Sooke scoop digest 1

FIRST EDITION

SPRING 2015 !

Full Moon # First Edition MULTIMEDIA ZINE WEAVING STORIES OF SOOKE & SOUTHERN VANCOUVER ISLAND

MYTHOS LEGEND OF THE SOOKE SASQUATCH

CULINARY QUEST TALE OF TOM KRAL 'NATURE'S CHEF'

NATURAL FAMILY MEDITATIONS OF A POST-PARTUM PAPA

SOOKE SCOOP

Welcome to our launch edition! "# South Vancouver Island, stretching from Sooke all along the Juan de Fuca Way is a rich and biodiverse region inhabited by 'Supernatural' wildness, cultural abundance and an open-hearted community. A need has been seeded: to give voice to the quilted patch-work of stories that make up our unique and friendly home. The Sooke Scoop endeavours to be an ongoing glimpse into our every day, collective mythology in the making. Enjoy!  CONTINUED AT SOOKESCOOP.COM

(Above) What's the Scoop: Stick in the Mud's mesmerizing 'Esmerelda' Blend SPRING DIGEST

FIRST EDITION

SPRING 2015 !

Where the Wild Things Are: Sasquatch as 'Sookesquatch' What is it about Sasquatch that raises the hair on the back of one's goose-pimpled neck or invites laughter and ridicule at the mere mention of the shaggy beast's name? This is my encounter with Sasquatch and how I came to discover the mystery in Sooke...

Sasquatch is an essential part of Cascadia's Mythos

As a naive child, I listened to the tales of Sasquatch with mute fascination as my brother Michael would spin yarns about the race of secret hairy giants living in the last patch of forest on the edge of our industrial home town, Windsor Ontario. I could barely contain my thrills when we camped overnight, heard hooting owls for the first time and supposedly found the Squatch's cave, which in actual fact was a forgotten sewer outfall I discovered in my more skeptical teenage years.

It was the lure of Sasquatch, and an out-of-place totem pole, that initiated my trek out West few lifetimes ago.

On the edge of the continent, I somehow knew I would one day have an encounter with the Wild One of the deep woods.

One of my first experiences on the island was hitchhiking to Mystic Beach when I got picked up by a 'hunter' of the legendary bipedal giant. He had purportedly tracked and heard, but did not actually see a nocturnal howling Squatch. He excitedly told me Sasquatch had been spotted around Sooke on more than one occasion. Later on, he showed me several photographs of a pair of giant handprints in snow, with his puny hands shown to scale. I felt that same chill come over me from my youth.

The name "Sasquatch" comes from 'Sasq’ets' the Chehalis or Sts’ailes First Nations Coast Salish Peoples. 'Bigfoot' is the American rendition. It comes as no surprise that this hairy giant, a mysterious and aloof Giganthopithecus of sorts, has gone by many names in the First Nations stories. While endowed with great mystical powers, the First People believed he was as real as you and I, yet stealthy as a ghost cat (unless you smelled them first...)

CONTINUED AT SOOKESCOOP.COM

Sasquatch originates from 'Sasq’ets', and has also been called by the names Bak'Was, Tsuno'qua, Ga'giit, Yeti, Boq's and many more. The First Peoples had contact with this race of wild Giants and considered them real physical and magicalspiritual messengers...

SPRING DIGEST

FIRST EDITION

SPRING 2015 !

Sleepless Nights with a Post-Partum Papa ! " # $ % & ' ( ! " # $ %

I hear four distinct, nearby breaths in the darkness. Calmest and clearest, is my beloved’s, Naomi. This is the sound of a confident, deep, fully earned sleep. Overdue sleep. A mother’s breath in cadence with the chorus of a million frogs just beyond our window’s sight, giving voice to the emerging spring every night after sunset.

