The Gateway: Volume 102, Summer Issue 3

CELEBRATING 20 1 0

1910

YEARS

volume CII summer issue 3

the official student newspaper at the university of alberta

www.thegatewayonline.ca

monday, august 15, 2011

inside

A one-man amusement park David Jacobson takes audiences on a wild ride with his solo Fringe comedy Theme Park.

A&E, Page 11

Aaron Yeo

PARTY LIKE IT’S 1969 Woodstock veterans such as Jefferson Starship performed at the first annual Edmonton Rock Music Festival at Hawrelak Park last weekend.

First spring/summer Power, water, services to U-Pass run a success be more accessible in SUB Alex Migdal Staff Reporter

Digging for green and gold The Golden Bears hockey team is on the lookout for a rookie to join their ranks in September’s open tryouts.

Sports, Page 12

Summer of jerks This summer brought no shortage of jerkiness from around the world. The Gateway’s got beef with some of the biggest.

Opinion, Page 6

More than 75 per cent of graduate students at the University of Alberta have been using the spring/summer U-Pass, indicating that its first implementation in the summer months has been successful.

As of August 7, preliminary figures show that 3,937 spring/summer U-Pass stickers that have been distributed out of the total of 5,200 eligible grad students. It’s a number that the Graduate Students’ Association VicePresident (Labour) Tamara Korassa is pleased with.

The U-Pass is only offered to research-based graduate students and those enrolled in a spring/summer course, and came about as the result of a survey of grad students done in 2009, where many showed support for a transit pass for May through August.

In March 2010, students voted in favour of the pass in a referendum and the GSA worked with Edmonton Transit System to fully implement it as a pilot project for this summer. The cost was a mandatory fee of $91.67 to

Aaron Yeo

all those eligible, identical to the cost of the Winter 2011 U-Pass.

“We were confident that the spring/ summer U-Pass would be successful,” Korassa said. “However, as we were the first group to try a spring/summer pilot program, we all had some concerns about the implementation.”

Korassa explained that those concerns were primarily logistical issues, such as differentiating between eligible and ineligible students.

“There are students from each group that want to use the pass and those that don’t,” she explained. “However, with the way the U-Pass currently operates and the way it benefits each of the stakeholder groups, it’s not possible to differentiate between students based on their preference for using the pass or not.”

Korassa indicated that the majority of feedback about the program has been positive, although more formal feedback will be required for the U-Pass’ long-term prospects. That information will be collected through surveys once the summer term is completed, and will help them assess exactly how successful it was.

Please see u-pass Page 2

News Editor

When students return to school for the fall semester, they may be welcomed with more power outlets, water-refill stations and better located services available in the Students’ Union Building.

Vice-President (Operations and Finance) Andy Cheema has been busy this summer implementing changes in SUB, which will see the move of the Peer Support Centre and Campus

a problem that Cheema had experienced as a student, which is why he made it a priority on his agenda.

“When I was running for this position, I did a speech in [the] Myer Horowitz, and one of the things I promised was that I would install more electrical outlets in SUB, and in fact there was cheering and applause when I said that,” Cheema said.

“In today’s information age, [...] it’s somewhat ridiculous that it’s difficult to find places to plug in your devices on campus.”

“It’s somewhat ridiculous that it’s difficult to find places to plug in your devices on campus.”

Andy Cheema Students’ Union Vice-President (Operations & Finance)

Food bank to more appropriate locations. Certain food and beverage businesses in SUB will also be providing GST exemptions to students with a meal plan, as permitted by national legislation to make food more affordable, a feature that’s already present in Lister itself.

Lack of available power outlets was

To remedy this, the SU has installed what they call “power posts,” 3-foot tall brown towers, scattered around the area in front of SUBStage. Each power post supplies four times as many outlets as the floor sockets which they replace, and cost the SU $200 in parts and labour.

Please see upgrades Page 4

2 News The Gateway www.thegatewayonline.ca monday, august 15, 2011 volume CII summer issue 3 Published since november 21, 1910 Online-Only Edition ISSN 0845-356X Suite 3-04 Students’ Union Building University of Alberta Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2J7 Telephone 780.492.5168 Fax 780.492.6665 Ad Inquiries 780.492.6700 Email gateway@gateway.ualberta.ca

editorialstaff editor-in-chief Alexandria Eldridge eic@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.5168

managing editor Justin Bell managing@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.6654

news editor Aaron Yeo news@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.7308

staff reporter Alex Migdal deputynews@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.6664

opinion editor Ryan Bromsgrove opinion@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.6661

arts & entertainment editor Madeline Smith entertainment@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.7052

sports editor Matt Hirji sports@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.6652

photo editor Dan McKechnie photo@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.6648

design & production editor Ross Vincent production@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.6663

online editor Jordan Ching

monday, august 15, 2011

www.thegatewayonline.ca

SU initiates November symposium U-Pass gets to celebrate undergrad research favourable

feedback by students

Alex Migdal Staff Reporter

The Students’ Union is kick-starting its plans to host a symposium to promote and recognize undergraduate research, set to take place midNovember in the Centennial Centre for Interdisciplinary Science.

The symposium is in its initial planning stages, with decisions about possible themes, names and events that will make up the symposium still pending. Organizers have secured $10,000 in funding from the U of A’s recently launched Undergraduate Research Initiative, a $200,000 investment that aims to connect undergraduate students with more research opportunities.

The initiative is being led by the Students’ Union Vice-President (Academic) Emerson Csorba, a strong advocate for undergraduate research.

“Considering how we’re a public research institution, with the [amount] of research that is going on, it’s important that every student has that opportunity to experience what the university really values,” Csorba said.

Csorba is aiming for 100 U of A undergraduate researchers to attend the symposium, a goal that he believes is ambitious but achievable.

Initial planning for the symposium has included assembling a planning committee, comprised of approximately 20 students and a handful of professors from various faculties on campus. Csorba said he was mainly

U-Pass Continued From Page 1

Justin Bell

LIMELIGHT VP (Academic) Emerson Csorba is behind the research initiative.

looking for “passionate and engaged” students to be on the committee.

“The students don’t have to be involved in research,” he explained.

“There’s a number that just finished their first year and were looking to get involved in undergraduate research but didn’t know how. Having that sort of perspective is valuable.”

The committee is currently meeting once a week and is focusing on securing the logistics of the event. The symposium will also offer $10,000 in student awards for research, which will be funded through partnerships with key stakeholders like the U of A’s Alumni Association.

Although Csorba believes that the symposium is a good stepping stone for the URI, he says it “can’t just stand on its own.”

