97/16 - Jan 24, 2019

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Country Cuzzins Volunteermusicians keep the music playing.

Thursday, January 24, 2019

New tools saved local man’s life Pamela FAYERMAN Vancouver Sun

Brad Baylis doesn’t remember anything about the day last summer when he hit a moose.

Indeed, everything the Prince George man knows about his close brush with death – not to mention the entire month afterward – he’s pieced together from friends, family and medical professionals who saved his life after the moose crashed through his windshield, sending Baylis careening into a ditch and trapped in his vehicle.

Baylis, 39, and the moose would be extricated from the vehicle and he would be airlifted to Vancouver General Hospital on life support.

While he was in the intensive-care unit for a month, plastic surgeons would spend 10 hours perfectly reconstructing his shattered face and intensive-care specialists would make Baylis the first patient to get a new procedure called brain microdialysis. With Baylis on the verge of dying from his traumatic brain injury, Dr. Mypinder Sekhon and colleagues deployed newly acquired tools that allowed them to frequently monitor Baylis’s braintissue chemistry so they could tailor the amount of glucose and other metabolic supplements he needed intravenously.

They were also able to do real-time monitoring of oxygen and blood-pressure levels in his brain to deliver medications with doses tailored to his condition rather than giving standardized doses.

“The impact with the moose caused major hemorrhaging in his brain and he was suffocating from a lack of oxygen while emergency crews were extricating him from the vehicle,” said Sekhon.

“It was a horrible, horrible injury with diffuse swelling throughout his brain.

Often with this kind of swelling, brain death will ensue. We had no option other than to try the bolt.”

Vancouver Sun photo

Bradley Baylis and girlfriend Carla Lewis. When Baylis of Prince George hit a moose near Fraser lake in 2018, surgeons at Vancouver General Hospital used a new proceedure called brain microdialysis to save his life.

The lumen (hollowed-out) bolt and accompanying disposable instruments are medical devices developed and manufactured by a Swedish company and, until recently, used mainly in research settings at Cambridge University in the U.K. Neurosurgeons drill a one-centimetre hole into the skull to place the bolt, which

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then allows doctors to pass a catheter through it so they can collect and analyze biochemical markers of brain activity (glucose, lactate and glutamate, among them).

The data is fed into an analyzer that gives a digital reading and then medical teams can adjust the amount of oxygen,

glucose and nutrients that comatose and other brain-injured patients need to not only recover, but also to avoid permanent disabilities.

“It’s changed the way we prognosticate,” said Sekhon.

Continued on page 3

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Thursday, January 24, 2019 | 3

Duo Keeping the music alive Christine HINZMANN 97/16 staff

All you need is a guitar and an accordion and the two men behind those instruments to make volunteer magic happen.

Bill Bosnich, 82, and Allan Thorp, 87, have provided musical entertainment to people in care homes and at seniors’ centres since 2003.

It started with the lovely Diane Reynolds who loved to entertain and was instrumental in organizing those talented people at the Elder Citizen Recreation Centre in the early 2000s. Reynolds has since passed on but her musical legacy lives on.

The group Bosnich and Thorp were part of what was first called Lads and Lasses and then it became the Country Cuzzins.

Thorp remembers starting off by first visiting Bosnich in his home to get to know one another.

“I leaned my instruments up against the wall and we had coffee and talked all afternoon,” Thorp laughed.

“We never played a song that day,” Bosnich added with a smile. “We got so involved with our own conversation we never did get our instruments going. It was something else.”

It was the start of a beautiful friendship.

Bosnich and Thorp play often at Laurier Manor, Parkside, Gateway, Birchview and Rainbow Lodge and make special guest appearances at River Bend and the Chateau, events like the Festival of Trees and if someone’s got a birthday celebra-

Our audience likes the songs they can sing along with us.

Bill Bosnich

97/16 photo by Brent Braaten

Allan Thorp and Bill Bosnich volunteer their time and musical talent to entertain at several seniors homes in Prince George. tion, they’ll entertain there as well.

Song styles include country and western, pop and seasonal selections.

“We like them all,” said Bosnich, who was about 16 when he first picked up the guitar.

Thorp said he particularly likes Que Sera Sera and he said lots of seniors like The Happy Wanderer. That val-deri, val-de-rah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha gets them every time. The Chatanooga Shoe Shine Boy, I’m Looking Over a Four Leaf

Clover and I Want A Girl, get enthusiastic responses as well.

“Our audience likes the songs they can sing along with us,” Bosnich said.

“They like the older songs because that’s what the old people recognize,” Thorp said, who began his musical ways by playing the button accordion when he was about eight years old.

Bosnich and Thorp have learned a lot about recall and memory by going into the care homes and seeing people who

are not engaged or enthusiastic and as soon as the two start playing music fingers start waving and toes start tapping.

“If they know the song, people will start singing right along with us,” Bosnich said.

And the odd one will even get up and dance, he added.

“I enjoy watching the expressions on the faces of the people we play for and some might even fall in love with us,” Thorp deadpans with a humorous twinkle in his eye.

To keep things fresh Bosnich and Thorp will learn a new song every now and then and they’ll practice at one or the other’s home or at the Elder Citizens Recreation Centre to get it right.

It’s all for the love of music each wants to share with those around them.

Bosnich said there’s never been a serious word between he and Thorp and although they tease one another, the key to their longtime music making is that they’re friends.

“We’ll keep doing this as long as we can,” Thorp and Bosnich agreed.

“But those instruments and all our equipment keeps getting heavier and heavier.”

‘Before this, we would fly blind, essentially’ Continued from page 1

“We can get a better idea of the disease process inside a patient’s brain. Before this, we would fly blind, essentially,” Sekhon said.

“You can give too much glucose and other supplements or not enough. Using this technique, we are now able to optimize the brain’s metabolism and personalize the care of the patient.”

Drilling holes into patients’ skulls is an admittedly invasive procedure that carries a small (0.5 per cent) risk of infection or bleeding, but at VGH, microdialysis has been used so far on five patients, including Baylis (in the past five months), and four of them have recovered. (The fifth succumbed to the brain injury.)

After being in the ICU for a month, Baylis was then transferred to G.F. Strong for rehabilitation.

He is overcome with emotion when he talks about the physical therapists there who helped him walk again, his girlfriend

Carla Lewis, family members and doctors like Sekhon – all of whom “never gave up on me.”

While he hasn’t yet been cleared to return to his job as a welder, the father of three is incredulous that he’s been able to almost completely recover from a brain injury as severe as the one he had.

He hasn’t yet resumed driving and he’s in no rush to get back behind the wheel.

When he got out of G.F. Strong a few months ago, he took the Northern Health bus back to Prince George and it was a trip that could have been terrifying and traumatizing but Baylis managed to take it in stride.

“During the latter part of the trip, the bus driver had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting a moose. When you live in this area, you know this sort of thing is going to happen at some point. I don’t know if this last incident was luck or fate, but you have to respect moose. They are amazing animals.”

Sekhon says that when Baylis was air-

lifted to VGH he thought Baylis had only a 10 per cent chance of surviving. But after a week, he came out of the coma and credits the new microdialysis tools for making the difference with his recovery. While the microdialysis tools are insanely expensive – startup costs of up to $500,000, then costs of up to $10,000 each time the suite of tools are used on patients – they would appear to be true lifesavers.

VGH is one of only a handful of hospitals around the world using it. Donors to the hospital’s foundation covered initial acquisition fees, but now the costs are absorbed into the hospital’s annual operating budget.

Only in the last few years have specialists like Sekhon had access to tools that allow them to individualize treatment plans for patients.

In 2016, Sekhon and colleagues were recognized for using brain-monitoring technology that helped salvage the neurological functions of a world-renowned

freestyle skier after she crashed during an international competition. In that case, doctors drilled a hole into the skull of the 22-year old patient – Jamie Crane-Mauzy – so they could take real-time measurements of oxygen and blood-pressure levels in her brain, which enabled them to tailor medications and other interventions to her condition.

Sekhon estimates VGH will receive 20-30 patients each year who will benefit from microdialysis and other brainmonitoring. The hospital has developed a specialized neurocritical-care program consisting of neurosurgeons and intensive-care specialists so that patients with severe brain injuries can get such advanced brain-monitoring, increasing their chances of recovery.

A study published last year that tracked 113 patients with severe brain injuries showed that those who got care from the specialized team were 2.5 times more likely to have a full neurological recovery after six months.

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The road to Northern Fancon Y

ou might think starting FanCon was as easy as picking up the phone and booking William Shatner and maybe that is true for other conventions.

But that simply wasn’t the case for us.

A lot of groundwork had to be laid before we could open the doors for FanCon year 1.

Let me bring you back to 2014.

All the signs were there that a comic con could be a reality in Prince George.

We had seen some success with a celebrity placement at Northland Hyundai with a longtime friend and collaborator of mine Kyle Bachman (who went on to become the dealer principal of Northland Dodge).

Kyle and I worked together for over a year to bring MMA superstar Georges St. Pierre in for an autograph signing at the dealership. The event was an unprecedented success and drew a lot of attention to the prospect of drawing more stars

Coyne toss NOrm Coyne

to Prince George.

Being a proud nerd at heart, I had always wanted to just go to a comic con and when the thought struck me that we could merge our success in tradeshows with this kind of star power.

I pitched my boss at the time, advertising manager Dave Smith, the idea and he loved it. I pitched publisher Colleen Sparrow and she loved it. Then I had to pitch Peter Kvarnstrom, the president of community media for Glacier Media, the parent company of the Citizen. Peter loved it. All three conveyed how important it was to know exactly what sorts of

costs we were looking at and the critical piece of sponsorship support to make it happen.

I travelled to Calgary Expo on a factfinding mission. I was overwhelmed by the scale of their event (their attendance topped 97,000 people that year). Being at the event loaded me with a ton of information and I was beyond excited for what we could do in our city on a scaled model of their event.

At the time, Sons of Anarchy was in its final season and one of the major guests for the Calgary Expo that year was Kim Coates from the series. His seamless positive manner and natural charisma made him an absolute fan favorite for the convention. We reached out to him to see if he would be open to the idea of coming to Prince George for an event. We still did not have dates in place but the prospect was there.

As fortune would have it, the BCNE

president at that time, Alex Huber, was looking for different ways to energize their brand. They had watched the Georges St. Pierre event unfold and were open to the idea of a celebrity placement.

When I mentioned the possibility of Kim Coates, Alex was excited. It meant Coates would not be coming to our first ever FanCon (I don’t think we had even named it at that time) but it would provide us with some critical operational experience. We hosted Kim at a fundraiser event for the BCNE at Pine Centre. He did not disappoint.

The autograph and photo session at the mall had the same energy that I had seen in Calgary and, at that moment, I knew we were headed for something big.

To say that Coates galvanized the interest that paved the way for Northern FanCon is an understatement.

Tickets are on sale now for Northern FanCon 2019 at www.ticketsnorth.ca

understanding addiction Addiction can be mystifying for those who haven’t experienced it

Dear Ann: I’m a 68-year-old man who seldom drinks and has never tried marijuana or other drugs. I played in a rock band in my youth and drugs and alcohol were all around me, yet they held no appeal to me. I would be one of those people who entirely can’t understand what it must be like to be addicted to something.

I hear people say that “addicts should never have started in the first place” or “they know it’s killing them… why don’t they quit?”

Can you explain to us who don’t understand how it feels to be truly addicted? At what stage did you realize that you were no longer a social drinker or drug user and were now truly addicted?

– Bob Dear Bob: Your first point “that addicts should never have started in the first place” is

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www.pgcitizen.ca

Ask an Addict

compelling. I did not know I was an addict until I couldn’t stop. If I could have stopped using when bad things occurred, then the diagnostic label of addiction just wouldn’t fit. Had I really known what

I did not know I was an addict until I couldn’t stop. If I could have stopped using when bad things occurred, then the diagnostic label of addiction just wouldn’t fit. Had I really known what horrors would come, perhaps I might have refused my first drink. horrors would come, perhaps I might have refused my first drink.

When I use, something magical happens to me.

Imagine being constantly outdoors in frigid, subzero weather. You’re barefoot, wearing wet clingy clothes and your frozen body is bone-rattling stiff. One day, you encounter a frothy hot tub, something you’ve never experienced before. Slowly, you slip yourself in and the warm water seeps into your soul. You are filled with subtle strength, peace-lovingnurture, parental sprinkled brown sugar, steamy hot oatmeal on a cold winter’s day. I am sunshine, all knowing, comfort and grace; life satisfies, is relaxing and warm.