It is a trouble-free breathing pattern. Gone are the days’ worries and triumphs: “Did all the toys get put away beneath the stairs? The dinner? Did you see Naia’s little whiplash smile? Will she wake up again throughout the night with her little snuffly nose? Ella’s free-style art masterpiece deserves a special place. Am I crushing her creativity by letting her watch another show? Will I get enough sleep tonight to feel nourished enough for tomorrow? How I love my sweet family! Shhhh, go to sleep Ella…”.

A devoted mother’s sleep, especially with a fresh nursing babe, is rarely deep.

But tonight she is comatose from utter exhaustion.

Loudest, almost a snore, is Ella’s rhythmic breath-beat, occasionally interrupted by her vivid dreaming, harsh coughing and wild thrashing about. Is she battling the monsters under the bed tonight? Of course, almost every night she dreams. Loudly. She is just as boisterous in her night world as her waking world. Wide-eyed wonder child, she demands to be heard, by the vast audience attending her somnambulant rehearsals with side-kick, imaginary companion, Maisy. “I never dream!” she insists, when we talk as a family about the evening’s dreams in the morning. This child, who I adore and love as my very own, can get cranky in the evenings when she has passed her sleepy-time window. When I’ve had enough, I begin to lowly growl like the bear-man that I am. It doesn’t always help the situation. In with the earplugs and out with dispensed bed-time hugs. Her hoarse coughing will probably wake us all up later at some point. Poor, sweet child, sleep…

Next, I can easily distinguish little Naia’s wheezy, milk-sodden breath in the cacophony. Just over two weeks and she has already caught her first cold.

Young ones with their immune systems are constantly learning, sharing health and sicknesses, adapting to brand new circumstances. She was sleeping like a hibernating cub for the first while, but now she wakes up frequently for feedings. Mama murmurs when I hear Naia latching onto her warm, milky wonders.

CONTINUED AT SOOKESCOOP.COM

SPRING DIGEST

Sooke Scoop Comics Page

COMICS PAGE March 2015

Issue No. One

TEL (250 EPHON )642 E -XX XX

sookescoop.com/comics

Sasquatch sightings in the Sooke Hills

FUNNIES PAGE COMES TO SOOKE SCOOP! GET THE SCOOP BEHIND THE MAGIC, MAYHEM, AND MYSTERIES OF SOUTH VAN ISLE

Local artist and illustrator Serge Foglio has got some stories to tell. But he won't talk!

-The

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A sa h DN c t a u Sasq

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Continued at SookeScoop.com

oos -E-K The Spidey Sense

DELIV ER HESSF TO: O Privat e Inv G Victor estigator ia, B.C .

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'Slug

Sooke Scoop Comics Page | Local Graphic Novels | SookeScoop.com for further details

Hills

TEL (250 EPHON )642 E -XX XX

Sooke Scoop Culinary Arts

CULINARY ARTS Spring 2015

Issue No. One

sookescoop.com/comics

NATURE'S CHEF AND THE QUEST FOR THE CULINARY HOLY GRAIL What is a restauranteur, born and raised in a European deli, trained by some of the world's best chefs doing in the back woods and stony beaches of Sooke? Co-authoring a 'food revolution' of course! Herein lies the story of a brilliant young chef on his quest for the deep-roots of his culinary path.

Tom's 'Call of the Wild' began as young boy, constantly surrounded by food. As a 'second Nature' he developed the arts of gathering, preparing and adventuring at his family cottage retreat near Muskoka. Away from the hustle and bustle of Toronto, he would come alive in the forests, and gardens, watching the golden hues of the sun setting in the West. The family always had something on the go, from jam making as a way of preserving the wild blueberries to picking and drying an assortment of fungi.

Here he is gathering mushrooms as a young lad.