“Having a strong symposium is the start, but the big goal for me is to make sure that it’s not just the symposium, but a whole slew of initiatives.”

Those other initiatives by the URI include the re-purposing of a space on the second floor of SUB into an office of undergraduate research in September and the launch of Yaffle, a centralized undergraduate research database in April 2012.

Although a future beyond this year for a symposium isn’t guaranteed, due to the URI’s one-time deal of $200,000, Csorba is already working on making the symposium a long-term fixture by working closely with the U of A administration and assuring that the next VPA will have a detailed transition report in order to facilitate planning for the next conference.

“I think there’s a certain curiosity that students from the U of A graduate with because there is that focus on asking big questions,” Csorba said. “But we still need to put more emphasis on achieving that curiosity and I think we do that through expanding undergraduate research opportunities.”

“Once the GSA has this information, we’ll be able to design a strategy for the continuance of the spring/ summer U-Pass program and also be able to look into options for annual graduate student passes,” Korassa said.

An annual transit pass could become availabe that would be valid for an entire year.

Korassa has little doubt that it will be supported in the future, thanks to the positive responses from students, as well as the fact that the program is “beneficial for many different stakeholders.”

“Students gain affordable access to the transit system, the university can free up parking space, ETS is able to plan for guaranteed revenue and consumers, and Edmonton benefits from an increased awareness and culture of public transportation,” Korassa said.

With the success of the spring/ summer U-Pass for graduate students, Korassa also believes that it may open the door for undergraduate students to implement a similar program.

Students’ Union Vice-President (Student Life) Colten Yamagishi is heading up the initiative for a spring/ summer undergraduate U-Pass, but the plan is only in its infancy, and will require a referendum vote from students.

online@gateway.ualberta.ca | 248.1509

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STREETERS If a man attacked you with a screwdriver, what would you do?

As you may be aware, a man armed with a screwdriver came at a Calgary police officer and was shot four times.

Compiled and photographed by Alex Migdal and Matt Hirji

Toni Almhjell Phys. Ed. V

Faye Hirsi Alumna

Niaz Memon Science III

Matt Cairns Phys. Ed. I

ad/graphic designer Vikki Wiercinski design@gateway.ualberta.ca | 492.6647

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The Gateway is created using Macintosh computers, HP Scanjet flatbed scanners, and a Nikon Super Cool Scan optical film scanner. Adobe InDesign is used for layout.

Adobe Illustrator is used for vector images, while Adobe Photoshop is used for raster images. Adobe Acrobat is used to create PDF files which are burned directly to plates to be mounted on the printing press. Text is set in a variety of sizes, styles, and weights of Fenice, Joanna, Kepler and Whitney. The Manitoban is the Gateway’s sister paper, and we love her dearly, though “not in that way.” The Gateway’s games of choice are GIRP and F.E.A.R. 3.

contributors

Andrew Jeffrey, Dustin Blumenhagen, Alana Willerton, Hayley Dunning, Rachel Singer Skybox by Dan McKechnie

Give him a tool box, and say ‘there you go.’ Or I’d probably curl up in the fetal position. [And just let them attack you?]

Uh, maybe hit them with a field hockey stick.

I would definitely defend myself. I think I have the right to do that as a Canadian.

If it was a screwdriver, honestly, I’d attack him. I can’t think of a funny way to say it or anything. Just chase him down. Taser him or something.

If he was big, I’d probably run.

The Gateway

News

volume cii summer issue 3

Influenza treatment study gives hope to transplant patients Rachel Singer News Staff

Transplant patients have weaker immune systems than normal, but University of Alberta research has taken step towards helping them combat the flu. The research, done

by Dr. Deepali Kumar, has won this year’s Gold Medal in Medicine from the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada.

Each year, a single medical specialist in Canada is awarded the gold medal and only four other researchers from Alberta have ever received the award.

“I was floored to get the email and this is the most important award I have ever gotten. The Royal College is an organization that all the specialist physicians in Canada are part of, so to get an award from [them] is amazing,” Kumar said.

Kumar, an associate professor in the Department of Medicine, received the award for her research on the effects of the H1N1 influenza virus on transplant patients. She had noticed that some of the transplant patients who got the flu became very sick and ended up in critical care, while others were fine. Kumar contacted her fellow colleagues in North America and Europe to see if they had noticed the same thing.

“It was interesting because they were all thinking the same thing. So we got together and we got information on all the patients everybody was seeing, and the U of A was the central site. All the information came to the U of A and I put it into a database and I analyzed the information,” Kumar explained.

From the analysis, which involved information from 237 patients, Kumar found that patients who received antiviral treatment within

Rachel Singer

FLU FIGHTERS Dr. Deepali Kumar’s research focuses on improving flu treatments for transplant patients who are usually more susceptible to viruses.

48 hours of flu symptoms fared much better and were less likely to end up in critical care, compared to those who received no treatment or who received treatment after the first 48 hours. The problem with starting antiviral therapy within the 48 hour time period is that doctor’s usually test if a patient has the flu first, which takes time to confirm.

Kumar suggested that doctors should use antiviral treatment the moment they suspect a transplant patient has the flu. This would ensure that doctors would not miss the time period that could prevent a transplant patient from ending up in critical care. If the test confirms a patient does not have the flu then the doctor can

quickly take the patient off the treatment, with little to no side effects.

Kumar pointed out that flu shots don’t work very well in transplant patients, as they try and boost the immune system, which is usually suppressed in these patients to prevent rejection of new organs. A flu shot is much more likely to work at least six months after the transplant date, when the post-operation medication has been reduced. One of the studies she recently finished looked at whether the flu shot under the skin is more effective in transplant patients than into the muscle which is normally done. The results have not been analyzed yet, but Kumar hopes to look at them this fall.

Diverse student choir earns second place in nationwide competition Alexandria Eldridge Editor-in-Chief

A choir that began in September as 50 strangers, some of whom had no previous chorale experience, recently earned recognition on the national stage for their vocal abilities.

The University of Alberta Concert Choir was recently awarded second place in the Mixed-Voice Collegiate Choirs category at the National Competition for Canadian Amateur Choirs, a prestigious competition run in part by the Canadian Council for the Arts. “[It] is a well respected competition, the only one of its kind in Canada, that has been very important for the growth of chorale singing in Canada,” said Debra Cairns, who conducts the choir and is a professor in the Department of Music.

“It’s a wonderful learning opportunity for choirs because you get feedback from the jury and it just helps you to raise your own level of performance to be able to put yourself on the national stage,” she said.