This is what addiction feels like for me.

Eventually and always though, tub waters run cold, so I constantly reach over to turn on the tap. With more water, I slowly submerge; the liquid spills over, ruining all that surrounds. Despite knowing the damage I still turn on the tap; I must constantly do this to ward off the shakes, even while knowing that one day I’ll drown.

In desperation, I try other means to make tub waters be warm. I engage in water aerobics, take off wet clothing while still in the tub, shifting positions but not getting out. After all, no matter where I go there I am, still shivering and wet. Insanely I try willpower; maybe this will change cold water to warm.

It is difficult to explain addiction to “normies,” the name we jealously apply to social users like you. Painful memories of use can be like childbirth – extreme, excruciating pain that suddenly dissipates at the moment of birth/use. After hours of blood, sweat and tears, when first holding their babe, parents slip into overwhelming bliss. Memories of labour retreat into haze; powerful love now resides in its wake. Addiction with addicts is the same way; the horrors of use fade back into our past.

Continued use, despite adverse consequences, is the very nature of substance abuse. Before diagnosis can happen, I need both aspects: continued use and knowing bad things will happen, even my death.

If everything was hunky dory and I could stop, then I’d be a normie, just like you all. It is a bitterly ironic catch-22 – telling us addicts to quit, when the very diagnostic criteria tells us we can’t.

Please remember this: we tend to think of addictions as our fault. Before recovery occurs, I externally blame all others for my way of being, while secretly inside, I feel defective and weak.

Rather than face my own demons, I projected out, onto the world.

I needed a completely new way to make cold water warm.

News Tip? Call 250-562-2441

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Food skills declining C an you bake muffins from scratch?

Freeze vegetables from raw? Can raw ingredients?

If so, you likely possess more food skills than the average Canadian. Over the past several decades, there has been an increase in processed, pre-prepared and convenience foods purchased in Canada, which has seemingly coincided with a decrease in food preparation and cooking skills. The average Canadian has only a fraction of the food skills their parents and grandparents had.

Food skills include the ability to meal plan, wash and chop vegetables, boil water, follow a recipe, cook raw meat and bake a simple quick bread. According to Health Canada, food skills are a “complex, interrelated, person-centered set of skills that are necessary to provide and prepare safe, nutritious, and culturallyacceptable meals for all members of one’s household.”

Some of these basic skills may seem obvious to even a beginner cook but if they’re not developed from an early age, they can be difficult to attain later in life.

Several technological and food systemrelated shifts have been identified as factors influencing the culture of cooking and food preparation today. Most of us have increased access to food, increased time and financial demands and decreased opportunities for gaining cooking and food preparation skills, both at home and through public education. Advances in food storage, preparation and cooking have also resulted in changes in the level of knowledge and skill required to cook.

Food for thought

Kelsey Leckovic

Why bake bread every day when the store-bought variety will last a week? Or six months in the freezer?

Since children and adolescents today have decreased exposure to cooking and food preparation activities, they are less likely to develop the cooking abilities that were common in previous generations.

However, children and adolescents who are involved in food preparation are more likely to make healthier food choices, which are associated with a lower intake of fat and higher intake of vegetables, fruits, fibre, folate and Vitamin A. Children aren’t the only ones who are lagging behind when it comes to the development of food preparation skills.

There are significant differences between men and women, especially those who live in the same household. The Canadian Community Health Survey showed that women are significantly more likely than men to report a high level of mechanical skill in food preparation, this would include activities such as cooking soup or stew from scratch or following a recipe for muffins. Handling a kitchen knife safely and cooking raw meat, chicken or fish were a couple of the most common skills in which men had reported to be proficient.

Certain segments of the population are also more likely to write grocery lists, an important component of meal planning.

Women, non-immigrants, Canadians with post-secondary education and those living in a higher income household are more likely to write grocery lists and therefore also more likely to eat five or more servings of vegetables and fruit per day compared to those who do not.

It may seem as if certain food skills are unimportant or obsolete, for example, why is it important to know how to preserve jam? Or bake bread? You can easily buy these items at a grocery store.

Having food skills is not only linked to healthier dietary habits, such as increased fruit and vegetable intake, but also higher levels of food conceptualisation. This refers to an individual’s ability to take a food or recipe and alter it to create something new. Sixty-three percent of Canadians have reported adjusting a recipe to make it healthier. Women, individuals with higher levels of education and income and those with a higher perceived ability to cook are more likely to have done this. The most common adjustments Canadians make to recipes include reductions in fat and sugar and the addition of more vegetables.

Food skills can be developed from a young age when parents are active in providing the guidance required to establish basic skills. But, once you become an adult, how can you develop these skills if they were not passed on earlier in life?

Superstore offers in-store cooking schools in certain provinces, includ-

Thursday, January 24, 2019 | 5

ing Quebec, Ontario and Nova Scotia, however, stores in British Columbia do not currently offer this service. Sobeys also offers cooking classes with registered dietitians, but these are mostly offered in the eastern half of the country. The closest we have to in-store cooking classes in Prince George are grocery store tours, led by a registered dietitian at Save-OnFoods. Not only is it more difficult to develop basic cooking skills later in life, but there is also a lack of resources to provide the guidance needed.

The most common barriers identified by individuals who do not prepare, or help prepare, meals at home include a lack of time, insufficient skills and the deferment of responsibility (i.e. “it’s not my job”).

As a dietitian, I’ve worked with patients who have lost spouses or otherwise found themselves in a position where they are now forced to prepare meals for themselves, when up until that point they relied on a loved one. Finding themselves in this position can sometimes mean an increased risk of malnutrition and a decline in overall health. Having the skills to be as independent as possible at any point in life will allow you to be an active participant in your own healthcare.

Offer to help a friend make dinner, start reading cookbooks, or take the dietitianled tour at Save-On-Foods, even by just observing another person prepare a meal, you can pick up valuable skills.

Kelsey Leckovic is a Registered Dietitian with Northern Health working in chronic disease management.

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6 | Thursday, January 24, 2019

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A generational difference Within a few generations, home entertainment has gone from radio shows to TV on demand

M

y grandparents grew up in a postwar world listening to shows on the radio.

My parents grew up without a television.

In the early days of home viewing, the channels were few and choices were sparse.

The TV Guide was in the newspaper and it was an important part of planning television watching for the week.

My parents tell me stories of how they used to have to run home after school to be able to catch a show because if you missed when the show was on, you missed it for good until it came into syndication years later.

They talk about having to watch Hymn Sing and Sing-Along-Jubilee because they were the shows that were on before the shows they really wanted to watch.

They remember fondly watching The

Home Again Megan kuklIs

Forest Rangers, The Galloping Gourmet, Razzle Dazzle and The Edge of Night although my dad does not remember this fondly – only mom.

It was a huge deal to stay up late to watch The Ed Sullivan Show, Bonanza, Tommy Hunter, Gunsmoke, Bewitched, Gilligan’s Island and Laugh In. Depending on who in your family had a colour TV, you may have been able to watch Hockey Night in Canada in colour and Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color which was later rebranded again as the Wonderful World of Disney.

My dad grew up in a number of different cities in B.C., so depending on where his family was in the province, he had a wider selection of TV shows.

In Prince George, however, there were two channels: Channel 2 and Channel 12 – one worked and one did not depending on where you lived in the city. You watched what was on; there were no choices.

Some of the shows they watched when they were younger were still a part of my childhood memories as well like The Littlest Hobo, Mr. Dressup and Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.

I loved Wok with Yan (“If Yan can cook,

so can you.”) and I remember thinking that a fondue was called a “fun-do” (“because they are fun to do”) for many years because of Yan. I loved The Friendly Giant and his pal Rusty still to this day and the theme song rolls around in my head at odd moments.

My parents told me that there was a 15 minute show en Francais called Chez Helene following the Friendly Giant in order to expose English children to the French language, likely as a part of a French language requirement for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

My husband and I also had to watch what was on and usually only on Saturdays.

He grew up in Surrey and they had far more choices than I did (since they had some channels from Seattle) and likely he did not have to watch the reruns of The Mighty Hercules which I discovered in my TV research was actually a cartoon from the mid-60s.

My mom watched the moon landing in Hart Highway elementary school on a 26-inch black and white television rolled into the classroom with the whole class huddled around it.

My great uncle would set up a projector in his basement so I could watch old reels of Woody the Woodpecker and Mr. Magoo.

I was 12 when we got our first computer and 14 when we got the internet.

I was in my twenties when I got my first cell phone.

My children have access to broadband

internet and will have no idea what dialup internet sounds like.

They have access to tablets (rarely, depending on behaviour), Netflix, a remote they can speak into, two TVs, YouTube, CD Players and CDs, records (if we want to go old school), an obscene amount of toys and an iPad that looks like it has been driven over by a truck and is being held together with duct tape.

What will they remember about their privileged childhood? What is coming next?

Will they have the holodeck from Star Trek in their homes or will even that idea seem quaint? Will they have a show they can remember fondly with their peers or does the vast array of choices they have for viewing limit their ability to socially bond?

Their viewing choices are not limited to their geographic boundaries and they are growing up in a world where the answer to every question can be found on a phone. Will they have robots? Will virtual reality actually be a thing?

I am increasing worried that their future looks bleak and they will have to sleep in some sort of oxygen pod to survive. Hopefully, not.

Hopefully, the technology of their future cures cancer and the Earth and we can colonize Mars.

But for now, they can find their own show on Saturday mornings by speaking into the remote.

One day, they will also be able to pour milk without spilling it on the counter.

Drawing inspiration from three martin luthers

I

grew up in an anabaptist community with a decent knowledge of the heroes of the Reformation. As we had no TV and very limited newspapers, I didn’t see images of Martin Luther King until I was older. As both men are religious heroes, the language describing them was similar and I can still remember thinking that Martin Luther and Martin Luther King were the same person.

Martin Luther King was named after his father, Michael King, but his father changed their names to Martin Luther King Sr. and Jr. after travelling to Germany. Being a Baptist pastor, Martin Luther’s accomplishments would have been very significant to MLK Sr., and I can see why he would have felt that a religious trailblazer born in 1483 would be a worthy namesake for a son born in 1929 in racially segregated America.

Among the ideas Martin Luther championed that gained traction in the 15th century Western world was the priesthood of all believers (which could be summarized to mean that everyone has the same authority in the church, regardless of position) and that commoners, ordinary folk, should have access to the Holy Scriptures in their own language.

Both of these ideas give power and significance to the ordinary, common, man, without regard to social or economic status. Advocating these ideas brought much hardship, disarray, bitter divisions, and eventually church schism, the effects of which we still see today.

These ideas would have resonated with Martin Luther King’s father and would

Thinking aloud Trudy klassen

have encouraged him that change was worth fighting for, even if the results were imperfect. He would have known that the battle against racial segregation would not be an easy one. He would have known that years of division and schisms would follow. How discrimination would not end just because racial segregation laws would change. MLK Sr.’s choice to change his and his son’s name to a hero of history’s confused me as a child, but I can understand how it would have made sense to him.

History is fascinating to me, how there is really nothing completely new. How a little white girl growing up in a very closed community with limited knowledge of current events can mistake two great heroes for one, then later learn that there was actually a connection.

How ideas, ideals, values and priorities, seem to fall in and out of favour, but our heroes share a significant amount of common values. How those who make huge impacts on our society are inspired by those who have fought important battles in the past. How worthy things to fight for and horrible things to fight against seem to require, again and again, brave men and women to fight, for what is right and good.

around town

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Barkerville Brewing Co. brewmaster Troy Rudolph pours a Hound of Barkerville Brown Ale during the 2015 Kiwanis AleFest. The event returns Friday and Saturday at Two Rivers Gallery.

Events feature Beer, music and haggis Kiwanis AleFest Friday and Saturday at the Two Rivers Gallery, 725 Canada Games Way, general admission tickets to the afternoon and evening tasting sessions are available in advance through this website only – no tickets will be available at the door. Event tickets are $65 each plus service charge.

Tickets include a souvenir tasting glass to keep, six tasting tokens (four once pours), tasty tapas from local restaurants, live local music, silent auction and art exhibits.

Additional tasting tokens will be available on-site three-for-$5.

All sessions are 19+ years old and two pieces of valid ID are required for entry.

For more information visit www.kiwanisalefest.ca. Friday at 6:30 p.m. at the Ramada and Saturday at 6:30 p.m. at the Coast are the Brewmaster Dinners featuring a specially prepared four-course dinner paired (and in some cases infused) with a selection of Northern BC’s finest locally crafted small-batch beers.