GREENMAN ADVENTURES MEETS NATURE'S CHEF I met Tom at a series of events I put on last year, called Wild Food Fridays. The idea, was to prepare delectable, locally foraged wild foods alongside the freshest farm grown goodness in a rustic, celebratory evening. Tom and I became instant brothers with a shared enthusiasm for feral foods and ferments . Our 'Bro-mance' has only grown deeper since meeting him, as he now lives next door. We are family. While we each have our diverse interests and endeavors, we continue to bring culinary 'Playshops' with wholesome, wild and locally grown abundance to the table. He has absorbed, tweaked and transmogrified everything I have thrown at him. With the signs of genius let loose, we continue to co-mentor each other on a regular basis.

The greatest thing I admire about his skill as a chef, is not his red seal, or his former restaurant, The Prague, a well-established, traditional Czech restaurant he revamped and revived in Toronto.

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Sooke Scoop Culinary Arts Page | Local Food and Drink | Continued at SookeScoop.com

Roots Beer

"LET THY FOOD BE THY MEDICINE"-HIPPOCRATES le Nett ging n i t S n s her: delio Dan Blossom -Gat e l p Ma rel p So Shee d kwee Chic

Stinging Nettles~Urtica Dioica

Drift~Wood~Hot~Rock Bouillabaisse

His greatest gift in my estimate is his adaptability to thrive in any culinary environment. When he transfers this desire to experiment and get closer to the sources of our sustenance, it inevitably leads him to Nature. It is a beautiful partnership we have: brothers united in a common cause to live close to Mother Earth, eating with Epicurean relish both the finest foods and the joys of familial friendship and philosophy. Epicurus, the Hellenistic Elder who founded a school of philosophy that had a garden as its home, would do well to tarry here.

His kitchen, overlooking the forests and ocean down by Ella Beach, is a delight to walk into....

He keeps a tight, well-stocked and organized ship. Part restaurant, apothecary and fermentation-elixir bar, Tom is always fine-tuning his kitchen space and experiments. Far beyond catering, he delivers a culinary adventure: bringing a mastery to 'nomadic kitchen arts', improvising

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and attuning to wherever the action is.

From the recent tasting of a smokedblack-cherry-vanilla-bean-licorice-root ale to his chiselled signature dish, the driftwood-hot-rock-bouillabaisse he conjured up on an Ella beach fire, or at an charity event feeding hundreds of hungry activists, Kral knows how to deliver the goods. But it is his passion for the holistic and rustic above all else, that led to his greatest self-madeProtect and Vitalize the 3 creation: "Nature's Chef".

Innovation usually entails a crisis, and a bumping up against limits that no longer serve a greater good. In Tom's case, having worked hard in the fastpaced restaurant-circuit, he succumbed to 'chef burnout'. Out of shape and 'out of his mind', he set about turning his life around. Which meant tapping the deep roots of food and drink. "Let thy food be thy medicine" became his guiding philosophy.

Treasures: Jing, Qi & Shen Jing is the candle and wick: it is our reserve of life-force akin to the body, or essence Qi is the flickering flame: It is the energy of life, ebbing and flowing, acquired by our breathing and eating. It is our day-to-day vital force.

Shen is the illumination given off by the candle. It is Spirit, Consciousness, Awareness

Sooke Scoop Culinary Arts Page | Local Food and Drink | Continued at SookeScoop.com

Sooke Scoop Merchants Series:

STICK IN THE MUD

DE STIC LIVER K IN TO: T T Eus he Mai HE MU tace n Tr D u Rd. , So nk TEL o E k e B. (250 PHON C. )642 E -563 C 5 S OFF TIC KIN EE@ THE MUD

Spring 2015

Issue No. One

David Evans and the Alchemy of the Coffee Bean: the Esmeralda

stickinthemud.ca

Arresting aromas: Stick in the Mud's roastoreum is the alchemist's lab where coffee beans are transformed into liquid gold...

FROM BOQUETE PANAMA TO SOOKE B.C. THE STORY BEHIND MESMERIZING ESMERALDA

Unbeknownst to many 'Outlanders', the little sea-side polis of Sooke is undergoing its own renaissance. From the plethora of artists and artisans, to singers, sailors and seamstresses, Sooke and Juan de Fuca are a veritable beehive of cultural flowering. If I had to point to where Sooke's 'pumping heart' of culture resides I would have to go with Eustace road: home to the Community Hall and the Legion.