The competition requires four pieces submitted on tape — one Canadian, one French, and the other two showing as much breadth as possible. Cairns

said the most difficult piece in the Concert Choir’s repertoire this year was a renaissance composition called O Magnum Mysterium, set by Tomás Luis de Victoria.

“It’s a very challenging piece because each vocal part is independent, so each vocal part has to be responsible for shaping a phrase and its own dynamics within that,” Cairns explained. “It’s not a style that we hear so commonly these days, particularly with the younger generation [...] so it’s a style that’s very hard to understand and pick up and takes a lot of dedication to learn.”

Cairns explained that she felt particularly proud of the way the choir performed Victoria’s piece, and that the way they showcased their capabilities, in addition to their breadth of repertoire, likely helped them clinch the second place award.

“Judges look at such things as tone, tuning, musical phrasing, balance between parts, blend of the choir [...] as well as the overall breadth of the style of repertoire. I think all of those factors came into play in helping us to come to second place.”

The U of A Concert Choir is an ensemble that started in 1970, and consists of 50 to 70 members, depending

on how many students are accepted in any given year. Any student on campus can audition for the choir at the beginning of the academic year.

“We have students who are from science, business, other disciplines within the arts — all across campus — and they all come together because of a love of singing. Some have had more singing and chorale experience than others [...] so it’s a wide variety of backgrounds and people,” Cairns said.

Kaylee-Rose Rudiger, last year’s president of the Concert Choir and an undergraduate music student said winning the award was unexpected, but is great because it gives the U of A’s music department some of the recognition it deserves.

“It was great for us because we didn’t always think that were doing that great or anything, and we’d actually accomplished a lot more than we’d ever imagined this year,” she said. “I think the choir, as well as the music department at the U of A, needs to be recognized for the wonderful things that go on in the Fine Arts Building.

I think it is a faculty that sometimes slips under the radar of many students on campus somehow, and yet has a mass amount of talent that should not go unnoticed.”

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News

monday, august 15, 2011

Award-winning mosh pit research breaks the mould in leisure studies Andrew Jeffrey

www.thegatewayonline.ca

GST exemption for Lister meal plan students

News Staff

upgrades Continued From Page 1

Music fans who shove, jump and run into one another is not often discussed in an academic setting, but a University of Alberta student has won an award for her research on the mosh pit subculture.

Grad student Gabrielle Riches recently won the prestigious Marion Miller Award for her paper, “Embracing the Chaos: Moshpits, Extreme Metal Music, and Liminality.” The award is given annually at the Canadian Congress on Leisure Research for the most outstanding paper written by a student, and it is not often that such an award is given for music rather than the “normative forms of leisure” as Riches puts it, such as sports and recreation.

“Within the leisure field we rarely talk about music. Music’s such a prevalent leisure pastime that it’s hard to ignore. So it was really cool that they took it seriously and they found it exciting, and when I went to the conference a lot of people could actually relate.”

While doing research on women’s involvement in the heavy metal scene as an undergraduate, moshing was an oft-discussed topic in Riches’ interviews. Through her research, she realized that moshing plays such a vital part of the heavy metal culture, and wrote a paper on its origins, how it’s changed and the role it plays in the metal scene. She also paid close attention to the place of women in mosh pits, which she found to be an under-represented aspect of metal.

“For women sometimes it’s even a little more intimidating to enter into the pit, but you kind of get hypnotized by seeing everyone move and [you] really want to be a part of that. You’re bound to get bruised and maybe some cuts when you go moshing [...] It’s like war wounds; there’s a sense of pride in that. The next day you feel that wince of pain and you think that was a good experience,” Riches said. “I think the mosh pit is also a cue for memories. When you think back to your metal shows, a lot of people not only remember the band but they

The two water fountains in SUB will be replaced with units that can operate as both a normal drinking fountain, and as a “water refill station” for bottles. They are a result of a joint project between the SU and the Office of Sustainability, and will supply refrigerated, filtered water to encourage reusable water bottle usage. The Office of Sustainability is providing the funds for the machines so there will be no cost to the SU. The point-of-sale machines at SU-run businesses in SUB — Cram Dunk, L’Express, Juicy, and RATT — will also be reprogrammed by September to exempt students with a Lister meal plan from paying GST. The Marina in Lister already provides this service.

“We had not been aware until recently that SU food and beverage operations could provide this exemption,” explained Cheema, who received confirmation from the Canada Revenue Agency. The exemption will only apply to students with a registered university meal plan, and not to non-Listerites who use money on their OneCard.

The Peer Support Centre, currently on the lower level of SUB, will move to the second floor by September, in order to be located alongside University-provided services.

The Campus Food Bank will relocate from the basement to the main floor, sharing office space with the Student Financial Aid Information Centre. The new location will provide them with more visibility and better office facilities, as well as feature a back door to increase student privacy, as currently students must leave through the same door they entered in.

“If you’re leaving with a brown paper bag of food you don’t necessarily have to worry about students seeing you with that,” Cheema explained.

While all the changes will be completed by September, the renovations for the Campus Food Bank will not be completed until later this year.

Dan Mckechnie

CHAOS Grad student Gabrielle Riches research on mosh pits show they’re not all about aggression.

remember the mosh pit because that’s a vital experience and that’s a memorable experience for a lot of metal fans”.

It was no surprise though that Riches encountered people who thought her topic of choice was too negative for leisure studies. As important as moshing is to metal fans, it has its detractors who speak out against the negative aspects of heavy metal and the violent nature of mosh pits. But Riches’ paper and presentations convinced many what moshing represents for metalheads.

“Some scholars are antagonistic because we always think leisure should be positive, it

should be about building self-esteem, building community and it does for metal. But it’s just so much more than building that sense of selfesteem. Leisure can be rebellious as well, and I think that’s important,” Riches said.

Moshing is no longer an underground form of dancing. Mosh pits break out at concerts that don’t even include metal bands and can be found all over the world.

Riches’ article is set to be published in an upcoming Journal of Cultural Research that is dedicated solely to heavy metal showing how metal and the moshing that goes with it have become an international phenomenon.

Opinion

opinion@gateway.ualberta.ca

monday, august 15, 2011

EPS crime plan misses the point EDMONTON LEADS THE COUNTRY WITH 33 homicides this year, and the city’s new plan to combat violent crime is hopelessly lacklustre at best. People have been looking to the municipal authorities for assurance that the city’s still safe, and all they’re hearing are vague promises of more policing and stricter knife control, with little prospect of addressing the real community-based social roots of the problem.