Tickets are $85 (plus taxes/fees/gratuity) includes the four-course meal, six-beer tastings, engagement with the brewers and chefs, and a souvenir glass to take home. Brewmaster’s Dinners are 19+ year old events and two pieces of

valid ID are required for entry. For more information visit www.kiwanisalefest.ca.

Coldsnap Music Festival

Friday to Saturday, Feb. 2 at venues throughout Prince George Coldsnap Music Festival offers a variety musicians who are from around the world providing entertainment. From the next big thing in indie rock to jazz veterans to Celtic, traditional folk, hip-hop, and beyond, Coldsnap is a unique blend of talent and performers. There is also a series of free workshops geared for music accessibility for everyone. For tickets and schedule visit www.coldsnapfestival.com.

Books & Co. Storytime

Saturday from 10 to 11 a.m. at Books & Co., 1685 Third Ave., children and their caregivers are invited to join in as stories are read and other activities take place like colouring, drawing and making crafts. For more information call 250563-6637.

FMX World Tour

Saturday at 6 p.m. at CN Centre, 2187 Ospika Blvd., the NITRO FMX World Tour sees pro riders compete in an intense competition, throwing out some of the most death-defying tricks ever seen. Su-

perman seat grabs, cliff hangers, kiss of death, back flips and super back flip combinations are just some of the tricks that will be used to fight for the NITRO FMX World Tour championship title. Meet the riders in the 4:30 p.m. Pit Party before the show. Tickets at ticketsnorth.ca

Robbie Burns dinner

Saturday at 6 p.m. at the Coast Inn of The North, 770 Brunswick St., the PGSO brings the event back with flair during the second annual Robbie Burns Night Dinner. Join in all the traditions of this special night for those Scottish and not so Scottish. Cocktails at 6, dinner and entertainment at 7 p.m. Dress is Scottish themed or business formal. For more information call 250-562-0800 or email gm@pgso.com.

Silent auction, dinner

Saturday at 5:30 p.m. at the Hart Community Centre, 4900 W Austin Rd., the District 57 Tapestry Singers is hosting their annual Silent Auction and Dinner night. There are lots of auction items, 50/50 draw, door prizes and raffle baskets. Doors open at 5:30, dinner is at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $50. For more information call 250-964-8184 or email cduerksen@sd57.bc.ca.

Spruce Kings Friday and Saturday, the Prince George Spruce Kings vs. Coquitlam at the Rolling Mix Concrete Arena at 7 p.m.

Tickets are available at www.ticketreturn.com.

Cariboo Cougars

Saturday at 4 p.m. and Sunday at 10 a.m. at Kin 1, the Cariboo Cougars play the Thompson Blazers.

STOMP

Monday at 7:30 p.m. at CN Centre, 2187 Ospika Blvd., STOMP, the international percussion sensation, makes its Northern BC premiere at the CN Centre.

From its beginnings as a street performance in the U.K., STOMP has grown into an international sensation over the past 20 years, having performed in more than 50 countries and in front of more than 24 million people.

Tickets are available at ticketsnorth.ca.

School break activities

Monday is a non-instructional day and the City of Prince George offers a listing of many different opportunities for learning and fun at www.princegeorge.ca/ schoolbreaks or call 250-561-7798.

News

8 | Thursday, January 24, 2019

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Welder, nurse bonded for life Seniors’ Scene

Kathy Nadalin

C

y (Cyril) Fortin of French descent was born in St. Front, Sask. in 1939; he is the fourth of nine children.

His father was a blacksmith and a welder with a shop in Perigord, Sask.

Cy learned the basics of his trade as a welder from his father. He arrived in Prince George in 1959 looking for work.

His first job working in a sawmill in Hixon lasted about three weeks doing hard work for very little pay.

He worked for a Prince George construction company with the intention of attending the B.C. Vocational School (now known as the College of New Caledonia or CNC) to obtain a welding ticket.

He earned his welding pressure ticket, worked for a construction company as a welder during the Northwood pulp mill construction project and then was hired on at Northwood as a full-time maintenance welder for the next nine years.

He was hired by CNC as a full-time welding instructor and over the years instructed approximately 3,000 welders.

There were 16 students in each class, which included apprenticeship welders, mechanical trade students who required welding to complete their courses and doit-yourself welders. Some of his former students eventually started their own companies. After a very rewarding 27year teaching career, he retired in 2000.

Cy registered his own part-time welding inspection company in 1987. When he retired in 2000, he went into full time work inspecting the steel used in the construction of bridges and buildings. As you pass over the newer bridges in Prince George, Hixon and across the Mackenzie River, you can rest assured that the beams used in the construction had been inspected by Cy to ensure quality steel. His inspection process protected the construction company against the use of unmarketable steel and insured it was fabricated to code. It was interesting work and he met many of his former students on job sites.

Cy met Irene Johnson on a blind date in 1961 in Prince George. Irene was born in Nakusp, B.C. in 1939. The fourth of five children, she was raised in the small and scenic town of Burton.

The original townsite of Burton was flooded out in the 1960s when the Keenleyside Dam was built on the Columbia River near Castlegar.

Irene graduated from a three-year registered nursing program at the Royal Columbia Hospital in New Westminster in 1961. She was working at the hospital in Fort Nelson and visiting friends in Prince George when she met Cy. They were married in 1965.

Before marriage, Irene worked in the pediatric ward at the Prince George hospital, drove across Canada in 1963 nursing in the surgery wards in Scarborough and Dryden, Ont., and Moncton, N.B. She decided to save money for gas and returned to Prince George (and of course Cy) in 1964 and worked for Dr. Pat Carson for five years as receptionist.

Irene took the nursing refresher course in 1981 at CNC and worked as a casual in the pediatric ward, the pediatric special care unit and at the correctional centre.

97/16 photo by Brent Braaten

Irene and Cyril Fortin have travelled the world, but are always glad to return home to Prince George.

She finished her nursing career with the home care nursing division before retiring in 1999.

Irene said, “We have two daughters; Teresa (Allistair) in Oakville, Ont. and Laurel (John) in Collingwood, Ont. who in turn gave us four beautiful grandchildren. Generally, we visit them twice a year.”

Volunteer work is nothing new for Cy and Irene; they have been involved in giving back to their community for most of their married life. Cy volunteered with the John Howard Society and is on the strata council where they live.

Irene volunteered for the Meals on Wheels program and with anything to do with their girls from Brownie and Girl Guide leader to camp nurse. For the past 18 years, she has been a weekly volunteer at the Hospital Auxiliary Thrift Store.

They love the outdoors and have created many fond memories by using the Caledonia Rambler’s hiking booklet as their trip guide.

Irene said, “We live on both fun and educational memories of Cuba, Chili, Tahiti, New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, Thailand, Mexico, Venezuela, Jamaica, our six weeks stay in Africa and our road trips to Alaska and across Canada.

“As empty nesters, we volunteered 11 times as hosts for the B.C. Parks Service in remote provincial parks like Spatsizi, Kakwa, Turner Lake (S. Tweedsmuir), Khutzeymateem Grizzly Bear Sanctuary, Mt. Assiniboine, Chilco Lake (Ts’ilos), Monkman and Naikoon on Queen Charlotte Island.

“In most cases we were air lifted into the park for a period of one month to meet and greet visitors, reviewing

information and to ensure their safety.

Between us we had the qualifications required by B.C. Parks to provide first aid, take care of and do maintenance repairs around the camp, monitor conditions of the trails, carry out studies complete with detailed reports as required and carry Boat Smart certification.”

Cy said, “We were actually surprised by the fact that we both enjoyed the isolation.

We relied on one another, had no fear of the wildlife and we met many interesting and wonderful people. Irene packed for the month which included food supplies, bedding and clothing. She canned meat of all kinds and prepared and stuck to a menu so that we never ran out of food. I was happy to provide fresh fish as an extra bonus to the menu.”

Cy and Irene became members of Branch No. 1 of the Prince George B.C. Old Time Fiddlers Association in 1992.

Over the years, Irene assisted during fiddle contests, the monthly dances, producing the newsletter, served as the board treasurer and visited members in the position of the Sunshine Lady. Cy played guitar as a backup musician for the fiddlers, served as a director and is a past president. They are now life time members.

The Prince George OTFs started informal fiddling jam sessions in the 1960s.

That led to the formation of the BCOTFA in 1968 bringing fiddlers and backup musicians of other instruments together to promote the art of old-time fiddling and to encourage young people to take up fiddling and violin playing. With approximately 200 members, Branch No. 1 celebrated 50 years of community service

this past November.

Irene said, “When Cy had surgery recently the OTF group was there when we needed their support. In April of 2018, Cy was taken to the University Hospital of Northern BC by ambulance. He spent a week in the intensive care unit before being transferred by air ambulance to Lions Gate Hospital for drainage of a brain abscess. He has struggled to recover as his memory was severely impaired and he had to learn to walk again. He was transferred back to UHNBC on May 14th for continued rehabilitation and returned home on June 15th.

“Many friends came to the hospital with musical instruments and their music proved to be the greatest therapy to restore his memory of how to play the guitar and to relearn the words to hundreds of songs he once knew. Initially even words to You Are My Sunshine were a mystery.

“Gradually Cy’s memory, musical skills and mobility have been restored – which in turn brought back a meaningful life.

He is back out in the community volunteering along with his music friends at various senior citizen facilities all over Prince George, Vanderhoof (monthly) and McBride (twice a year). We are so thankful to all of them for being there for us.”

Cy concluded by saying, “I still require physiotherapy as my balance is still a bit of a problem. I have everything to be thankful for from my wife and supportive family to all our friends in the community. Prince George is a great place and we both love it here. I always say that once you drink water from the Fraser or Nechako Rivers you always return.”

Books

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Too much Honesty isn’t the best policy Jon Michaud 97/16 wire service

Mulholland handout image

Golden State, by Ben H. Winters, depicts a future in which anyone found guilty of telling a lie can result in imprisonment or exile.

Golden State

By Ben H. Winters Imagine a country so traumatized by deception, lies and gaslighting that it opts to prioritize facts and truth-telling above all else. Here’s what your life would be like: Ubiquitous video cameras would capture your every word and action and feed them into a permanent record of all that is “Objectively So.” Like every other citizen, you would keep a detailed account of your life, gathering diary pages, receipts and annotated conversations, and sealing them in a Mylar bag each night. If there’s ever a question about what happened on a given day, this archive can be accessed to determine the truth. If you were found to have lied or fabricated any fact in the record, you could face imprisonment or even exile.

And in accordance with the national ethos, all fictional storytelling – whether on the page, the stage or the screen – is outlawed. No novels, movies, plays or internet.

Ben H. Winters’ new novel Golden State unfolds in such a place, an alternatefuture California where “the preservation of reality’s integrity is the paramount duty of the good citizenry and of the government alike.” The novel’s narrator Laszlo Ratesic, is a member of the state’s Speculative Service, the law-enforcement body charged with ferreting out lies and liars and with sorting “accidental infelicities” from “purposeful misrepresentations.” Like other members of the service, Laszlo has a sixth sense for mendacity. It produces a physical reaction in him, like an allergy. Laszlo is an amiable bear of a man, a 19-year veteran of the service, 54 years old, bearded, overweight and recently divorced – in short, your typical, jaded, detective-fiction detective. Oh, and he has a backstory. Laszlo lives and works

in the shadow of his brother Charlie, a legendary serviceman who died mysteriously in the line of duty.

At the novel’s outset, Laszlo is asked to mentor a promising rookie named Aysa Paige. She’s his antithesis: slim, young, energetic and idealistic. This odd couple is dispatched to investigate a seemingly simple case, a roofer who has fallen to his death while on the job. But anomalies soon start piling up. The house belongs to a judge. The roofer was there outside normal working hours. Video surveillance suggests he might have been spying. Was the judge hiding something?

Was the roofer bumped off? Laszlo and Aysa follow these leads deeper and deeper into the legal and bureaucratic infrastructure of the Golden State until they run smack into the powerful elite who run the country. Their investigation forces Laszlo to confront his own complicity in the maintenance of this totalitarian system.

Winters has a knack for creating appealing detective fictions that skew reality in thought-provoking ways, producing a hybrid of the familiar and the uncanny.

For the first two-thirds of Golden State, Winters pulls it off again. The novel is in equal measure a gripping detective story and a disquieting work of speculative fiction. Winters brilliantly imagines the quotidian manifestations of a truth-obsessed culture.