And in a tightly tucked away corner of Eustace, an oasis of coffee, community and culture resides a deceptively small space which houses its own coffee-house re-birth, David Evans' Stick in the Mud. Every renaissance has its cadre of alchemists fine-tuning their magical Elixirs of Life, and Evans is no exception to this rule. His own brand of alchemical gold is the coffee bean of course.

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Fortune tellers have long practiced an art of reading coffee grinds residing at the bottom of a finished cup of coffee to divine the past, present and future of the coffee querent called tasseography.

Quality control, bean by bean

Roastoreum

The Olfactory Test

Muchos Pesos: The Esmeralda once fetched the outrageous price of $350 a pound!!

Sooke Scoop Merchant Series | Promote your business through a story! | SookeScoop.com for further details

ESMERALDA: FATE AND FORTUNA

David weaves together the narrative threads of a superb coffee across a continent. What does this have to do with Fate & Fortuna?

DAVID TELLS THE STORY OF THE ESMERALDA

While this specific form of divination may or may not hold the key to providential revelations, the art itself lies in the crafting of a good story that resonates with soothsaying satisfaction. Evans weaves together a satisfying yarn that goes to the origins of a coffee-growing family.

THE PETERSON FAMILY

The story begins with the Peterson Family.

Recently, they visited Sooke in April 2014, meeting up with Evans and the Stick in the Mud crew, telling their own story. The family has owned the Hacienda la Esmeralda coffee farm in Panama, for the last 40 years. Close to Sooke's "sister town", Boquete Panama, they also purchased the 'Esmerelda Jaramillo'. It was here on this farm that the wonderful Esmeralda Special trees were discovered and cultivated.

COAL HARBOUR AND THE END OF AN ERA

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In the 1950's, the patriarch of the family, Price Peterson, worked in Coal Harbour, near Holberg, in Quatsino Sound, at British Columbia's last whaling station. He was working with the station's chief marine

biologist at the time, Eric Diedrich, studying a parasitic animal found in whales and the pilings of docks. Eric's son, Stephan Diedrich, strangely enough, has a direct connecting thread to Evans because he built the Stick's coffee roasters.

PETERSONS WORK WITH THE NGÖBE–BUGLÉ

Price returned to Panama to 'beef up' the family farm by introducing first beef, then dairy cattle. He was reluctant to go into coffee because of the labour situation with the Ngöbe–Buglé that live in the highlands of Bocas del Toro, Chiriquí Province. In a racist climate, the Ngöbe–Buglé people are looked down upon by the Hispanics and European descendents. It is the aboriginals that pick all of the coffee. Price reasoned that if he had to rely on this small group of natives and they organized, they could ruin him and every other coffee grower in Panama.

But that never happened.

Peterson decided to grow and experiment with coffee. What Price soon realized, was that the Ngöbe–Buglé had no hierarchical structure in their social makeup. It is a tightly knit family-based society.

What do the coffee grinds divine?

Is it possible to read someone's fortune at the bottom of a coffee cup?

Tasseography, the fortune-telling art of reading coffee grinds or tea leaves at the bottom of a cup through an intuitive interpretation of synchronistic events.

Fortuna, the Roman goddess of fortune and luck was also associated with Fate: the personification of chance events was closely tied to virtue of character.

Sooke Scoop Merchant Series | Promote your business through a story! | SookeScoop.com for further details

STICK IN THE MUD DISCOVERS A MAGIC BEAN

Pinpointing the best coffee: Coffea arabica variety geisha While this might lend itself to exploitation of the natives, it seemed good for coffee growers. So as not to exploit the situation with the natives, the Peterson's wanted to build a school, community kitchen, and do what they could for the Ngöbe–Buglé.