Police Chief Rod Knecht and Mayor Stephen Mandel unveiled their much-hyped plan over the course of two press conferences last week, saying they would increase police presence and focus on weapons, drugs and alcohol, distressed communities, and social disorder. But all of this is what law enforcement is supposed to be doing already: it sounds like their solution for reducing violent crime is just “do more policing.”

The police have identified problem areas in Edmonton, but their plans are still vague; they say they’ll be sending more officers and community development teams to try and understand the background causes and how exactly to address them. In other words, they don’t know what the problem is, and don’t know how they’re going to approach it — so there’s no reason to make an announcement about it.

One area that will see change, however, is knife control, since half of this years’ homicides involved knives. Police are looking to crack down on their concealed use, and want Crown prosecutors to more strongly enforce charges for simply carrying an edged weapon; possession earns a minimum sentence of six months, while brandishing it could get you up to 10 years in prison. But approaching the weapon issue with draconian strictness raises the same questions as the decades-old debate about gun control. It’s been argued back and forth about whether or not extreme weapon control helps lower crime, but people keep dying anyhow.

Not only is more strictly enforcing existing laws against carrying concealed knives completely unenforceable without random police searches, it’s also staggeringly unlikely to prevent any knife-based homicides. A person who has already rationalized murder won’t stop because the law says he can’t carry a knife; the law also says he can’t commit murder.

He’ll have either brought the knife anyway, or he’ll find another weapon. What EPS needs to realize is that the weapons aren’t the problem — the issue lies with the people.

Much of Edmonton’s violence stems from gang relations, immigrant communities, and the homeless population; four of the murders this year involved young Somali-Canadians, a community that has a history of trouble with gang violence — over the last five years, 18 Somali men have been murdered in Edmonton, and only three cases have been solved.

Additionally, Edmonton’s estimated homeless population of 2,400 is a community that’s not restricted to any single neighbourhood. More than half of the victims of 2011’s homicides were either homeless, or once connected to a homeless shelter or agency.

Helping this group of people off the streets and into a safe place at night will help reduce the chance of late-night confrontations. Even if directing resources towards helping the homeless has no effect on crime rate, at least it can measurably help the persistent homelessness problem in this city.

There’s nothing truly noteworthy in the new police initiative — Mandel even said that most changes won’t be noticed until three to five years from now.

There’s no saying what the crime rate will be in 2015, with or without a special plan. But we shouldn’t be expecting EPS to solve this problem alone, or blaming them exclusively for the homicide count, because there are plenty of other factors that influence how safe a city is. The communities, and the broader municipal authorities need to take action as well.

The city needs to focus more on addressing the social issues underlying Edmonton’s crime rate, and not turn the city into a police state with weapon control and a cop on every corner. The police force’s plan does little to reduce violence in immigrant and homeless communities — communities that need the most help if we’re going to give up first place in the homicide race.

Aaron Yeo News Editor

Ross Vincent

letters to the

eds

Drummond ‘s work held in high regard Your recent report on this year’s staff layoffs in the Department of Computing Science contained one very unfortunate turn of phrase that needs to be corrected.

The article was clear enough in establishing the well-deserved high regard Edith Drummond had here.

However, the article at one point seems to say that all of her work was actually being done by others.

That is simply untrue. Fortunately, the rest of your article speaks volumes to the excellence of her work.

If any doubts remain, any graduate student in this department will happily give you a personal example of her concern and service.

Mike MacGregor

Computing Science, Faculty

from the

web

Water scarcity risks threaten developers RE: (City taking growth in right direction by Justin Bell, July 24) City Council has taken an important step today in making

Edmonton a green, clean city of Champions. While it is unfortunate that the precautionary principle has been removed as an explicit guiding principle of the document, many salient points in The Way We Green reflect economic and developmental challenges with respect to the limit of our watersheds, airsheds, and land use.

While housing and development interests rail against this document, they are not looking at their own long term interests with respect to the limits of our watershed.

While business can minimize risk in other areas, it is impossible to minimize risk for water scarcity. We look forwards to participating and encouraging participation in the implementation of this framework.

Chelsea Flook

Via Internet

Letters to the editor should be sent to letters@gateway.ualberta.ca or delivered to SUB 3-04. Website comments may occasionally be printed.

The Gateway reserves the right to edit letters for length and clarity, and to refuse publication of any letter it deems racist, sexist, libellous, or otherwise hateful in nature.

The Gateway also reserves the right to publish letters online.

Letters to the editor should be no longer than 350 words, and should include the author’s name, program, year of study, and student identification number to be considered for publication.

letters from the archives Students not paying attention to reality Dear Sir, The issue of “The Gateway” of November the 28th contained several matters of general and present interest and I, therefore, ask your indulgence in taking the liberty of forwarding the comment thereon.

If the articles in question voice the general opinion of the student body and from personal experience I believe they do, (at least the opinions of those that have formed any), it would appear that the students believe that “all’s right with the world”. The statement that there are evils and ignorances and injustice—in short, that there are glaring faults in the present social economic and religious systems, is resented and that any means of disseminating criticisms of the systems should be quashed.

In taking this attitude, the students are merely acting as they were brought up and trained to act, that is to be timid and submissive conformists. The fact that they are able to attend a university indicates that the majority are from homes of well-to-do parents who have secured or established themselves in good paying positions. It is impossible [...] to lack faith in a social system which has

given them, the deserving, a satisfactory standard of living. The majority of students have grown up in an atmosphere of orthodox approval of things “as is.” [...]

Another writer in the same issue of the paper can not reconcile the operation of the officiers training corps with the campaign to secure student signatures to the disarmament petition. When students are accepted as members of the corps, they are not asked if they believe in war and preparation for war; it is tacitly assumed that as orthodox university students, they accept the prewar conventional opinion on the matter. The assumption is apparently correct, since the corps has flourished and continues to do so. The allurements of military ranks of course have an influence — the uniforms are so very nice at dances, the girls simply go crazy over them; it much be very nice indeed in peace times! But here again the students passively conform to the mode of conduct planned for them.

You are indeed a credit to your training, and your masters should be very proud of you.

Yours very truly,

“Quaeacumque Vera”

18 December, 1931

Letters from the Archives is a semi-regular feature where The Gateway runs historical letters that we feel are of particular importance. Or that are hilarious.

