My darling. Do you miss me like I miss vou?

Don't lie, you need me like I need yo u. ' .

Remember when we first met? It was your first time out. I was sitting with your fri ends across the fire from you. We flirted a little, stole hidden glances here and there. I could feel your excitement along with your innocence and purity; I couldn' t wait to be your first. It was magical, wasn't it? Remember how it felt when I first touched your lips? I cascaded down your throat and enveloped yo ur lungs in a warm embrace.

You couldn't believe it - it was pure ecstasy. I swear you felt it right down to your knees. I held you close.

You didn ' t notice but I watched as you sat there with that euphoric smile on your face, and I knew you'd g row to love my savage grace. those were s uch great times we had, so why are yo s~ mad? You should be glad! I waited patiently every t1me you turned your back. who was there for you when alex died? who held you when you cried? who took the pain away? who helped yo u pick up the pieces and put on a brave face at the end of the day?

Sure we had a few rough patches : when we stole from your parents, when we lied to your sisters and cheated your friend, ~a got a bit hopeless, ang ry, maybe a little de pressed ... in the end just remember we both had one goal, love, so don't be sad, you did not have to sell your soul ...

Cheyenne Maya Stevens

BROKEN HEART BROKEN HEART An Exhibition on Trauma "The Thin Veneer of the Lost Limbic" Does The Male Have a Psyche?"

By Montana King

OPENING NIGHT AT THE CARNEGIE CENTRE 401 Main St. 3rd floor FRIDAY APRIL 4111 5:30-8:00 pm.

WHAT WILL THE DTES LOOK LIKE IN THE FUTURE? Right now, the city is making a plan for the DTES for the next 30 years. The plan is called the Local Area Plan (LAP). The plan will decide who will be able to live here in the future and who will be comfortable in the neighbourhood. Will the DTES be like Yaletown? Or will low income people be able to keep living here?

Daisy Moe, what's all

That would keep condos out. so

this talk about 60- 40?

hotel rents won't go up so fast

So far we only have a draft plan from the city. There's one good recommendation: To make sure that 60째/o of all new buildings are social housing and 400/o are market rentals in the Oppenheimer area. This would keep condos out of the area and help keep rents in the hotel rooms down. But there is no plan to replace all the SROS with good housing or house all the homeless people.

Wh~rt d~ea

the

mneC)nt)(e e~ucus t~r ih~ DTEI?

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w~ni ~n ~ pl~n

1. End the DTES housing crisis. Designate land for social housing. Build 5000 units of self-contained housing for DTES residents who are homeless or live in hotel rooms. Make a plan do this within 10 years using city, provincial and federal funds.

2. Define Social Housing. Make sure that people on welfare, with a shelter allowanc-e of$375/month, pensioners and people who can't afford market rents can afford social housing.

3. Change zoning laws. Support city staff's plan to require 60% of new buildings in the Oppenheimer area to be social housing, and 40% to be market rentals (no condos allowed). Require one third of all new housing in Thornton Park and the Hastings Corridor to be social housing available to people on welfare and basic pension, and onethird to be social housing available to the working poor.

Curioser and curioser! All those planning meetings, and I'm still stuck in this skuzzy SRO!

4.1mprove the housing we have. Hold • landlords accountable for bad conditions. Stop renovictions and bring in real rent control.

5. Control business gentrification. Create a process directed by low-income people to approve or deny new business (restaurant, liquor, boutique) applications.

G. Quality, living wage jobs far law-income residents. Create job training programs for anyone who wants them. Require local business to hire local residents.

7. Safety for all. Stop criminalizing survival work like sex work and vending. Stop abuse by police and security guards. Create a special office directed by low income and Indigenous residents to receive complaints and direct investigations.

8. Create an Aboriginal Healing and Wellness Centre. Fund a centre designed and operated by Indigenous people, with the consent of people from the local nations. Include resident-run intergenerational housing in the building for Elders, children, youth, young parents and adults.