However, the last third of Golden State fails to deliver on the promise of its first two hundred pages. Winters paints himself into an imaginative corner. When Laszlo finally penetrates the corrupt reality behind the Golden State’s fact-based facade, what he and the reader discover is a scenario distressingly familiar from dozens of other science fiction books and films. Instead of a cathartic redemption, Laszlo achieves only a meek escape.

Jon Michaud is the author of the novel When Tito Loved Clara.

soldier who saved hemingway identified James McGrath Morris 97/16 wire service

He may be one of the most important figures in the history of 20th-century literature, yet he never published a word.

Instead it was in dying that this man made his mark. He was an Italian soldier stationed in a trench along the Piave River in northern Italy during the First World War. On a summer’s night in the final year of the war, he stood directly in front of 18-year-old Ernest Hemingway, who was distributing candy and cigarettes as a Red Cross volunteer.

When an Austrian mortar landed near the soldier, he was killed instantly.

Hemingway sustained extensive wounds but survived because the soldier’s body

took the brunt of the explosion. Had it not been for the soldier there would be no The Sun Also Rises, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Old Man and the Sea. Hemingway’s wounds brought him a medal and introduced him to nurse Agnes von Kurowsky while recuperating, and his legendary love affair with her provided the material for one of his best novels, A Farewell to Arms.

Yet until now the soldier whose life was lost that night has remained nameless. But now, at last, we can identify this man. After a cross-Atlantic joining of research efforts, Italian historian Marino Perissinotto and I have been able to put a name to the soldier who saved Hemingway’s life.

The search for the soldier’s identity be-

gan in earnest after I published my 2017 book, The Ambulance Drivers: Hemingway, Dos Passos, and a Friendship Made and Lost in War, which detailed Hemingway’s First World War experience. At the end of the book, a postscript lists the names of 18 Italian soldiers, culled from Italian military records, who died in battle the night of the mortar attack.

In the postscript, as well as a subsequent online article, I issued a challenge to Italian scholars to complete the research and pinpoint which of the 18 men saved Hemingway’s life.

Perissinotto came across my article and developed a strategy to shrink the number of candidates. First, he identified the locations of the army units of each soldier who died that night, nar-

rowing the list to three in the immediate area of the mortar attack. Two of the dead were serving with the 152 Reggimento Fanteria, Brigata Sassari, which was stationed some distance away from the Piave. The third man was in the 69 Reggimento Fanteria, Brigata Ancona, in front-line service along the Piave at Fossalta on the Venetian plain where the worst of the fighting occurred. That left only one soldier in the vicinity of where Hemingway was wounded. And that man who unknowingly gave his life for literature was Fedele Temperini of Montalcino, Tuscany. He was 26 years old when he died. Strict Italian privacy laws prevent us from learning more about him.

But at last we have a name.

millenials

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Netflix: Fortnite is a bigger rival than HBO brian fung 97/16 wire service

In 2013, a top executive at Netflix famously announced that the company’s ambition was to “become HBO faster than HBO can become us.”

The declaration made headlines at the time for its audacity: Netflix was gunning for the king of premium television.

But now it seems Netflix has identified an even bigger rival: the massively popular video game Fortnite.

The online shooter accounts for an enormous amount of consumers’ screen time, Netflix said in a shareholder letter Thursday, making it a formidable foe in the global war for Internet users’ attention.

“We earn consumer screen time, both mobile and television, away from a very broad set of competitors,” Netflix said in the letter. “We compete with (and lose to) Fortnite more than HBO... There are thousands of competitors in this highly fragmented market vying to entertain consumers.”

Netflix’s decision to name-check Fortnite reflects the game’s ever-growing popularity. It boasts over 200 million registered users, and some 80 million log in to play each month, according to

Citizen news service photo by Daniel Acker

The Netflix Inc. app is displayed on an Apple Inc. iPad mini tablet compute. publisher Epic Games.

Thanks to an engaging combination of reward mechanics, social communication and ease of entry – the game’s competitive mode is free to play – Fortnite soared to fresh heights last year, helping Epic

earn a reported $3 billion in profit.

Epic wants to translate that success into an even bigger opportunity to hook internet users, by building its own app and game store that undercuts the likes of Apple and Google.

For now, Netflix’s chief near-term threat remains other major TV content companies.

As firms such as Disney pull their content off Netflix ahead of launching their own exclusive streaming video apps, Netflix will face pressure to defend its subscriber base – the only way the company makes money.

In its earnings report Thursday, Netflix said it added modestly to its audience, drawing in 1.5 million users in the United States and 7.3 million internationally.

But Netflix’s nod of respect to Fortnite is also a recognition of how significantly Netflix’s horizons have expanded.

Ever since its humble days slinging DVDs to customers through the mail, Netflix has been a video company.

Even now, as it pours billions into streaming content, Netflix restricts itself to displaying films and TV shows.

But as it’s evolved, Netflix has also come to appreciate that there are only so many hours in the day – meaning only so much screen time consumers have to devote to entertainment.

That puts it on a collision course with other digital media: Not just YouTube or Hulu, but podcasts, blogs and, yes, video games.

5G promise problematic with Huawei, critics say todd shields 97/16 wire service

The new wireless technology known as 5G will do more than make mobile phones faster – it will link billions of devices, revolutionizing transportation, manufacturing and even medicine. It will also create a multitude of potential openings for bad actors to exploit.

The vulnerability helps explain the rising tension between the U.S. and Huawei Technologies Co., China’s largest technology company. Huawei is pushing for a global leadership role in 5G, but American officials suspect that could help Beijing spy on Western governments and companies.

“Huawei’s significant presence in 5G creates a new vector for possible cyber-espionage and malware,” Michael Wessel, a commissioner on the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission that advises Congress, said in an interview. By connecting whole new classes of products, 5G “creates new vulnerabilities.”

The technology holds great promise.

Forests of gadgets will communicate instantly via millions of antennas. Cars will talk to each other to avert lethal crashes, factory foremen will monitor parts supplies and doctors can perform remote surgery as video, sound and data flow without delay. Connections will be 10 to 100 times faster than current standards – quick enough to download an entire movie in seconds.

Yet U.S. national security officials see billions of opportunities for spies, hackers and cyber-thieves to steal trade secrets, sabotage machinery and even order cars to crash. Citing security threats, the U.S. has been pushing allies to block Huawei from telecommunications networks. The U.S. Congress has banned government agencies from buying the company’s gear.

The company denies that it is a threat.

“The fear about Huawei and 5G is misplaced,” Andy Purdy, chief security officer for Huawei in the U.S., said in an inter-

view. “This is a strengthened network, a more secure network.”

The new technology will require an overhaul of telecommunications infrastructure. The term 5G stands for a fifth generation, to succeed the current fourth generation of mobile connectivity that has made video sharing and movie streaming commonplace.

Standards for 5G are being written, and large-scale commercial deployment isn’t expected until 2020, according to the U.S.-China review commission. Major U.S. carriers AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. are rolling out smallscale versions of the service.

In the meantime, the number of internet-connected devices is growing by nearly one-third each year, and will reach 25.1 billion by 2021, according to an estimate by consulting firm Gartner Inc. As those changes unfold, Huawei is under intense scrutiny by the U.S. and its allies. Canada is conducting a security review of 5G technology, Germany is weighing whether to restrict Huawei’s role, and British authorities are said to have concluded Huawei gear puts U.K. national security at risk as they debate whether to impose a ban.

Its chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, the daughter of founder Ren Zhengfei, was arrested in Canada at the behest of the U.S. in December on fraud charges linked to alleged Iran sanction violations. A sales executive was arrested last week in Poland on suspicion of espionage and fired over the weekend.

“His alleged actions have no relation to the company,” Huawei said in an emailed statement, noting: “The incident in question has brought Huawei into disrepute.”

A federal criminal investigation of possible parts theft from T-Mobile US Inc. was revealed this week. China’s foreign ministry said Thursday the legal dispute between Huawei and T-Mobile had already been resolved, and expressed concern about the motives behind the “reinvestigation.”

The company, founded by Ren in 1987, has emerged as a premier overseas presence for China, with a projected $108 billion in annual sales and operations extending to Africa, Asia and Europe.

Ren, in a rare discussion with foreign reporters on Tuesday, denied suggestions that Huawei aids the Chinese government in espionage, saying it has no regular contact with Beijing.

“Some countries have decided not to buy equipment from Huawei,” he said.

“Therefore, we can shift our focus to better serve countries that welcome Huawei.

We can build high-quality networks in those countries to prove that we are trustworthy.”

Ren also called Donald Trump “a great president” and said he’ll take a waitand-see approach as to whether the U.S. leader will intervene on behalf of his daughter. Trump in December said he would intervene if it helped win a trade deal with China.

Huawei holds an ever-growing share of the world’s smartphone market and it and China’s government have both made it a priority to develop 5G capabilities.

Already Huawei is the world’s largest telecommunications equipment maker, with 28 percent of a $37.2 billion market in 2017, according to the U.S.-China review commission.

Huawei has said that blacklisting its equipment without proof will hurt the industry and disrupt the development of new high-speed technology.

In its latest annual report, Huawei said it had conducted 5G tests with more than 30 leading carriers in more than 10 cities around the world. “We have been investing heavily in 5G research since 2009,” the company said.

Huawei has always maintained that it’s independent and doesn’t give the Chinese government access to its equipment.

Misgivings, however, continue to flourish in the West.

Retired Air Force Brigadier General Robert Spalding, a former member of

the National Security Council under the Trump administration, has privately circulated a memo painting a future of communications dominated by China.

Eventually, alternatives to its network technology won’t exist, because other suppliers won’t be able to compete with government-subsidized offerings from Huawei and fellow Chinese gear maker ZTE Corp., Spalding said in the memo.

Once China controls the market for internet-connected devices, it will be able “to weaponize cities,” Spalding said in the memo: “Think of self-driving cars that suddenly mow down unsuspecting pedestrians. Think of drones that fly into the intakes of airliners.”

Chinese laws obligate the nation’s telecommunications operators to provide its intelligence services unfettered access to their networks, James Mulvenon, a China expert at the SOS International intelligence consultancy, told the U.S.-China review commission at a March hearing.

Mulvenon called Huawei “a legitimate globally competitive $90 billion plus company” and said “it is not a front company or a platform for Chinese intelligence.”

But, he said, “Given the nature of the political and legal environment in China, they would not be able to refuse a request, a subsequent request, from the Chinese government for access” to a network that Huawei runs.

In the U.S., telecommunications companies have also played a role in surveillance. For instance, in 2013 members of Congress confirmed they knew of a secret court order compelling Verizon Communications Inc. to turn over data about its customers’ calls.

In 2015, Congress voted to stop the National Security Agency from collecting bulk records on Americans’ phone calls and instead get a court order for specific records.

As 5G is introduced, there’s an increasing push to bar risky equipment from crucial networks, said Wessel, of the U.S.China commission.

News

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Alternatives for taking an oath in court bc provincial court Special to 97/16

“Do you swear that the evidence you shall give shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” This is the oath most often taken by witnesses in Canadian courts who choose to swear a religious oath before they testify. As they swear the oath, the witness will be asked to place their hand on the religious book that binds their conscience, most commonly the Bible.

Everyone testifying in a court case must promise to tell the truth, but in Canada today witnesses are not obligated to swear an oath on the Bible. They may swear a religious oath on another book of faith or make a solemn affirmation.

In the past, Canadian courts saw some unusual forms of oaths. This column explores the variety of oaths that have been sworn in B.C. courts and the modern alternatives.

Swearing an oath

A witness may swear an oath on the holy book that binds their conscience.

B.C. courthouses are equipped with Bibles and may have other books of faith, depending on the location. People whose consciences are bound by a holy book other than the Bible may swear an oath on that book or they may make a nonreligious promise to tell the truth.

If a person wishes to take an oath on a book of faith other than the Bible, they should speak to the lawyer who will be calling them as a witness. The lawyer should inquire whether the court registry

has the desired book, and if not, make necessary arrangements to obtain the book and bring it to court. If a special oath will be required, the court registry should be notified at least two weeks in advance so the court clerk can be prepared and obtain the trial judge’s authorization to administer it.

If a lawyer is not involved, a witness who wishes to bring their own holy book or use a different form of oath should tell the court registry about it at least two weeks before the trial.