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Opinion

monday, august 15, 2011

www.thegatewayonline.ca

The biggest jerks of the summer Opinion

Ryan Bromsgrove

staff

Group Commentary

From Marcus Bachmann calling homosexuals barbarians, to Capcom cancelling the long-awaited Megaman Legends 3 and blaming the fans, this summer has seen some jerky behavior.

But some have reached unprecedented heights of jerkiness over the past months. They’ve been such unforgivable jerks that The Gateway can’t let summer end without calling them out.

Dan McKechnie Texas governor Rick Perry is a jerk, with presidential ambitions. He led a prayer rally on August 6 that wasn’t a presidential campaign kickoff, no sir.

Perry brought in evangelicals leaders from all over the country to pray for the US, because prayer is central to sound governance. Perry is a small-c fiscal and social conservative who frequently calls for tax reform, cutting Texas’ tax revenue by $15.7 billion. Texas requires, by law, that it post a balanced budget. It also had $6.6 billion budget shortfall in 2010. Perry, who campaigned on property tax reduction, requisitioned funds from the federal government.

Now that the federal government is broke, Perry is cutting spending instead of raising taxes to meet that balanced budget requirement. Consequently, the budgets for Medicaid, schools, and social services are being slashed.

Bad news for Texans, but why should anyone else care? Perry has growing popular support, thanks to his socially conservative policies—opposition to gay marriage and abortion rights, and an evident unwillingness to keep the church out of his statesmanship—and he wants to be President.

With his current track record, that doesn’t bode well for the country, or anyone connected to the US—i.e., everyone.

Not to linger on US politics, but I’m going to have to call out the Democrats as the biggest jerks of the summer.

Again and again they’ve bent over backwards to show that they’re utterly spineless. They were elected by people who don’t want Republicans running amok in Washington, and are doing everything they can to allow the GOP to get what it wants. Canadians often criticize the two-party nature of US politics, but it’s becoming disturbingly one-party disturbingly fast.

The apparent debt crisis put this on display in stellar form. The US debt ceiling has been raised in the past so many times you’d think it was a completely arbitrary number that the US didn’t want to exceed. The Democrats wanted tax increases along with spending cuts; the Republicans just wanted spending cuts. Despite controlling the senate and the presidency, the Democrats rolled over and gave the Republicans exactly what they wanted. So, way to go accomplishing nothing good despite holding power, Democrats. You jerks.

Andrew Jeffrey One of the biggest annual summer news stories is the championship round of the NHL season, where the imagination of thousands of fans are captured as they watch with baited breath to see who will walk away with the Stanley Cup. What gave the story legs this year wasn’t the final itself, but instead a story that transcended sports: the Vancouver riot that followed the city’s beloved Canucks failing to win the Cup. One incredibly large and ridiculous temper tantrum was let out by a city as a whole as Vancouverites lit fires, flipped cars, looted and caused an overall dangerous ruckus. Pointing a finger at the biggest jerk of the 2011 summer, then, is an easy decision to make. The root cause of the incident should be unearthed and held responsible for costing the city of Vancouver a great deal of money and endangering many innocent Vancouverites. That root cause, and the biggest collective jerk of

the summer, is the Boston Bruins. The whole team.

The Bruins selfishly put their own desires ahead of the safety of Vancouver, as they had the audacity to defeat an obviously more deserving Canucks team in the Stanley Cup finals. Refusing to spread the wealth, they denied the Canucks their first win of the Cup, and — incredibly — they didn’t even stop to think how that would affect Vancouver residents after the series ended.

If only the Bruins had thought about the damage that’d be done to Vancouver with a Canucks loss in the Stanley Cup final. If only they’d had the decency to consider the embarrassment and shame Vancouver, and Canada, would feel after such a riot. But no, the Bruins never had the decency to consider how their victory would affect anyone but themselves, and for these terrible and selfish actions, the Bruins should be seen as the inconsiderate jerks they are.

Matt Hirji When I was asked to write a piece about the biggest jerks of this summer, I drew a blank.

Sure, there were politicians that screwed up and brought the entire global economy to the verge of another great depression. And there were some journalists who made international headlines for breaching professional ethics.

Jerk is a harsh word, but I can only point the finger at myself: a) I refuse to recycle. In fact I’ve started to heat my home with a tire fire in my basement. While the fumes may be hazardous to my health, it’s worth it because I know it’s even more harmful to mother earth. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, you dirty hippies. b) Just last week I literally stole candy from an infant. Her tears made me laugh. c) Hey Ryan. You know that girl you were desperately in love with a couple weeks ago? The one that doesn’t return your phone calls anymore. Yeah, I may have told her that you have raging STIs. d) I started all of the riots. I sent all the dick pics.

Government policy led to London riots Hayley Dunning

T

o some of us, the UK riots defy explanation. To most, however, the explanation’s simple: it’s gangs, thugs, opportunistic thieves, and low-lifes, out for all they can get and all they can wreck.

Just like in Vancouver, it was a select few individuals and groups that took something innocuous and turned it into an excuse for violence. It has nothing at all to do with the growing gap between rich and poor in the UK, and the growing sense that people are being left behind by their government, as the cost of essentials rises and cuts run deep.

To blame the riots solely on violent thugs is naïve and simplistic. There is some merit in the theory that group mentality spread the first outbreak like a disease, followed by hot spots across the country flaming into a full-blown epidemic. But ordinary people need more than an anarchistic moment to riot. It requires long-term stress and widespread dissatisfaction to create

the political climate in which people across the country to collectively snap. It’s the slowly increasing stress from multiple directions that produced the riot mindset as a response to the tragic, but relatively minor, police shooting incident.

[T]he idea of an American-style medical system where the poor are punished is worrying. It probably worries the rioters too.

The November protests that erupted in London from the unprecedented hike in tuition fees had an obvious cause and effect, but since then, the chipping away of government help has silently continued.

Unemployment has doubled in the UK over the last five years, and the impossible rise in tuition from £0 to £16,000 per year since 1997 has left only the wealthy with the possibility of improving their opportunities, especially as government aid for the needy has been eliminated with the new austerity measures. Health care funding has been slashed by 25 per cent, which is a giant blow to

the always under-pressure National Health Service, the country’s healthcare provider. Often complained about, the NHS nevertheless supplies an essential social service; as a Brit, born and raised, the idea of an American-style medical system where the poor are punished is worrying. It probably worries the rioters too.

There’s a reason Scandinavian countries constantly top happiness ratings and lists of “Best Countries to Live.” If you Google “Finnish riots” you get links to a cell phone game company — not scenes of civil unrest. University education is still free in many European countries, with government stipends given to all. Investing in education is seen as good for the country, rather than something an individual does to better themself. Healthcare is similarly socialized, recognized as something essential to all.