9. Fund peer run mental health services. Fund and enable mental health services run by people who experience mental health issues themselves and have experience in the system.

10. Fund harm reduction services, detox, and treatment on demand. Empower people who use drugs to design and implement harm reduction services. Make sure that anyone who wants detox or treatment can get it right away.

11. Fund social services that provide safety and choices. Make sure that people with mental illness are given choices that include non pharmaceutical and non institutional options, choices about what kind of support they need and who provides it.

12. End discrimination so everyone_can get the services they need. Make sure Indigenous residents, people with disabilities, queer and trans people, women, and people who speak Chinese and Spanish can use services and feet welcome there. Fund services that make the relationship between settlers and Indigenous people equal. Make the DTES a sanctuary zone where all have equal access to health, housing and social services regardless of citizenship status.

Rents are going up in the hotels and

What's the LAPP? Some of you may have heard of the LAPP, which stands for the Local Area Planning Process.

The LAPP is the process that the city created to make the plan. Most low income caucus members are LAPP committee members.

Who is the low income caucus? The low income caucus is made up of people like Tracey Morrison of Western Aboriginal Harm Reduction Society, Dave Hamm ofVANDU, Phoenix Winter of the Carnegie Community Centre Association, Karen Ward of Gallery Gachet, Colleen Boudreau representing sex workers, anti-oppression organizer Tami Starlight, and Victoria Bull, an aboriginal grandmother raising her grandchildren. They are joined by volunteers Harold Lavender, Ian McRae and Herb Varley. CCAP organizes the meetings.

What has the Caucus been doing? The Merciful Minerva! caucus has been holding Town Hall Meetings Can't t hey read at Cit y and other events to hear what low income Hall? Thousands of residents want in th e plan. The caucus has people signed th is been telling the city what it hears. In June, petition! the Caucus organized a petition drive a nd a rally for a Social Justice Zone in the DTES. Over 3000 DTES residents signed the Social Justice Zone petition.

Are some people fighting for more condos and less social housing? Yes. Some business groups and developers don't like the 60 I 40 plan for the Oppenheimer area. Many are meeting and writing to the City to argue for more condos and less social housing.

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The Carnegie Community Rction f1roject (CCRJ1) is a Jlroject of the Carnegie Communitg Centre Rssociation. Visit us at the CRRNt~E COMMUN\TY CEN'T'RE. 2NO flOOR. 401 MR\N STKEET (@HRSTIN~S). VRNCOUVER. UNCEOEO CORST SRUSH TERRITORIES hHJ>:I/ccaJ>vancouver.wordJ>ress.com * tamaraccap@ gmail.com * 604.729.2380

Not all Advertising LOOKSiike an Ad 'Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.路 A little homily to deal with reality. The one that makes more sense to me is 'Subjective approach with objective adjustment.' This keeps the wide spectrum of possibilities in perspective and allows conscious intell igent and intuitive responses.

It also helps one keep their wits about them when anger or other difficult emotions strive to colour and muddy a situation. A prime example is the poor-bashing diatribe/ad that's on Page 2 of a recent Vancouver Sun. As ofthis writing 121 people are signed up to speak at City Hall on the controversial Local Area Plan set to decide the developments to be permitted in the Downtown Eastside for the next 30 years.

The author Shelley Fralic went on and on about how much of a money pit the area has been for decades, how undeserving residents are for their anti-social & anti-goodness lives. According to the stereotypes s he is flaunting, every addict has chosen to be one and should rot in hell ; every disabled or mentally ill bozo has nobody to blame but him or herself and should stop sucking on the tit of governments that idiotically keeps them alive. Every crime, undesirable result of poor people driving all the decent people away, every family having to Jock up their kids to keep them from being ravaged by contact with or even knowing about the cesspool the Downtown Eastside has become are all due to her and all the decent people allowing it.

But it's just the spectre of low- income people getting anything that brings out the poor-bashing in force and vehemence.