However, a judge may require a person to affirm in certain circumstances – if the judge decides it is not reasonably practicable to administer an oath to the witness in the manner appropriate to their religious beliefs without inconvenience or delay. (See section 20(3) of the B.C. Evidence Act)

Affirming

An affirmation is just as acceptable in court as an oath. A witness who does not wish to swear a religious oath may testify in Canadian courts after making a solemn affirmation – “I solemnly affirm that the evidence to be given by me shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” – and their testimony will have the same effect as if it were taken under oath. (Canada Evidence Act section 14, B.C. Evidence Act section 20(4)) It is good practice for lawyers to find out whether their witnesses wish to swear or affirm and let the court clerk know as the witness is being called to testify. If this is not done, a witness will be asked whether they wish to swear an oath or

affirm after they enter the witness box.

Promising to tell the truth A child under the age of 14 does not take an oath or make an affirmation – they testify after making a simple promise to tell the truth. (Canada Evidence Act s.

16) Note: after swearing an oath or affirming, a witness will be asked to “state your full name and spell your first and last name for the record.” If a witness is also asked to state their address and they prefer not to make it public, they can tell the judge they do not wish to say their address aloud.

In the past

Online research reveals the origin of oath-taking is not clear because it predates recorded history. However, there is evidence that ancient civilizations in the Middle East swore oaths using divine symbols. In ancient Egypt, people swore by their lives and “ankh”, the word for oath, meant “an utterance of life.”

Romans, Greeks and Germanic tribes all swore oaths – often by their swords or other weapons that symbolized the god of war.

In the more recent past, colourful oaths have been sworn in B.C. courts, reflecting a witness’ religious beliefs or country of origin. For example, the Candle Oath involved a witness placing their right hand over a lighted candle placed on the ledge of the witness box, and saying, “I will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and if I do not may my soul be extinguished as I quench this flame” before extinguishing the candle.

Another oath required the witness to write their name on a piece of paper and burn it, swearing that their soul would be consumed by fire like the paper should they not tell the truth.

The Saucer Oath involved a witness kneeling and striking a china saucer against the witness box, before declaring that if they did not tell the truth their soul would be cracked like the saucer. The Chicken Oath was even more elaborate, involving lighting candles, decapitating a chicken and burning a signed oath in the candle flame.

Another form of oath incorporated religious symbols of bread, salt and water rather than a holy book and some B.C. courthouses kept a tray stocked with these symbols on hand and replenished them from time to time.

Steps have been taken in other provinces to facilitate use of an eagle feather when taking an oath or affirmation.

The Provincial Court of B.C. is open to exploring a similar initiative in this province.

Conclusion

Courts understand that in our diverse society witnesses will have a variety of religious traditions and non-religious beliefs. What is important is that a witness’ promise to the Court to tell the truth binds their conscience.

Whatever form that promise takes, it is a commitment to tell the truth. A witness who does not tell the truth can be charged with perjury and if found guilty, they can be sentenced to jail for up to 14 years.

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When money is tight, turn to cucina povera Joy MANNING 97/16 wire service

Maybe you are one of the hundreds of thousands of people not getting your paycheck, thanks to the government shutdown. Maybe you feel squeezed after a holiday spending frenzy, or you’ve been watching the stock market the past few weeks and are worried about your retirement fund. Right about now, a lot of us are feeling anxious about money.

I know I am. As a freelancer in the gig economy, I try to be prepared for money hiccups. When I lost my biggest client late last year, I told myself not to panic.

This is what my emergency fund is for.

Then a surprise five-figure tax bill slipped through my mail slot and swallowed that money, six months of living expenses, whole.

Like most Americans, when I look at my expenses, most of them are fixed. I can’t cut back my monthly mortgage, health insurance or student loan costs. I don’t have cable TV or other low-hanging fruit in my budget, so the need to save money leaves me staring down one big adjustable line item: food.

After taking the obvious first step of cutting way back on restaurants and prepared food, I had to look at my grocery receipts. As a writer and recipe developer, food is central to my work. But even if it weren’t, I would still spend a lot of time in the kitchen because I love to cook. And when I’m not careful, I can really overspend on groceries. Last year, $14-perpound exotic mushrooms, $20 pastured chickens and $50 bottles of olive oil were not uncommon purchases. Coming into 2019, I know this can’t go on.

In America, we don’t have what the Italians call cucina povera, or poverty cuisine.

“There isn’t a long history of famine here. But most other places in the world, across Europe and China, people know how to eat well with less,” said Andrew Coe, a food historian and co-author of A Square Meal: A Culinary History of the Great Depression.

During the Depression, he said, most Americans, accustomed to a bland, meaty diet, followed the advice of the new Bureau of Home Economics.

“They advocated a whole new way of eating that focused on getting the most bang from your buck nutritionally,” he said. Flavor, however, was not a consideration. Recipes published by the bureau included baked onion stuffed with peanut butter.

Immigrants, on the other hand, leaned hard on their traditional food cultures to enjoy meals even without much cash for ingredients.

“Italians gathered wild dandelion greens from vacant plots, stewed them with olive oil and garlic, and served them over toast,” Coe said. Sounds like a 2019 restaurant dish to me.

I’ve always been inspired by my Italian roots. My mother-in-law recalls her own Italian grandmother foraging for greens.

So it’s no surprise that as I started meal planning on my new budget, the dishes I made skewed toward cucina povera.

Though my food budget has, ahem, changed, I don’t feel deprived at mealtime. Fancy ingredients are wonderful, but I haven’t always had them.

As I started to shop on a newly strict food budget – $80 a week for my family of two, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s “thrifty plan” – it brought me back to my first journalism job, when my hus-

Washington Post photo by Tom McCorkle

Mushroom and kale pizza is an inexpensive and tasty homemade dish.

Cut down on food waste

band and I moved in together. We lived on our entry-level salaries making those early, painful student loan payments. We It costs the average American $38 a were on the thrifty plan without even month. When it comes to making pizza, knowing it, and it never occurred to me to I strategize to ensure that any leftover feel deprived. ingredients are portioned for long-term This was the time I first fell in love with storage. For example, I buy decent food, in fact. We shopped at discount mozzarella by the pound from a cheesegrocery stores and cooked special dinners monger. I cut the block into five roughly from scratch together. When I started to 3-ounce pieces, using one for pizza now cut grocery spendand wrapping the ing in late 2018, I remaining four There isn’t a long reverted to meal tightly and storing plans that mirrored in a zip-top bag in history of famine here. what I cooked in my the freezer for later.

But most other places in first kitchen back I start with a the world, across Europe in 2003: simple, 28-ounce can of mostly vegetarian whole tomatoes, and China, people know comfort food. blitz them with my how to eat well with less.

Back then, our stick blender, and Andrew Coe divide into five onedate nights revolved around homemade cup containers, uspizzas. Everyone ing one and freezing loves pizza, but it the rest. Even my is a special favorite of experts in thrifty dough recipe makes a spare ball to freeze treats, including Beth Moncel, author for later. of the blog Budget Bytes and the book Over the years, I have come to refer Budget Bytes: Over 100 Easy, Delicious to this as “the pizza system.” It means I Recipes to Slash Your Grocery Bill in Half. almost always have what I need to put a With a degree in nutritional science, cheese pizza on the table without a trip to Moncel said healthy cooking and budget the store, and I never throw ingredients cooking overlap more than most people away. I try to apply this systematic, use-itthink. Pizza is the perfect example. up thinking to all my meal plans.

“You want to really control how much of the expensive stuff you use,” she said.

“With homemade pizza, you can use half Pizza is adaptable, and if you have stray the usual amount of cheese and not even veggies in the fridge, chances are they notice.” will taste good on a pizza. But if I don’t My homemade pizza indeed calls for have anything on hand, I follow Moncel’s less cheese than many other recipes I’ve advice in the produce section. seen.

“Stick to hearty vegetables that don’t The dough I make is nearly half whole- spoil fast,” she says. wheat flour, and I like plenty of vegetaDelicate, tender basil, arugula and baby bles for toppings. All these choices make spinach are out; robust kale and stout pizza night an affordable, wholesome button mushrooms are in. But a bunch way to splurge. of kale and an eight-ounce package of Here are other ways to cook well on a mushrooms are more veggies than even I budget: can fit on a pizza.

Be flexible

Enter the frittata A frittata is a dish that will run you about $1.25 per serving. This easy, economical, open-faced omelet rescues a wide variety of crisper rejects from the compost bin. Frittata is good for breakfast, lunch or dinner; hot or cold; alone, with a salad, or in a sandwich. I don’t think one bite of frittata has ever gone to waste on my watch. Almost anything you like on top of pizza, you will like married with eggs in frittata form.

Enjoy making the best of things. Another budget meal very close to my heart and heritage is pasta. I often think about the prison dinner scene Ray Liotta’s character described in the movie Goodfellas. It made me realize that, in movies at least, good meals are a kind of shorthand for a good life no matter what else is happening. Each inmate brought a level of technique to their cooking. Garlic was shaved to translucent thinness with a razor blade as the proper ratio of onions in sauce was debated. Even in jail, characters made the best of their situation and enjoyed themselves through the power of cooking.

Pasta is somehow luxurious, even though it costs only loose change per serving. Adding a little sour cream – the poor man’s creme fraiche – to your tomato sauce enhances that impression.

So does a light flurry of salty Romano cheese. It costs only 83 cents a bowl, but you would be lucky to find better at your neighborhood Italian joint.

If I need to, I can make even cheaper food than pizza, pasta and frittata. Lean times in graduate school, for example, taught me my way around a pot of rice and beans. But spending the absolute least amount of money possible, no matter what, isn’t my goal right now. As long as I stick to a thrifty budget while my emergency fund recovers, I can still enjoy one of my favorite parts of life: cooking and eating well at home.

News

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All people have value

A

s part of my Social Justice 12 class, I have students present their research on a topic of interest to them.

These reports always inspire lively and insightful discussions. A subject that seems to consistently draw a great deal of interest is the Nazi genocide of the handicapped.

The Nazis determined that many people were not worthy of life and that it cost the state too much money to take care of them.

Therefore, under the cover of the Second World War, they killed 200,000 people with disabilities, primarily by gas, lethal injection or starvation.

This impacted many German families and they objected to their spouses, children, cousins, parents, aunts and uncles being killed.

It proved to be a public relations nightmare for the Nazis and they officially relented, though the murders continued in secret.

After presenting their research, my students ask their classmates what humanity has learned and how we’ve changed. Do we value all people in our society and do we treat everyone as an equal?

While we have certainly gotten better, few would argue that we continue to discriminate.

I looked up at my wall during the discussion and I saw a message that I put up to remind myself of my mission as an educator, “Help each student to achieve their individual greatness.”

This brought me to an important realization, that it is impossible to distinguish

Lessons in learning Gerry Chidiac

between a person who is “acceptable” and one who is not. It also challenged me.

First of all, as a public school educator, it is my job to give my very best to each and every person who enters my classroom.

I am thankful that no distinction is made with regard to financial means of the parents, race or religion. Every person is a gifted individual, even if the gifts are not yet obvious.

We have made significant progress as a school system and a society to bring about the integration of students of all abilities.

Embracing the challenge of integration has made me a better teacher, and, as always, I learn a great deal from my students.

Are we doing enough, however?

Time and again, it has been demonstrated that people once deemed hopeless and unreachable, when they are loved, encouraged and helped in drawing out their individual greatness, do amazing things.

Why would we ever doubt that everyone, regardless of external appearances, has something tremendous to offer?

How foolish the Nazis were for trying to place a dollar value on human potential.

Yes, some people need more support, but

how dare we say that they are not worth the investment?

The truth is that there are no distinctions between human beings which make us any more or any less worthy of love and respect.

All efforts to discriminate, by IQ level, ethnicity, skin colour, and so on, are at best ridiculous and at worst horribly cruel.

Former UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, when visiting and UNICEF camp in Gabon in 2010 said, “A society is judged by its treatment of its weakest and most vulnerable members.”

What more can we do as a country to support our vulnerable children and adults?

In doing so, we need to be aware that this is not charity, we are simply doing what is right.

How many geniuses were once categorized unteachable?

How many great artists were judged as crazy?

How many kind and wonderful people find it difficult to live on their own? How many people once struggling with addictions are now helping to heal those who continue to suffer?

We are all imperfect, and we are all tremendous.

If we learn anything from our history, it is that we are all better when we walk this world together.

Gerry Chidiac is a champion for social enlightenment, inspiring others to find their greatness in making the world a better place. For more of his writings, go to www.gerrychidiac.com.

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Frailty linked to dementia risk 97/16 wire service

HALIFAX — Researchers have discovered that frailty is a key risk factor for dementia.