The Peterson's constructed it all in the early 70's, started growing coffee slowly, and yet...no one went to the schools. After having been exploited for generations by Europeans, the aboriginals didn't trust them with their children. While they worked there, got paid, and appreciated it, they didn't want the Europeans tampering with their children. The school went fallow.

When some missionaries arrived they thought they would put on some classes at the school. Eventually, the Ngöbe–Buglé parents started sending their kids because they felt these missionaries were not there to take advantage of them, but were serving a higher purpose. While we may question the motives of these missionaries, the natives felt at the time that these people were very different from the people who had exploited them for so long.

COFFEA ARABICA VARIETY GEISHA

And so it all slowly began to work. Over a few years they were selling good coffee. Not great coffee, but pretty darn good. Soon they bought another farm across the road.

Suddenly, they noticed all of their coffee tasted a little bit better. Up to that point, all the coffee beans were blended together.

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They deduced that one plot on the farm must be producing something special.

Daniel Peterson, the son and farm manager triangulated all the different varieties of Coffea Arabica and found one small area that was growing Coffea arabica var. geisha. That variety, they realized, was spectacular.

The Geisha was experimented with in particular because it was resistant to "rust" (roya disease) caused by a fungus that has decimated most of the crops in Roasting beans in a Diedrich coffee roaster is a fine art Central America.

Also, at certain elevations of up to 1850 metres, it is outstanding. It is now grown all over the world. Since the Peterson's commanded the amazing price of $350.25 per pound at the Best of Panama AuctionInteresting thread: Naturals Category, making it the highest Stick in the Mud's price ever paid for green, unwashed coffee.

THE STICK IN THE MUD FINDS ITS WAY

Back to the Stick, and the threads of this narrative: David's mentor and coffee roaster was Sam Jones of 2% Jazz, another coffee Mecca on the South Island. David asked Sam if he could get five pounds of Esmeralda. It sold for $8, a small French pressed cup's worth at the Stick in the early days. "We got a lot of media coverage for that one. It really helped the Stick find it's way in the beginning, showing who we were and what we wanted to be " Evans said.

coffee roasters are built by Diedrich Roasters founded by Stephan Diedrich whose father worked as a marine biologist at Coal Harbour's last whaling station where he met Price Peterson, a biologist turned coffeefarmer extraordinaire...

Sooke Scoop Merchant Series | Promote your business through a story! | SookeScoop.com for further details

Sooke Scoop: Merchants

Jill enjoying a massive cup of coffee in the Stick in the Mud's colourful and welcoming courtyard.

If you enjoyed this story and wish to have your own business, art, craft, or services' story told, please contact me at: sookescoop@gmail. com There are a variety of marketing packages and budget ranges to choose from.

By working together we will build a conscientious, community & help support independent media.

Sincerely, Dante

SOOKE SCOOP .COM

FR O M : SO O K E SC OOP So ok eS co op .c om so ok es co op @ gm ai l. co

m

Spring 2015

Issue No. One

CONTACT:

Sooke Scoop Sookescoop@gmail.com (250)642-4704 Sooke, British Columbia

SPRING, 2015

What's the Scoop?

An introductory editorial The 'What', 'Why', 'Where', 'Who' and 'How' of the Sooke Scoop

!

Snail Mail

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World-Wide

#

Postcard Project

(Coming to South Van Isle)

Sender:

write a message,

add a stamp $ send this postcard to someone special ❤ ️ anywhere in the world " It takes a bit of effort...

Receiver: check-in @ the 'Map Page' at Sookescoop.com and post: Place ' Personage ( and Message Received )

Welcome to our First Edition of Sooke Scoop!!!

South Vancouver Island, stretching from Sooke to Victoria ('There') and all along the Juan de Fuca Way ('Back Again') is a rich and biodiverse region inhabited by Supernatural wildness, cultural abundance and an open-hearted community.

A need has been seeded: to give voice to the quilted patch-work of stories that make up our unique and friendly home. The Sooke Scoop endeavours to be an ongoing glimpse into our every day, collective, inter-woven mythology in the making.