That was how it was in the UK in the past. The NHS was set up to slay one of the “five giants” during postwar reconstruction: want, disease, squalor, ignorance, and idleness.

Now the UK government is leaving the public to fight the giants on their own, and they’re angry at being left out in the cold. With no help in sight, it’s not surprising that the public’s anger is pouring onto the streets.

The Gateway

Opinion

volume cii summer issue 3

Greyhound’s rural route cutting an opportunity for competition Ryan Bromsgrove

C

anada’s one of those countries where if you don’t have a car, you’re not going to find it easy to get around — especially if you are unfortunate enough to find yourself living outside of an urban area.

So when the prominent intercity bus operator, Greyhound, recently chose to cut a large number of its Alberta rural routes, the decision was not particularly welcomed by many of those living in out-of-the-way communities — some of whom depend on the service for access to medicine and their families in the city.

But six weeks since the decision to deregulate the bus system in Alberta, it’s more sensible to see this as the first step toward some real competition for the previous near-monopoly of Greyhound.

Previously, the large intercity bus operators such as Greyhound and Red Arrow had been granted limits on competition by the government so long as they ran unprofitable routes to small towns. This practice has allowed the large companies to dominate the market, establish themselves as the only choices, and resulted in a lot of frustration in consumers who had grown dissatisfied with the service.

“It might not be profitable to run service seven days a week for a start-up, but most people who’ve flown are familiar with booking their vacation around cheaper flights. It shouldn’t be too much of an issue for anyone planning to get from Cold Lake to Edmonton to plan their city visits around infrequent service” Starting October 1, this system will be abolished. Greyhound had been complaining for some time that these routes were becoming unfeasible to run, claiming that servicing rural Alberta was simply costing them too much money.

The bus company complained that they were running 55 seat buses out to small towns and sometimes not even picking up 10 passengers. In 2009, Greyhound Canada demanded $15 million from the government over the Canada-wide issue of servicing small towns.

While you might think the obvious solution would be to send out smaller buses on less frequent schedules, clearly, Greyhound thinks the best thing in the new unregulated Alberta market is to cut the routes it’s not making any money on with its current fleet.

But a lot of people do rely on bus service to get from small towns to cities, and the apparent solution of “just buy a car” doesn’t cut it. Not everyone, regardless of whether they live in a small town or a city, can afford a car, and the service cuts will obviously make things harder for them in the short term. But in the long term, this isn’t exactly insurmountable.

There is demand, however fluctuating, and all it’s going to take is one dude with a minibus to deliver the supply.

It might not be profitable to run service seven days a week for a start-up, but most people who’ve flown are familiar with booking their vacation around cheaper flights. It shouldn’t be too much of an issue for anyone planning to get from Cold Lake to Edmonton to plan their city visits around infrequent service, if that’s what it takes.

I’m far from having blind faith in the free market’s ability to make everything work best for everyone by magic, but this does seem like one of those situations where it has the potential to shine. If it is in fact profitable for anyone to run a small-scale service to the small towns of Alberta, someone will figure out how. If it isn’t profitable, if there’s absolutely no way to make some cash driving people from one town to another, at least we’ll know for sure that it wasn’t just Greyhound being difficult.

Then, and only then, would it be time for a conversation about whether those living in rural areas have a right to transportation that those in cities should help subsidize.

7

ThreeLinesFree

Got something that you need to get off your mind? Either email us at threelinesfree@gateway.ualberta.ca, tweet @threelinesfree, or message us at www.thegatewayonline.ca/threelinesfree To the cute girl in Chem 102/105 stop talking to the guy thats looks old enough to be your dad! Sit by me instead!

Layton is the silver fox of my dreams. Well my boyfriend is close behind, his premature gray hair is fucking hot too...Threesome?!?

I wonder if you guys are accepting these in the summer. If not, Fuck You! Lost my notes! Insert long rant riddled with swears here >>> Holy Hell! Turn the heat down.Not all guys cheat, right??

Why does the university hire some ‘instructors’ that don’t do research, but are terrible at teaching? What is their purpose? don’t judge the people doing presentations in class. more than likely, they were up till 7am wasted out of thier minds and can hardly remember what they are talking about.okay...what I’m talking about.

Dear English teacher I have written a haiku Sincerely, student.

How is this university SO full of such beautiful, intelligent people? I love it!

Thank you, stranger, for your therapeutic smile. :) Stop with the curve-happiness! If there are only 30 people and the average is 85%, it doesn’t make any fucking sense to curve the class!

Hey, blonde Transcend kitty with the fabulously long, sexy neck.. I wanna bite it! Arf! Arf arf arf!! Yooooowwl! ..Blue eyed wolf Okay, I made it out of Minecraft for a couple of weeks. Keep trying to dig up Hawrelak park to search for diamond ore, though.

Stop lights are ahead but our brakes are dull. Let’s slow down and carefully watch the road. I don’t want to crash and be another statistic. -C

Anyone interested in making a u of a longboard club? to the people who think pulling fire alarms when there’s no fire is funny: it’s not. Grow up and stop acting like 7th graders. You disrupted my nap and I will hunt you down and exact my revenge. count on it.

The Raccoons’ didn’t make any darn sense.

Katie, you are the best non-male member a Handsome Men’s Club could ask for.

Freshly picked green onions = best Please stop blocking in BUS Attention fat people: the elevator in the university lrt station is for people who are disabled, not lazy. Maybe you wouldn’t be so fat if you walked up 8 flights of stairs everyday like everyone else treeeee-fitty Don’t you just hate it when you open a door and five little people beat you through it like you opened it for them? Yeah, it makes me livid I wish I wasn’t such a lazy bastard Dear “Tim McIlrath” look alike in secondary Ed: you are beautiful. You were the only reason why I showed up for EDIT 202 last winter semester. Good times. Stay sexy. ; ) I think its funny you can’t manage to hold a roommate. Maybe its you, not them?

But of course not...nothing is ever your fault.

The Gateway reserves the right to edit any submissions, as well as refuse publication of any submission it deems racist, sexist, hateful, libellous, or overtly offensive. The Gateway cannot guarantee that your submission will be used (but we’ll try). Submissions should be 130 characters max (including spaces).

8

Feature

monday, august 15, 2011

www.thegatewayonline.ca

can you make it

LOUDER? Jordan Ching Aaron Yeo

words by photos by

S

tanding next to a vehicle as it vibrates so violently its windshield deforms from the pressure is sort of amazing. It’s also terrifying, since anyone sitting inside without hearing protection would most likely be bleeding from their ears and suffer permanent hearing damage — inside the car, massive subwoofer and speakers are pushing the volume past 150 decibels.