A study by Halifax’s Dalhousie University and Chicago’s Rush University found frailty aggravates the effects of plaques and tangles – the jumbled strands of proteins that accumulates in some brains. It found frailty may even be a risk factor on its own, and resilience may be the most important protection against Alzheimer’s disease and dementia. The first-ofits-kind study, published in Lancet Neurology, looked at autopsy and clinical data from 456 people.

The subjects were part of Rush University’s Memory and Aging Project, and their frailty was measured on an index developed at Dalhousie.

The researchers say seniors’ homes are key for promoting preventive measures like social interaction, physical activity and healthy eating.

“We confirmed that there are a lot of people with lots of plaques and tangles who don’t have dementia,” Lindsay Wallace, a co-author of the report, said in a statement.

“These people were less frail.

Conversely, there were people with very few plaques and tangles who had severe dementia. These people were very frail – in fact, they were more frail even than the people who had lots of plaques and tangles and dementia.”

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CROSSWORD PUZZLE 97/16

See solution on page 17

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SPORTS

T h u r s d a y , J a n u a r y 2 4 , 2 0 1 9 | 15

97/16 photo by James Doyle

Devin Chapman of the Cariboo Cougars looks up ice during the first-ever B.C. Major Midget Hockey League outdoor Winter Classic game in Fort St. James on Sunday. The Cougars tied the Vancouver Northeast Chiefs 2-2. Curious about those fellows watching the game in the fancy box seats in the top left of the photo?

See what they did and more scenes from the game on page 16.

Outdoor game a Thrill CHRISTINE HINZMANN 97/16 staff

Fort St. James saw the first ever BC Major Midget Hockey League outdoor game take place Sunday afternoon in Nak’azdli Whut’en territory.

During the Northern Winter Classic, the Vancouver Northeast Chiefs took on the Prince George Cariboo Cougars at the Ernie Sam Memorial Arena and it was standing room only. The outdoor game was the last of two games played in Fort St. James. The first game was played Saturday at the Fort Forum Arena.

On Sunday afternoon, Chief Alec McKinnon said he was pleased to see about 1,000 in attendance for the historymaking game that he said brought the community together.

“This means a great deal – look at how many people came out to the event,” McKinnon said. “It’s brought people out and brings people together.”

To make the event happen Rolene Sam, who is the office manager for the Nak’azdli Whut’en non-treaty First Nation, took on the event on top of her other duties and then McKinnon took over for a while before handing it over to Marvin Martin to do the finishing touches.

“It took many people to make it happen – the number of volunteers fluctuated day-to-day,” McKinnon explained. “But John Sam was here every day and Marvin worked 16 to 20 hours a day to make this

happen. We hope we can hold this for the next 10 years. That’s our goal so that every team in the league can come out and play on the outdoor arena. My next job is to upgrade it.”

The rink is currently 31 feet shorter and 12 feet narrower than most rinks in the B.C. Hockey Major Midget League.

McKinnon said they would like to install permanent bleachers and extend the roof and ice to official size.

“Those are big money items,” McKinnon said. “We’d also like to build a Zamboni garage so we don’t have to park it in the Petro’s car wash.”

But it’s really about the community effort behind the hockey game.

“For the last month it was all hands on deck and the last week was super busy,” McKinnon said. “But again the most important part is to get the little ones out and inspired because now we have the ice in, but mostly it’s a community thing, bringing us together and we need to start taking pride in things like this. This brings the District of Fort St. James and the Nak’azdli Whut’en Territory together and we just need to take care of one another.”

Marvin Martin, always quick to deflect credit for the event, said he took over organizing the event in November and it all came together only because of the dozen or so volunteers that helped.

“And this is just the beginning,” Martin said. “We’re talking about bringing in

more teams in the future. This is just the first time for all of us and we’ll be upgrading and making improvements as we go along.”

The game play ended in a 2-2 tie and because it was so mild the ice conditions deteriorated enough to stop game play before overtime could take place.

During the game spectators seemed to enjoy the up close view as many people stood along the boards to watch the game.

About half the bleachers were impossible to sit on as water dripped from the melting snow on the roof onto the lower half of the benches. Nobody complained and fans were still very enthusiastic about the event.

Joe Tschampa from Prince George was standing beside a bleacher full of friends and family watching the game.

“This is great,” Tschampa said. “It’s the first outdoor midget game in Canada so I wanted to be part of it.”

Game play stopped abruptly when the puck came over the glass and hit one of his friend’s in the hand. Fortunately, she laughed it off and game play resumed.

“The whole event has been really well organized and very well attended,” Tschampa said.

Shawn Julian of The Taba Group, which sponsors the Cariboo Cougars, said this was an important event for the community.

“This is a great event and will definitely

influence the community in a positive way, especially for the youngsters to come out and see a sport we all love. We now have an outdoor rink and the indoor rink that are both operational. It’s really good for the community.”

Chief McKinnon hopes the game was the start of something more.

“It means a lot to us and we’re hoping to inspire the youth – you know, there’s more to life than video games,” he said.

“We need to get outdoors. We’re living in the north.”

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97/16 photos by James Doyle

Winter Classic scenes

Top left, local children greeted the Vancouver Northeast Chiefs as they made their way from the dressing room to the ice to play the Cariboo Cougars at the outdoor Winter Classic on Sunday in Fort St. James. Top right, volunteers clear the ice of snow during a break in the action. Above left, hockey fans bask in the afternoon sun while the linesman squints to see the game. Above right, fans circled the rink to watch the first-ever outdoor B.C. Major Midget Hockey League game. Below, one group of fans brought a comfortable seat with them and strapped it to the top of their vehicle to watch the game.

health

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Eating less beef, more plants a gradual change, experts say cassandra szklarski 97/16 wire service

TORONTO — New recommendations urging a drastic reduction in the amount of meat Canadians eat would require support from industry and government to achieve, say nutrition and food experts who suggest individuals start by making small changes in their diet.

A report by the Stockholm-based nonprofit EAT says people should be eating much fewer eggs, meat and fish and next to no sugar.

The study, published Wednesday by the medical journal Lancet, represents a big shift that could be hard for many Canadians to stomach: it recommends about 100 grams of red meat per week when Canadians on average eat about 90 grams per day, says University of Guelph nutrition professor Jess Haines.

The report also recommends 50 grams of pulses per day, when only 13 per cent of Canadians regularly eat such foods, which include beans, peas and lentils.

“We certainly can’t expect the consumer to just take these drastic shifts in intake without support, and I think that would mean we need investment from governments at various levels to make this happen,” says Haines, noting EAT urges adoption by 2050 in order to feed a growing global population and address ecological pressures.

That could include making such foods the norm at schools, childcare centres, long-term care homes and restaurants.

Haines says industry should pursue innovations in developing meat substitutes and calls on government to offer subsidies to encourage production of particular kinds of vegetables, and offset costs that prevent one in eight Canadians from affording a healthy diet.

Education is key, as well, she says, suggesting that cooking classes be mandatory in schools.

“Given that we don’t typically eat a lot of those pulses, it’s likely that many people aren’t that familiar with recipes on how to prepare those.”

The study limits red meat to a hamburger a week, while eggs are capped at four a week. Dairy foods should be about

Citizen news service photo

Meat is shown in a grocery store in Toronto on Nov. 30. New recommendations urging a drastic reduction in the amount of meat Canadians eat would require support from industry and government to achieve, say nutrition and food experts who suggest individuals start by making small changes in their diet. a serving a day, or less. Meanwhile, it encourages whole grains, beans, fruits and most vegetables, and says people should limit refined grains such as white rice and starches including potatoes and cassava.

Montreal chef David McMillan says he believes many Canadians are already moving towards this model, and that the restaurant industry is responding.

“We’re seeing a lot more whole-grain eating, lentil, vegetable soups are selling like mad, sandwiches composed of mostly vegetables are selling easily,” says McMillan, whose Quebec eateries include the venerable Joe Beef, McKiernan Luncheonette and the veggie-heavy Le Vin Papillon.

“Large salads are back. Not because we’re deciding that but because the customer is asking for it and we’re accommodating them. We can see that we can get away ultimately now with cutting a very thin steak as opposed to having a giant steak before.”

Still, McMillan said it’s hard for the home cook to pivot with evolving dietary advice. He pointed to the layout of most large grocery stores as being part of the problem by setting up distinct zones for produce, baked goods, meat and dairy.

“When you’re separating all of these things, we’re not creating combinations for people to make it easier for them to do their groceries. That’s why all these

meal plan companies are having actual success when they’re shipping you a bag and in the bag there’s a carrot, an onion, a celery, one pound of hamburger steak and a can of red kidney beans and a card that says: Brown meat, add onion, carrot, celery, kidney beans, tomato paste, now you have chili,” he says.

“How are we teaching people to cook for themselves?... We don’t necessarily know how to cook as a people. I’m astounded at how little the kids are (taught). Not teaching cooking in schools is ridiculous.”

Haines suggests individuals take small steps towards increasing plant-based proteins, noting people are more likely to

stick with new ideas that way.

“Do you normally have a meat pasta sauce? Could you cut the meat in half and also add some beans to that?” she suggests.

“And then gradually you can make it more and more beans and next thing you know everyone in the family is used to eating more of those beans.”

Lenore Newman, Canada research chair in food security and environment at the University of the Fraser Valley, says people may also have more success by shifting their view on animal protein as something to be reserved for the occasional meal, rather than viewing it as a staple.

“In Alberta, I’m sure people are going to keep eating steaks for quite a while yet. But they might be looking at it and saying, ‘Well, maybe not everyday.

Maybe not quite as often, maybe more as a special occasion,”’ says Newman, the Vancouver-based author of Speaking in Cod Tongues: A Canadian Culinary Journey.

“Day-to-day, people aren’t going to eat an East Coast lobster or a West Coast salmon. They’re not doing that every day.

So in their daily food, which of course is the bulk of it, they’re much more likely to follow trends they think might improve their health, improve the environment or save them money.”

health

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New digital alert for forgotten meds PETER HOLLEY 97/16 wire service

When his chemotherapy patients leave the hospital to continue treatment at home, Edward Greeno faces a new challenge.

He can no longer ensure they’re taking their medicine.

Greeno, the medical director of the Masonic Cancer Clinic at the University of Minnesota, has come to realize that some patients, like children hiding naughty behaviour from a parent, will fudge the truth to avoid his disapproval, even when their health is at risk.

To combat patients’ fibbing and forgetfulness, Greeno has begun deploying a new tool in recent months: a pill embedded with a tiny, ingestible sensor. The sensor transmits data from inside the patient’s body to a wearable patch placed on their abdomen, which then connects to a mobile app that patients and doctors can access.

That data offers a new window into patients’ health and behaviour, Greeno said, allowing doctors to remotely monitor someone’s heart rate, activity level and sleep cycle. The sensor, which is about the size of a grain of sand and dissolves in the gastrointestinal tract, also tells doctors when a patient has ingested their medication. The information is compiled in a database that doctors can access from their devices.

At the Masonic Cancer Clinic, as part of a pilot program, doctors have begun pairing the sensor – made by a California company called Proteus Digital Health – with a common chemotherapy drug used to treat stage 3 and 4 colorectal cancer patients.

“When we give people chemotherapy in the clinic with an intravenous drug, we’re able to assess the dose and timing and make sure they’re well enough to continue getting the treatment,” Greeno said. “But when you send them home with a bottle of pills, you don’t know when they’re taking them or if they’re well enough to take them.”

“You’d think for cancer treatment that patients would be pretty diligent, and

Citizen news service photo

A liquid-filled capsule. that’s not always the case, for a variety of reasons,” he added.

Ingestible technology has raised a variety of concerns among experts and ethicists since the Food and Drug Administration approved digital pills in 2017, from how physicians will use the wave of new data created by the technology to whether that data may be vulnerable to hackers.

“The health industry is behind the curve when it comes to cybersecurity,” Jason Christopher, chief technology officer at the cybersecurity company Axio, told Forbes last year. “Forget health record databases – how do you patch a digital pill?”

Despite the concerns, many experts have pointed out that the technology will help doctors ensure patients are taking their prescribed medication. Not taking medicine – or “medication nonadherence” in the health-care world – is a “common and costly problem,” according to a study cited by the National Center for

Biotechnology Information.

“Approximately 30 percent to 50 percent of U.S. adults are not adherent to long-term medications leading to an estimated $100 billion in preventable costs annually,” according to the 2013 study.

Comparing medication nonadherence to weight loss, NCBI researchers say the problem is more complex than it might seem and often has multiple complicating factors. Greeno agreed, pointing out that his patients aren’t always lying about their behaviour. Sometimes older patients have trouble opening pill bottles.