Fralic writes as tl1ough she is speaking directly to the prejudices, the bigotry and the cultivated ignorance ofMr & Mrs John Q Taxpayer. There is no room or even need for further argument: all these undesirable, indecent, dishonest, criminal activities and the people responsible for same (I guess that's us!) must go ' 路somewhere else."

Sound familiar? It was exactly the same when the Chinatown Merchants Association made statements in the press, right after a front page quip in the same Vancouver Sun about how there were at least 7000 addicts living in the hell of the Downtown Eastside, and the CMA said, "We love drug addicts. They should go into treatment.. somewhere else" (with one

saying off-record that an island somewhere would be ideal (where 'they' could get clean (or die?!)))

Such people, and this kind of thinking is certainly shared throughout the business & development ranks everywhere, are most firm in expressing their views in_ terms that completely deny any common humanity With anyone beneath their own fantasy-status or class.

That's how it's done: if you want something someone else has got, you first dehumanise them, hold them up for ridicule and scom, then make them your enemy threatening the (your) purity of purpose and hop~ fo_r the _world embodied by your kind. Then you ar~ JUStified 111 your own mind to scapegoat, lock up, dnve away or just kill all these sub-human creatures. . Back to the beginning: hoping for the best, preparmg for the worst gives a lot of power to those happy to crush you. The first impulse is to react, and that c~n fit you into more of their stereotypi ng. Be pasSionate about your rights and your stance. Never give up and find friends. The power of those who think ~he~selves over you is a paper tiger, only intimidat~ng 1f you let it overwhelm you .. only overwhelming 1fyou let it intimidate you.

By PAULR TAYLOR

A Canadian Anthem Oh, Carnegie, Our nearby living room.

Your dome just seems A dark smiling mushroom.

The library, the round staircase The cafeteria.

The poolroom and the Learning place, The auditorium.

Oh, Carnegie, Almost nearly free.

Wish that I could now walk back To the Carnegie.

Oh, Carnegie; the best place In Beee Ceee!

Garry Gust

my addiction So my sweet darling I see your pain I am o n the corner o f Hastings and Ma in

Growing up I never thought I would be an add ict But in my addiction l"ve been caught I've stolen, cheated and lied All the thi ngs I. said I'd never do I watched my best fri end die Along with her pati of me seemed to die 路 The streets bring me com fort I have nowhere to lay my head each n igh t l have become a s lave to dru 0as But I won' t g ive up this fi ght

O h I will lie to yo u And make you my slave Soon you will be addicted I am everything you' ll crave You' ll sleep with my men And work for my fri ends You must obey my orders O r your life sadly ends I pro mise this tho ugh If you do all I say I' II feed your addiction And you' ll love what you crave So poor vulnerable girl I've corrupted your mind So fa r beyond lost No one could really find But the d rugs and the money Oh and the man in the street Countless nig hts hiding O nl y to get beat You' ll run and yoti' ll hide O nl y to crawl back to me You say you' re not addicted But I saved you, can' t you see So my secret darling How has the ride been with m e Yo u a re my precious slave Simply a prisoner never set free Diane Neufe ld

Diane Neufeld

Legacies To their children, my parents left a legacy of lies a legacy of pain a legacy of hate To my children. I will leave a legacy of truth a legacy of heali ng a legacy of love Angharad Giles

Achievements I be lieve in people who put all the ir effotis In whatever endeavours they gain I salute people with all talents -music, art, poetry & w rit ing If you believe in yourself You will succeed in everything.

1 be lieve in myself, DrugStOre Window I be lieve I can do whatever is best -and so can you Tara's a big gi rl All my re latio ns, the mean ones call her M iniVan Bonnie E Stevens ~ut we shush 'em up 'fore she hears might be big but as sensitive as dee r got a big heart, that girl We are all normal what e lse matters?

He re inside this place seen a cowboy come o ut a drugstore We are all normally d raggin' the bars o ut front Locked up fo r many days I guess the big scary woman dancing We were once normal come and eat 路em whole couldn't Now we Jay locked inside just couldn't pass up te chance they Just an average person hurtin' her feeli ngs Whose soul has slowly died In this place we call home no-one noti ced We are a ll pretty much the same the wince of pain. but I saw, 1 saw .. .