Most people don’t know what dB drag racing is. Whenever I mention the competition to someone, I’m typically met with a blank look on their face.

While it’s an international sport with countless followers, it doesn’t tend to find its way into the mainstream.

In essence, dB drag racing pits car stereo systems against one another to see who can crank up the noise the loudest. Competitions are held all over the world, and are open to anyone who thinks their vehicle has what it takes to compete.

The dB Drag Racing Association (dBDRA), which has been around since the mid-‘90s, is the international association that oversees all of these events and specifies the rules that govern the format of the events, as well as the regulations that make them run smoothly. Participants are classified based on a wide array of criteria that encompasses all aspects of a user’s system, from the number of speakers to the number of batteries.

Competitors then participate in qualifying rounds where they are metered using a special microphone designed for high sound pressure levels (SPL) measured in decibels (dB). Their system must meet a minimum SPL of 120dB if they are in a category with eight or fewer participants in order for

them to move on. For larger brackets, only the top eight will advance.

Finally, elimination rounds occur where competitors go head to head, with the loudest system advancing and eventually being crowned the winner.

The prizes often have no monetary value attached, usually a trophy or a certificate, but it’s more about the comaraderie and the competition than about prizes. Bragging rights are also a nice bonus.

When it comes down to it, these events put on by people like Ray Choy, owner of FX Audio, are what bind this community together. For him, he says it was a logical choice to start organizing events.

“I was a competitor before and […]

I own a car audio shop, so it goes hand in hand. You have shows, you get people to come out, and you generate hype around your business.

Then I became a dB drag racing certified judge, started helping hosting shows for other stores, and then I started travelling worldwide helping out with shows.”

People will come in from as far away as British Columbia and Saskatchewan to compete in local events, with the most recent one being held August 13 in Spruce Grove.

With a total of 31 vehicles present

in a wide variety of classes, the qualifying rounds were hectic. Participants typically take some time to tweak and check over the components of their system, but plenty of them just hang around chatting with the other participants and checking over their one-of-a-kind sound rigs.

It makes for a much lighter atmosphere than one would expect at an event which is, after all, a competition. But according to Matt Tracey, one of the competitors, it’s the norm in this sport.

“Everybody gets along with everybody. People help out people [and] if you need to borrow stuff, people let you borrow stuff.” He pointed out another competitor behind him who was doing his run while three guys braced the car’s trunk lid. “You got people helping this guy out, pushing on his trunk to help him get a higher score. They might not even know each other.”

He did lament the fact that compared

to Eastern Canada, there was a general lack of events in the area, saying that “we need to get more of this going in Edmonton.”

When it comes to the large national and international events, the competition usually gets more intense. Choy has been all over the world for world finals and has seen competitors ship their vehicles overseas in order to compete. Nowadays, though, there are much easier and less costly ways to get people together for these events.

“When we compete internationally or even nationally, we can do it via web. Previously, the only way to compete with someone else was to be at the same event. Now with […] high data rate transfers, we can have a video conference with somebody in Europe and have a head-to-head competition with them.”

Regardless of the event size, however, it seems that most everyone has memorable moments from one event or another. Breaking 150dB,

for example, is considered a major achievement, and Allan Kaufman, a competitor from Westlock, remembers the day he accomplished that feat quite clearly. “[Choy] was the head judge that day, and I was doing 148s and 149s but I couldn’t quite break that 150. He told me to try a few things and […] sure enough I started blowing 153s like nothing.”

Of course, there are less illustrious moments, too, often entailing damage to the vehicle in the name of a better score. At one event, he tried having people lay on his roof, which resulted in it caving in, while at another, his buddy tried to stop his windshield from buckling by “standing on the hood and putting his ass on the windshield, [which] cracked it.”

But in a competition to see who can create noises loud enough to blow out ear drums and rattle windshields, a little bit of a collateral damage is to be expected.

A&E

entertainment@gateway.ualberta.ca

monday, august 15, 2011

social

intercourse

Dedfest 2011 Presented by Metro Cinema Thursday, August 25 – Sunday, August 28 Garneau Theatre (8712–109 Street) $20 and up at yeglive.ca Nothing seems to bring the people of Edmonton together like a festival, though that warm, fuzzy feeling of togetherness doesn’t exactly apply to this one.

For the third year in a row, Dedfest is back to bring us the latest in independent horror, sci-fi, and alternative cinema, featuring 14 films over the course of a weekend. The festival, which brought gems like The Human Centipede to the screen last year, is set to entertain yet again with greats like Trollhunter and Super, the latter starring The Office’s Rainn Wilson and Edmonton’s own Nathan Fillion. So grab some fellow movie junkies and come prepared to experience a weekend of blood, gore, and monsters — and you’ve been warned: warm and fuzzy feelings are not included.

Mothership Down Written by Marty Chan Directed by Wayne Paquette Starring Marty Chan Stanley Milner Library Theatre (7 Sir Winston Churchill Square) Runs until Sunday, August 21 $10 at the Fringe Theatre box office Who says that aliens and politics don’t mix?

Edmonton playwright Marty Chan’s contribution to this year’s International Fringe Theatre Festival brings us a political satire that melds those very two ideas together. Inspired by an offhand comment made by Tory leadership candidate Ted Morton about a “PC mothership,” the play features an alien invasion that has taken over our government in pursuit of just one little thing — our vote. Not only do they want to win ballots, but they also want our participation in the form of an actual mini-election and debate that takes place during the show. Sitting in the audience, you may just find yourself deciding the very outcome of the play. If Chan’s past productions are anything to go off, Mothership Down will definitely be a worthwhile addition to anyone’s Fringe experience this year.

The potential of musical messages Kae Sun crafts musical philosophy with creativity, conviction, and social consciousness

musicpreview Kae Sun Open Sky Music Festival Saturday, August 27 and Sunday, August 28 Hawrelak Park (9930 Groat Road) Festival passes $40–60 at yeglive.ca and Blackbyrd

Hoots, Cackles, and Wails and Hunting Blind

Madeline Smith

Created by Robin Arseneault and Paul Jackson Opens Saturday, August 20 Art Gallery of Alberta (2 Sir Winston Churchill Square) Gallery admission $8.50 for students

Music and politics have a long, storied relationship together. For Ghana-born, Toronto based singer-songwriter Kae Sun, the two are impossible to separate: the songs he sings are inextricably linked to the experiences of his past and the observations of his present. But as he describes it, his main goal is to keep things “as human as possible,” with an emphasis on letting listeners feel and understand the music in their own way.