Other times, he said, they’re so fatigued and foggy that they struggle to adhere to a rigorous schedule that requires them to ingest multiple pills each day. And sometimes, he said, they struggle to deal with a medication’s side effects.

The problem, Greeno said, is that chemotherapy drugs can have a very narrow therapeutic window and often cost be-

tween $10,000 and $20,000 per month.

“I had one patient whose hands hurt and she couldn’t open her pill bottle,” Greeno said, noting that when the patient’s daughter was around she would take her pills, but when her daughter was gone, she wouldn’t. “Normally, I might not find out about until weeks later when she comes to the clinic. But now, the app is telling me in real time that she didn’t take her pills and I get that message in clinic the next morning.”

Brenda Jans Darling, 45, has another reason she sometimes fails to take her chemotherapy medication on time: She’s a working mother of two juggling recovery with a daily onslaught of activities.

Darling, a sixth-grade math teacher in Minnesota, said she initially agreed to partake in a digital medicine pilot program about three months ago because she thought it sounded interesting. What she quickly discovered, she said, was that she enjoyed seeing her health data like her sleep and activity levels tracked on an app. She also found that information useful, comparing it to a “medical Fitbit.”

What she finds most useful, however, is knowing she no longer needs to count her medication to ensure she hasn’t missed a dose at the end of a busy two-week medication cycle.

“I’ll be having breakfast and one kid needs a permission slip signed and the other one needs something else and – while all that’s going on – I’m trying to make sure I took the right number of pills at the right time of day,” Darling said.

“Life happens, right, and it can be tough to keep track of everything.”

Now when she forgets, she added, she gets an alert on her iPhone that says, “We have not received data from your 8 a.m. dose,” which she finds extremely useful.

Darling said she isn’t worried about her doctors having access to an ever-growing amount of personal health information and believes that data will be used to combat the disease she’s spent the last two years battling.

“I’m going to do whatever I can to advance cancer research so we can find a cure to our modern-day plague,” she said.

Roadkill for dinner? Rules for it in Canada Ncolette derwporiz 97/16 wire service

Jeremy Vander Meer had his first experience with salvaging a roadkill moose soon after he moved to Alaska nearly five years ago.

“It was pretty easy, actually,” he said in a recent interview. “It was kind of perfect.”

The 31-year-old, who grew up in Oshawa, Ont., said it happened in the winter, it wasn’t too cold or too dark and there was some snow on the ground.

A pregnant cow moose had been hit by a car and had to be shot by state troopers, who called the next person on a roadkill applicants list. In this case, it was a friend of Vander Meer so he and his partner, Joanna Young, headed to the scene to help clean up the moose.

“We helped finish cutting it up and took it to the car and drove home,” said Vander Meer. “After that, it’s a couple evenings of butchering it and severing it into steaks and cubes and hamburger, and packaging it up and freezing it.

“Everybody takes their cut, depending on how many hours you worked.”

The laws on collecting roadkill vary in Canadian provinces and territories. The one constant is that the Canadian Food Inspection Agency doesn’t allow the meat to be sold.

“Federal regulations require that a meat product can only be sold if it is derived from a healthy animal which was slaughtered in accordance with commonly accepted practices,” said spokeswoman Lisa Murphy.

“Dead (roadkill) and diseased animals are not allowed to enter the food chain.”

In Alberta, people are required to contact a Fish and Wildlife officer.

“They would need to get a hold of the government to obtain permission to pick that up,” said Insp. Richard Lyons of Alberta Fish and Wildlife. “Nobody can possess wildlife unless there is an authority to do so.”

Officers consider each request on a case-by-case basis, including whether the roadkill would be used for food, he said.

“It’s definitely common for an officer to authorize possession,” said Lyons. “Then the person would be allowed to have it and use the meat, but normally what we

do on those authorization permits is indicate on there that the meat hasn’t been inspected.

“In most cases, we can’t confirm that it’s fit for human consumption.”

Lyons said it’s difficult for officers to know how long the meat has been sitting there or whether it’s carrying disease so people would be eating it at their own risk.

Similar to Alberta, anyone who wants to pick up dead wildlife in British Columbia must apply for a permit.

“It would then be inspected to ensure that it was not killed illegally,” said Dawn Makarowski, a public affairs officer for the B.C. Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development.

If conservation officers determine the meat is salvageable, a person who wants to keep it can get a permit.

Officials said the only rule around roadkill in Yukon is that the person must have a permit for the possession of wildlife.

Ontario also has some legislation on wildlife found dead on the side of the road.

“In most cases, you may keep these carcasses without approval,” Jolanta Kowalski, a spokeswoman for the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, said in an email. “But certain species must be registered online... before you can keep them for personal use.

“This includes all large mammals, birds of prey and fur-bearing mammals.”

Kowalski said no one is allowed to buy or sell roadkill, although there are exceptions for pelts sold by licensed trappers.

“Anyone who is attempting to retrieve road-killed wildlife is reminded to do it only in a safe and responsible manner,” she said. “Proper carcass-handling practices will help ensure a quality food product for the table.”

That includes keeping the meat clean, using clean cutting tools, wearing gloves and proper hanging and cooling.

Vander Meer said he has learned those practices from friends by helping salvage roadkill a handful of times.

“I’m not a particularly good hunter, so this is a great way to get moose still, without having to be successful hunting,” he said.

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T h u r s d a y , J a n u a r y 2 4 , 2 0 1 9 | 19

Handout photo

Children’s entertainer Ginalina will perform a show as part of the Coldsnap music festival on Sunday at the P.G. Playhouse. The following day she will lead one of the Integris Ice Jam workshops at the Two Rivers Gallery titled Inspire The Children.

Ginalina loved by kids, adults Frank PEEBLES 97/16 staff

There’s a reason Coldsnap chose Ginalina to be a headline performer.

She has four albums of family material, sure, and she has her own show on the Knowledge Network, granted. She has Juno and Canadian Folk Music Awards nominations. It is there, in that latter category, that Ginalina and Coldsnap found their common ground.

There are different types of children’s entertainer. There’s the kind that makes funny voices and faces to get kids laughing, the kind that incorporates costumes and props, another that writes songs that only a child could love about pet ostriches named Mittens or some such whimsical nonsense.

All of these genres have their strong points and exemplary performers. One could include acts like Charlotte Diamond, Al Simmons and Sharon Lois & Bram among the greats.

That is not how Ginalina conducts business. She’s in a different category.

There are also many levels of children’s entertainer, just like their are artistic gradients among country or jazz or any other form of music act. Some are complex ensembles spiraling down to the DIY musicians who base their act on tinny drum machines and garage sale keyboards.

The entertainers at the top of that mountain have familiar names like Fred Penner, Raffi and the late Mr. Dressup.

When they perform for kids, they also know they are performing for parents.

They treat the children like little people,

with their songs and stories, and consequently the adults in the room can enjoy the musicianship and narrative as well.

The Irish Rovers made a career out of walking with a foot on each side of the demographic line. The Barenaked Ladies album Snacktime was written on this same page.

Ginalina is exactly this kind of artist: loved by children, appreciated by adults.

She bases her songwriting on timeless themes and doesn’t talk down to anyone in her audience.

“You have to be very intentional about how we raise up our kids,” said Ginalina in a call to The Citizen from the home where she schools her kids and bases her music career.

“For myself, when I think about these lyrics, one of my goals is to reward the repeat listener – so every time they listen to the music, there is something new they can gather, whether it’s a new insight or a musical riff they hadn’t picked up on before, or just a new appreciation for how the lyric resonates differently now that their child is two years older but there is still something there for them.”

Growing up in Toronto, she played classical violin as a child. She also figured out guitar and ukulele, in amongst the three languages in which she is fluent (English, French and Mandarin). She described herself as “a goal-oriented person,” which is symptomatic of why she sidesteps silliness and slapstick in favour of happiness based on nature, recreation, and the observations of life. Like folk music itself, it is real elemental stuff.

“In fact I relate most closely with a folk

artist. I’m a folk singer,” she said. “That’s where I started before I did children’s music. I travelled to different cities, I went overseas, I played in restaurants and bars, just playing the regular singersongwriter type of music on my guitar. I really feel at home with the free-spirited singer-songwriter, ‘let’s take ordinary life and make it beautiful’ feeling that I think folk singers kind of imbue.”

She might never have arrived at playing music for children at all, had she not had her own. She has four kids and early on started sharing her music with her newborns. The songwriting and recording became a practical extension of just entertaining her own wee ones and they are still young (the oldest is nine) so the songs keep flowing naturally.

“I’ve never taken formal music lessons except through public school,” she said.

“My parents were poor, hardworking immigrants, so I think I have always felt very instinctive about the writing being very cathartic for me, and the expression of my ideas and my observations in the world. With having the young children around, I just found it quite natural to be spending my time with them, but also processing in the back of my mind all these experiences and sort of collecting them, and being very intentional with our conversations and listening, and hearing how they thought about things, and how they saw the world, and then in the depths of my night, often these ideas would flow together naturally and weave itself together.”

The albums date back to 2012 with Sandcastle Magic, then Forest Friends’

Nature Club in 2015, Home Is Family in 2016 and the most recent is It Takes A Village.

Together they have earned her a win at the Western Canadian Music Awards and perhaps most importantly three trophies from the Parent Choice Awards. The Parents’ Choice Foundation said “her respect for her young audience shines through one sunny song after another,” when expressing their appreciation for the affable singer-songwriter.

Another sign of appreciation and authentic affection came in unusual fashion when it was announced she would be one of the Coldsnap Music Festival headliners. Some longtime friends who moved away to Prince George promised to host her visit and when she ran into a Prince George couple in the Lower Mainland these strangers immediately volunteered to take her for dinner while she’s in our city. She said there was nothing more Canadian than “open-access strangers” as she called them – all the people who have stepped forward to ensure her first Prince George performance experience is a happy one.

Ginalina performs at 2 p.m. on Sunday at the P.G. Playhouse. On Monday, Ginalina will lead one of the Integris Ice Jam workshops from 10:30-11:30 a.m. at the Two Rivers Gallery where the theme will be Inspire The Children.

For a full Coldsnap Winter Music Festival schedule and instant ticket purchasing for any of the shows, log onto their website at coldsnapfestival.com. The festival runs Jan. 25 to Feb. 2 at various venues around the city.

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Gouchie hosting reconciliation workshop Frank PEEBLES 97/16 staff

Reconciliation is a philosophy for reconfiguring society in ways that include Aboriginal people as never before, and acknowledge the past wrongs on which Canadian culture was built.

The Coldsnap Music Festival is using its musical platform to open a wider and more focused discussion about what this means in our local lives. The organizers of the seminal Canadian winter event have always made a point of programming Aboriginal musicians each year, but they are taking it deeper this time. They are going on the record and talking about it in detail, in public.

Each festival has, in addition to its slate of concerts, a built in workshop series they call Ice Jam that is rooted on social themes.

“With the topic of reconciliation being such as important one, we thought it was a good time (to ask nationally acclaimed local musician) Kym Gouchie to help formulate a plan,” said Coldsnap artistic director Sue Judge.

The result is the Monday workshop entitled Embracing Reconciliation starring Gouchie and a group of carefully chosen friends to aid in the discussion.

The Lheidli T’enneh First Nation is a full sponsor of the conversation.

Also aiding the discussion is the concert-mentary Gouchie and other local musicians made together last March, when her concert For the People Live @ The Prince George Playhouse was filmed.

“I pride myself in the work that I have done as an artist and I’ve used my music to create awareness and foster change,” said Gouchie.

“I have had countless conversations off the stage after a show where nonIndigenous people will ask me how they can engage with the local First Nations where they live and my answer is always this: Find someone in the community that you can form a friendship with and start there. Attend community events and become a familiar face.

“Offer to help where needed. Learn the protocols. Support youth events and community fundraisers. Be patient as it may take time to earn trust and acceptance but once you’re in, you become family and often become adopted as aunty, uncle or a brother sister.”

From personal understanding, a person-to-person relationship can replicate into government-to-government relationships and better connections between the sub-sectors of a community. That is a large part of what reconciliation involves.

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Kym Gouchie performs with her band Northern Sky in 2018 at the P.G. Playhouse during the For The People concert.

“Reconciliation means the restoration of friendly relations,” Gouchie explained.

“Where do we start? Has there ever been a friendly relationship? When you look back on history, we have always been pitted against each other. Can we truly move past the ‘Cowboy and Indian’ mentality? How do we reconcile what has never been a friendly past. We need to start with the truth and we need to embrace it. We cannot heal what we do not acknowledge and I believe that Canada has made progress but since the TRC (Truth & Reconciliation Commission) released the final reports and 94 calls to

action, who can honestly say that they’ve read them? Who has the time for that, anyways? We need community forums.