As hours fade another case And days pass us by of cruel and unusual We see and hear horrid thi ngs stupidity. hope you're proud big man that make us want to di e AI So welcome to the funny farm Where we all are insanely sane Welcome to the place we call home Where we all are pretty much the same Diane Neufeld

Pinochio Knows or Gepetto was a Pervert (this week'sfahytale update from thefairytale continuum's continuity departm ent. "Hi there'")

Yeah 1 told you guys I'd be gettin' around to this one so if you don't like it. or prefer it in rid iculous leprechaun patois please drop me a note via the fairytale continuum ... Wherever that is.

Actually it's just down your street up the second to last laneway, back of the last warehouse on the left, or the righ1 if the wind is coming from the south. Remember that one. Otherwise you're better off waiting till things are in print before running around looking like a brainwashed chicken repeating humour as fo wl fact... Actually, and again. tha last comment was for the bozo who just burst through the continuums door dressed as Sancho Panza claiming he'd been abducted by a group of weird psychics who specialize in fucking up polygraph readings. Took a while to get that freak out of the fairytales too.

But where was I again?

Right, Pinocchio, the sapling son who never existed in the first place.

There are some who say that Pinocchio is the original template for "Sonny" in the new 1 Ro bot movie, but to tell the truth 1think those people need a refresher course something like you'd see on Sesame Street (one of these things is not like the other, etc. etc.) concerning the differences between artificial intelligence that will never actually be intelligent (because it's artificial), a chunk of wood a delusional old geezer has long heartfelt conversations with while he hacks away at it with objects sure to get him on every no=fly list on the planet, and the differences between subjective verses objective when dealing with mysterious things like fairytales, and the bozos who pretend not to know what they are.

Don't ask Gepetto. Somebody left the door ajar and now he's over there in the corner of the continuum we normally reserve for visiting spirits from way way out there pretending to everyone who will listen that -we work an alchemy of common sense into lead bricks for imagination- as being the only hope for Gepetto's obsession; Pinocchio #1313.

So could we all keep on lying to Pinocchio to keep Gepetto's beliefs about the things he has created but doesn't want to take responsibility for from getting out ofthe bag. The bag he keeps his new and improved but only half finished Pinocchio in.

Yeah kiddies, Gepetto's a freak 'cause Pinocchio ... remember Pinocchio? There's a story or five about Pinocchio, yeah Pinocchio's a piece of wood. A piece of wood on puppet stri ngs to be exact. And we all know what happens when Pinocchio goes off the stage, right? Yeah, right back into the box Gepetto kee ps all his self portraits in .

Does Gepetto have a secret wish to be a piece of wood like Pinocchio? Or does he just want to have a piece of wood to talk to and take to the park on Sundays like a page out of a collection ofNorman Rockwell sumpthin-orothers . And could someone please tell me why Gepetto's favourite piece of wood gets longer every time Gepetto lies? Remember, Pinocchio's a piece of wood, not an artificial intelligence (that has to be programmed to respond) called Sonny. No sir, old fashioned puppets have to be manipulated by puppeteers, which in this case is Gepetto.

That's a good question; Why does Gepetto's favourite piece of wood -that he keeps re-shaping with lethal objectsgrow longer when Gepetto uses Pinocchio to lie to everyone? Does Gepetto suffer from Munchausens Syndrome b' Proxy? (That's a transferrence based mental illness usually suffered by control freaks in order for the control freak t get attention.)

Poor Pinocchio the proxy puppet. A critter Gepetto won't allow the dream of growing up. No, Gepetto insists his proxy piece of wood must be a real live little boy.

Sumpthin' tells me the fairytale continuum's continuity department should retain the Insane Louse Posse' to hand! critters like Gepetto and keep his personal fantasies outta the fairytales. But I'm just the fairytale continuum's mascot so no one really listens to me. Though it is a nice perk offairytale life to be able to tell critters like that freak Gepetto to "F-off" from fairytale to fairytale. Even though Gepetto usually has no idea we're insulting him .