Having worked at journalism for over 25 years, crafting words and images, I have always wanted to tap into the incredible potential of the internet and multimedia worlds. Bringing together the stories and voices of the local as well as the planetary niches, I will strive to provide a local, digital 'agora': a place to gather thoughts, ideas, art and stories together,

providing a more authentic expression of our collective culture than the 'news' allows for. With a consciously crafted ecological footprint, we can utilize high technologies to deliver a more immediate and immersive storied experience that involves the entire community of life.

This is not a "news" site in the trite sense. Stories need time to soak into one's blood, bones and spirit.

We do not do fast-food storytelling. Like a fine meal and an aged fermented mead (which we'll be offering by way culinary events soon!) we are offering something new and ripened to chew on...to digest slowly for an Age. From myths to musicians and merchants, we aim to listen for the songs and stories, both new and old, that make Sooke and the Southern Island such a delightful place to live!

SPRING DIGEST

WHAT'S THE SCOOP? !

SPRING, 2015

PRINT 'DIGEST EDITIONS' ARE AVAILABLE BY ORDERING ONLINE AT SOOKESCOOP.COM We will be offering a space for local yokels to help create an online as well as in-the-flesh community, by way of contributors' pages, stories, events, and an in-the-field 'What's the Scoop?' Speakers Corner, which will take place in and around Sooke in the form of podcasting and video blogging.

Waste not: Tom lying amidst one

ad paper from the local rag.

Multiply this by 4000x2=8000!!!

This is equivalent to approximately 8 sq.kms. Of paper waste a week!

We can do better...

What's the Scoop?

Editorials, reviews, interviews and opinions, themes and directions

To begin this endeavour, I have devoted hundreds of hours of blood, sweat and tears, always attuning to the needs of our community, listening closely to the voices, from the loud to the softspoken. Having worked as a local reporter, I have aspired to compassionate journalism and transcending the limitations of the often wasteful and limited print mediums. I wish to have a 'newsletter-digest' magazine

printed, on recycled paper, and earth-friendly ink. The costs are high, but the quality is meant to be savoured rather than utilized for fuelling fireplaces, filling recycling bins and landfills.

The pulsing heart of the Sooke Scoop will be a devoted, online magazine-style website, in a true multi-media format. Feeds will be seeded in the social-networking worlds of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr...

Every Full Moon Cycle we will be covering fresh stories under some of the following categories:

Mythos, Culinary Arts, Natural Family, Merchants-Artists and Artisans, Comics and Graphic Novels, Polis & Philosophy, Wild and Free, Farm-Garden-Fish-HuntGather, and 'What's the Scoop?'

ONLINE MAGAZINE: FROM DESKTOPS TO TABLETS AND PHONES...THE FUTURE IS NOW!

Wild and Free : Exploring and adventuring in our Supernatural surround is what we do best in these parts!

Imago Dei: Image of the Day

Comics and Graphic Novels: comics as a powerful method of storytelling, featuring local illustrators and writers Mythos: myths & legends and the Supernatural: the local, planetary, cosmic stories of Dreamtime...

Merchants, Artists & Artisans: Creating community through business, art, and performance, with an emphasis on the stories behind the craft

We rely on donations to keep Sooke Scoop afloat. Please visit the website and donate if you can. Thankyou!

Culinary Arts: 'Let thy food be thy medicine!' Slow, local, foods, beverages and wild cuisine, prepared with love, health and grace Natural Family: Cultivating natural, intuitive and empowered families, through the thorny challenges of life

Needless to say, the time and effort has been epic but I feel up to the task and already have a supportive team and community to help me birth this dream.

If you feel so inclined, please donate, subscribe, contribute and sponsor our efforts at bringing this truly alternative media source to Sooke and beyond...

Carpe Diem...The time to 'seize the day' is at hand! ❤ ️ Dante

SPRING DIGEST