“We need to sit down over a coffee and have conversations and ask questions in order to fully grasp just what it is that our country and our communities need to do to heal and move forward. There’s so much to discuss and for me music is the perfect vehicle to do just that.”

“Reconciliation with our Indigenous peoples is an intricate journey, so let’s get involved now,” said Judge.

“Come to participate or simply to observe and learn.”

The event will include a panel discussion moderated by CBC Radio’s Andrew Kurjata, who has played a leading role in past Ice Jam successes.

Some of the confirmed names on the discussion stage in addition to Guchie are young LTFN cultural leader Joshua Seymour, Lheidli elder Darlene McIntosh, city councilor Cori Ramsey and others pending confirmation.

It will happen from 1-3 p.m. that day at the Uda Dune Baiyoh-House of Ancestors building (355 Vancouver St.) See related story on page 21

Francofun Winter Festival coming Frank PEEBLES 97/16 staff

The French influence on winter blows all across Canada like an Arctic gale. The franco-Canadian community has made a party out of snow and ice for hundreds of years and for the past 33 it has been official in Prince George.

The 34th Annual FrancoFun Winter Festival is set to launch, bridging two of the city’s other cultural institutions in the winter.

The FrancoFun events link from the Coldsnap Music Festival all the way to Downtown Winterfest, providing their own colours to each.

Otherwise known as the Festival d’Hiver, this set of French concerts and parties is organized each year by the city’s francophone headquarters Le Cercle des Canadiens Français de Prince George (CCF).

This year’s first event is a trio of bands performing at Coldsnap on Feb. 1 at the Ramada Hotel. Go out that night to dance up a storm (Dansez Une Tempête) to the music of The French Connection, É.T.É., and LGS. On Feb. 2 there is an art exhibition opening at the CCF building (1752 Fir St.) at 7 p.m.

A free evening of skating at the Outdoor Ice Oval happens Feb. 4 from 6 p.m.

to 7:30 p.m. for those who email their RSVP to infolecercle@gmail.com. There’s a maple treat for the first 50 participants.

On Feb. 5, the festival goes to the movies, with the showing of La Bolduc at 7 p.m. at the CCF building.

A meal for local seniors will be served on Feb. 7 in collaboration with the Prince George Chateau (4377 Hill Ave.) at noon.

One of the city’s favourite winter parties, attended by speakers of all languages, is the Cabane à Sucre or the Sugar Shack day. Enjoy brunch, old time fiddlers, live French folk band Les Rats d’Swampe, and sumptuous maple syrup from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at St. Mary’s Hall on Feb. 9.

The string of activities closes on Feb. 10 when Le Cercle des Canadiens Français joins with Downtown Prince George in the seasonal hotspot event Downtown Winterfest from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. in Cetreville, the core of the city’s downtown.

The FrancoFun Festival is also the channel into a tempting contest.

The grand prize – Grand prix du Festival – for the Festival d’Hiver is a $750 travel voucher for the Via Rail passenger train.

For more information about the festival or the French-culture club that organizes this suite of winter soirées, go to their website at www.ccfpg.ca or call them at 250-561-2565.

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Doc screening raising cash for site c opposition Frank Peebles 97/16 staff

Art and debate will share the spotlight at a fundraiser event for those opposing the Site C dam construction.

The film Water Warriors – a 2017 documentary about Aboriginal activists and their supporters in New Brunswick who engaged to block natural gas exploration they believed to be an environmental threat – will be screened at Artspace. A collection of film clips pertaining to the Site C project will follow.

Two special guests will be in attendance.

“After the screening, we will host a Q&A session with director Micheal Premo and Nipawi Kakinoosit who is featured in the film and was in New Brunswick during the height of the events depicted in Water Warriors,” said event host Erin Bauman. “Nipawi was also a participant on the Treaty 8 Justice For The Peace Caravan trip in 2016 that left from Bear Flats, B.C. to Montreal for the Site C Court of Appeals case as a member of Treaty 8 and an Indigenous youth ambassador.”

With the dialogue by the documentary makers will come a fulsome discussion of the Site C issues, Bauman said.

“It is our hope to spark respectful de-

All money raised will be donated to “the people of West Moberly and Prophet River who are in court to oppose the Site C damn project...”

bate and conversation with all members of the public to express how members of the community feel in regards to Site C and other environmentally impactful projects and activities, regardless of their opinion or point of view,” she said.

Entrance is by donation, though no one will be turned away due to lack of funds.

All money raised will be donated to “the people of West Moberly and Prophet River who are in court to oppose the Site C damn project and to raise awareness about the impacts of the fossil fuel industry on our environment and about Indigenous land use rights,” said Bauman.

The event happens Friday at 8 p.m., upstairs at Books & Company. For more information, look up the event’s page on Facebook.

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WOrkshops focus on society, music 97/16 staff

Coldsnap is the platform for two sets of workshops that involve the musicians on their annual program of performers.

The Integris Ice Jam Series is centred on social issues, which is why it contains the reconciliation event.

The Sound Factory Workshop Series is aimed at musicians wanting to study their craft.

Here are the complete lists of the two sets of Coldsnap side-events (attendance is free for both series):

Integris Ice Jam Series

• Jan. 26 “Songs & Stories Around The Firepit” with Big Little Lions 1-2 p.m. at the Fire Pit Drop-In Centre • Jan. 27 “Sunday Gospel Hour” with Kat Danser and Guy Davis 12-1 p.m. at Trinity United Church • Jan. 28 “Kids Ice Jam-Inspire The Children” with Ginalina 10:30-11:30 a.m. at Two Rivers Gallery • Jan. 28 “Embracing Reconciliation” with Kym Gouchie & Friends 1-3 p.m. at Uda Dune Baiyoh-House of Ancestors • Jan. 29 “Not Quite Classical” with Atlantic String Machine 1-2 p.m. at Brunswick Seniors Activity Centre

• Jan. 30 “Music: The International Language” with Amir Amiri and Richard Moody 12-1 p.m. at IMSS Building • Jan. 31 “Free As The Northern Prairie Wind” with the Celeigh Cardinal Trio 12-1 p.m. at the Native Friendship Centre • Feb. 1 “Roots Rockin’ Calypso with Kobo Town 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. at The Exploration Place • Feb. 2 “Swagger And Swing” with Red Haven 12-1 p.m. at Railway & Forestry Museum

Sound Factory Workshop Series

• Jan. 28 “True Acoustic Blues” with Guy Davis 10:30-11:30 a.m. at Sound Factory • Jan. 30 “Intro To Sound Engineering” a Music BC How-To class with Stephen Darke 10:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Sound Factory (registration required via the Coldsnap website) • Jan. 31 “Guitar Magic” with Terra Lightfoot and special guest Sam Weber 10:30-11:30 a.m. at Omineca Arts Centre • Feb. 1 “Fiddle And Cello” with Élizabeth and Élizabeth 12:30-2 p.m. at P.G. Conservatory of Music

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Toyota debuts new Supra Hannah Elliott 97/16 wire service

Last Monday in Detroit after multiple leaks on blogs and social media, Toyota unveiled in real life the continuation of many fan boys’ most darling of darlings, the 2020 Toyota Supra.

It’s the first time Toyota has made and sold a new Supra in the U.S. in 21 years.

It’s also the first time the automaker is doing a throwback sports car that includes BMW DNA-the modern Supra shares much of its engineering and mechanics (chassis, engine) with the Z4, BMW’s $50,000 coupe.

The timing on this tiny two-seater is telling. It comes as the American auto market is increasingly stretched between SUVs and sports cars, with sedans fading out in between them. Along with the Ford Shelby GT500, the Supra was the only notable sports car debut of the show.

“Certainly there are still vehicles that prioritize fun driving – I don’t think that’s going away,” says Stephanie Brinley, the lead automotive analyst for IHS Markit research firm. “But customers have shifted, and they prefer utility vehicles, and that’s what’s selling. The auto show in Detroit reflects that.”

Supra also arrives just as iconic cars from the 1990s are becoming popular to collect and drive among millennials (see also: Acura NSX, Nissan GT-R, Porsche 928). One notable Bring a Trailer sale saw a late-era Supra with just 7,000 miles on the odometer sell for $121,000, while a similar ’94 Supra went for $80,500 earlier last year.

The new Supra takes some cues from predecessors such as the 1965 Sports 800 (a tiny two-seat coupe similarly at home on the road and on the track), the 1967 Toyota 2000GT (they each have “double bubble” rooflines), and the 1990s-era Supras with much same body style (promi-

Bloomberg photo by Sean Proctor

The Toyota Supra was on display at the 2019 North American International Auto Show (NAIAS) in Detroit on Jan. 13. nent front grill, hatchback rear) as the one unveiled in Detroit.

Today’s version, though, comes with modern conveniences such as LED headlights, auto-dimming mirrors, rearview cameras, rain-sensing wipers. The standard-issue wheels are 19 inches.

Inside, the car is well-suited to a couple who want to use it as a daily driver with a day or two of track driving thrown in.

It comes with a small (6.5-inch- or 8-inch depending on the version you buy) computer screen display, automatic climate control, and optional adaptive

cruise control.

Under the hood there’s a turbocharged straight-six-cylinder, 335-horsepower engine and eight-speed transmission with paddle shifters. (All of those are made in BMW’s hometown of Munich.) It can hit 96.5 km/h in 4.1 seconds and has a top speed of 250 km/h.

Even more importantly, it’s perfectly suited to driving on the track: a featherlight 3,397 pounds and rear-wheel propulsion combine for nimble dynamism at high speed. Two driving modes-Normal and Sport-come standard.

Not that everyone is as enthused as those guys at Jalopnik.com, where the headline on the review is “The 2020 Toyota Supra Is Here and It Looks Glorious.”

“It feels like online people are expecting the Supra to be the next version of the 911,” Brian Moody, the executive editor for Autotrader told Bloomberg in Detroit.

“I think it’s going to be a car that you can get. A good performance car. But I feel like the expectations online are building toward something it can’t deliver: Nostalgia.”

Volkswagen, Ford marriage leaves investors feeling jilted 97/16 wire service

The much-anticipated alliance announcement by Volkswagen AG and Ford Motor Co. left investors feeling let down as it lacked a big-bucks plan to join forces on electric vehicles and self-driving cars.

Wall Street was hoping for a blockbuster deal, such as the billions of dollars General Motors Co. landed for its selfdriving unit from Honda and SoftBank Vision Fund last year. There also was some belief Ford would tap into VW’s massive electric-vehicle development program, so the companies could jointly take on Tesla Inc.’s dominance of that segment.

Instead, VW and Ford merely said

they’re committed to exploring those areas, and formalized cooperation on commercial vehicles – a project the two companies announced they’d pursue seven months ago.

The payoff from joining forces to develop trucks and vans won’t be peanuts: Ford sees the tie-up adding $500 million to its annual pretax profit. But that benefit won’t be felt until 2023.

“This is a toe-in-the-water kind of deal,” said Jeff Schuster, senior vice president of forecasting for researcher LMC Automotive. “It really wasn’t much of an announcement, frankly. There’s nothing beyond what was already anticipated.”

Volkswagen shares closed up just 0.3 percent Tuesday, while Ford fell 1.7 per-

cent. Both entered the year looking for a lift after their stocks dropped about 17 percent and 39 percent last year, respectively.

The commercial-vehicle alliance may do more for VW than Ford, as it fills two weaknesses in the German automaker’s commercial lineup – pickups and delivery vans – that are already areas of strength for Ford, Jefferies analyst Philippe Houchois wrote to investors. The market continues to wait for more from Ford on how it’s going to improve its fortunes.

“Ford keeps frustrating investors by delivering piecemeal information on its future plans,” Houchois said in a note. He recommends buying the shares and has an $11 price target.

CEO Jim Hackett has been disappointed right alongside Ford investors. On the floor of this week’s North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Hackett told Bloomberg Television he’s not happy about how Ford performed in 2018.

Wall Street would like to see a more detailed plan from Ford on its path forward, said David Kudla, the chief executive officer of Mainstay Capital Management in Grand Blanc, Michigan. Whereas GM’s CEO Mary Barra has been articulating a clear vision and comprehensive strategy, “we haven’t seen that from Jim Hackett,” he said.

Ford chairman Bill Ford elevated Hackett, 63, to CEO in May 2017 and gave him a mandate to speed up decision-making.

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