Hang in there Pinocchio! Help's on the way.

Skippy the tye-dyed mascot

Don't Get Me Started Saint Minus tells me people who do not guzzle booze are to be now classified mentally ill - right arm I mutter under the falling snow, like forest smokers aiming the ir butt at a 2 hundred yearold tree I walk by Keefer and Main and see selfi shist lunacy as condos for the rich continue to grow, pipelines already cracking, pot is a no-no how someone e lse can tell what and what not 1 can do I do not think so you catchy me or kill us the poor the many the enraged, sinister-handed in a right-of-way world you try to fight back then your character and rent and the city you loved arc attacked when Main and Hastings becomes the epicenter of West Van.Two .... where will we be Hey god I think your trident-shaped global leach phone is letting you know you're being paged, like4 an isolationist popularity contest or a fish and chippendale-themed restaurant kind of makes you think of how the poor will be ordered to dress, will the Minister of gods please tell us what plans bad or worse will be enforced in nuclear terms what the hell is next. ..

So many hands so little time are we fu lfilling futility so bent on destruction it's as if by design but not just yet there are some who still care, it's open season for the land of us sitting ducks every block you kill I'll key your expens1ve suv - Sel fishist Ultra Violent- truck Unfortunately the s um of my hopes and dreams could not buy a one-zone 90-minute busfare, like c rashing your karma reality seems to be the one and only luxury yo u can afford a blip on the bottom of page e leventeen thus your 15 seconds are crushed between a missing cat and another missing girl so much for notoriety jump abourd the SSAnonymously Anonymous classes begin whenever you want any vacant lot will do; like the dirt fore all to see in your hands like the pin drops only pove1iy and depression real people understand, like the better part of a bitter life there are no more commands for me and you, Skid Row is now in escrow as more buildings and streets get to die and we look at ourselves some will scream some juist cry I hate those ri ch bastards for trying to make us look

like the stumbling blocks and the bad guys all this evil on our streets why? The time we don't have is the only time we have got it's the Gregors and Clarks and Furlongs, Williams and you to Diane Watts you deserve nothing but being chained together and thrown into the sea to rot, but instead of wrecking the ocean we shall condemn you to just one room & the public' II be witness to your equal opportunity doom.

Have Fun see ya no maybe not.

By ROBERT McGILLIVRAY P.S. Russia screw off, with love the Ukraine!

Spring Flamenco Series at the Carnegie Join us for our spring series of flamenco workshops, where you will be immersed in the music, rhythm, and dance of southern Spain. From the gypsy camps and Moorish m_edinas of Sevi lie, G ranada & Jerez, Flamenco embodies the passion, pride, suffering, and joy ofthe people. Learn dance technique, rhythmic hand clapping or palm as, and how to listen and respond to the music. No dance experience necessary.

Open to all genders. Ole! Instructor: Kelty McKerracher

Saturday March 22, 4 pm - 6 pm Fridays in April and May (except April18) 3 pm - 5 pm

*Special Event* Flamenco Movie Night with Oscar Nieto Respected Vancouver maestro Oscar Nieto will take us on a journey throug h the evolution of flamenco in the 20th century with 'the medium of film. Be wowed by footage of the some of the great dancers including the legendary Carmen Amaya. Oscar has a wealth of knowledge having worked directly with many of the artists and will give historical commentary after each clip - this is an event not to be missed!

Saturday March 29, 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm

1)oN'-r1"ouc.l-/

ME, L\Jel'..'/ CH~RM5~

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Carnegie (~ ]'!_E _j_V S LETTER

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." -Margaret Meade

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THIS NEWSLETIER IS A PUBLICATION OF THE CARNEGIE COMMUNITY CENTRE ASSOCIATION Articles represent the views of individual contributors and not of the Association.

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FRIDAY, MARCH 28TH make submissions to Paul Taylor, Editor.

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