“Music is sort of like an extension of life,” Sun says. “If you want to sing about something, it makes more sense to live a life that makes it natural for you to express things. […] So if there’s something that I had written about, it’s because I actually cared about it in some way.

“I mean, can anyone afford not to care?” he continues. “The way I see it, we can’t — our generation can’t afford not to care. It’s ridiculous how much is wrong; things in the world seem to be getting a little worse. It’s like the balance is way off on how people ought to be treating each other, the way I see it. I care about that.”

Sun’s songs are full of references to the

At the AGA, things are not always what they seem.

You may think you’re coming to see Hoots, Cackles and Wails, the latest new exhibit featuring work by Alberta artists Robin Arseneault and Paul Jackson, but the true object of your visit has yet to be uncovered. While the exhibit is certainly a worthwhile stop, make sure to take a peek at the AGA’s beautiful outdoor terrace on the third floor, where you’ll find the real attraction: Hunting Blind. Inspired by the accompanying exhibit, Hunting Blind is a sculpture born from a joint commission by the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and the AGA after Arseneault and Jackson won a 2010 province-wide competition. The resulting piece will be on display for the next five years, but don’t let yourself be the last to see it.

Alana Willerton

The Human Centipede’s number one fan

Arts & Entertainment Editor

injustices he observes in the world, but in his view, his particular blend of music and activism is just a natural extension of the way he needs to express himself. While he feels compelled to make music, it’s similarly impossible for him not to speak out about his convictions.

“Some people, especially people who are really famous, they go, ‘This is my cause.’ What do you mean, this is your cause? Are you alive or dead?” Sun laughs.

“Our generation can’t afford not to care. It’s ridiculous how much is wrong; things in the world seem to be getting a little worse. It’s like the balance is way off on how people out to be treating each other, the way I see it. I care about that.”

Kae Sun

“A five-year-old can probably tell you how unfair things are. If people insist on spending more money on building weapons and only care about feeding people when the situation is extremely dire, and there’s no will to do anything that really fosters life or regenerates resources, yet we put all our money into making bombs, does that really make sense? Anyone that’s presented that issue would, I hope, say it’s not fair,” he says emphatically. “It’s not a cause; it’s not something that I choose.”

Sun’s 2009 album Lion on a Leash is a clear

reflection of his commitment to exploring both his creative instincts and his thoughts about issues affecting our world. Sun features Zimbabwe performance artist and poet Outspoken on a song called “Freedom Train,” a spoken word piece about Zimbabwe’s struggle with political repression and the desire to speak out about it.

“It’s more important for me to talk about people like [Outspoken], because he actually he lives in Zimbabwe. I live [in Toronto], and he lives in Zimbabwe — he lives under those conditions that he’s speaking about in his poem. I feel like, who can say it better than someone like him, who lives through that every day and has an opinion about it. […] I can’t write any song that would be as expressive as he was in his poem,” Sun explains. “If only people like that had more of a platform. Then we could all do our best to help out, you know?”

While Sun has a clear idea of the message behind his music, he has a deep respect for the art form that reaches beyond his underlying commitment to activism. Creativity, for Sun, is part of instinct — not a vehicle that fulfills a certain agenda.

“I don’t think anyone should use music to do anything,” he says. “It’s not political, it’s not a tool — it’s bigger than that. I believe in God and I think music comes from God, and music can change a person’s life. You can’t really control music, just like I don’t think a person can control God or control nature, so I’m not really trying to use it.

“Artistically, instinctively, there are certain things people pick up on, and if I don’t express those things, I don’t know what will happen to me.”

10

Arts & Entertainment

monday, august 15, 2011

www.thegatewayonline.ca

Roaming the open prairie with Maria in the Shower musicpreview Maria in the Shower

With Low Flying Planes and Swear by the Moon The Artery (9535 Jasper Avenue) Thursday, August 18 at 8 p.m. $8 at yeglive.ca and theartery.ca

Dustin Blumhagen

Arts & Entertainment Staff

The occasional hint of gypsy folk woven into the sound of Maria in the Shower is anything but spurious. The travelling troubadours spend countless hours on the road hitting everything from jazz festivals to house parties. Tracking down the nomadic band members for an interview is a difficult task. When the group is finally reached, they’re unsurprisingly on the move, en route to Medicine Hat after making a pit stop at an accordion store. As lead vocalist Martin Reisle speaks, his voice carries over the hum of the highway in the background.

“So far [the tour has been] good.

We haven’t torn each others’ limbs off or anything,” he says, the other band members laughing in the background. “We’re actually getting along

pretty well, I’d say. We have been on the road for over two months now — I reckon that’s an accomplishment. […] We’re all in a van with all of our gear, so there are only four seats available. The rest is taken up by stand-up basses, accordions, guitars, and camping gear for some festivals.”

The miles logged on the highways of Western Canada, combined with their temporary tour-van home, make the band’s gypsy image all the more appropriate. But even with their devotion to life on the road, the members of the cabaret caravan have their limits. While the Vancouver band is a regular presence back home on the west coast, they have yet to bring their live show to the eastern side of Canada.

“We refuse to go past Winnipeg until someone flies us out,” Reisle says boldly. “Not so much for [fear of] dropped bookings as the drive from Winnipeg to Toronto — it’s almost as great of a distance as driving from B.C. to Winnipeg, only there’s very little in between there. […] There are lots of people playing there, but it’s not so much that they’re great places as they’re the only places to play. It oversaturates those places a bit — it’s a big gap to cross. That’s still half of Canada that we have to get

albumreview extra happy ghost!!!

Modern Horses Saved By Radio

Ryan Bromsgrove Opinion Editor

If you like hearing the same few words over and over, then Matthew Swann of extra happy ghost!!! won’t disappoint.

Listening to Modern Horses, the band’s first album, you sometimes wonder if you’ve heard him repeat more lines than deliver new ones — all of them sung in a tone somewhere between rainy-

Sunday-afternoon-moping-around and half-heartedly trying-to-wake-up-froma-dream. By the time you get to the sixth repetition of “I want to get off,” in “j23439”, you’ll be wishing he would just do it already so he’ll leave you alone for a while.

Every song on the album suffers

to someday.”

While they’re daunted by the idea of taking their show beyond the familiar territory of the prairies, that doesn’t mean Maria in the Shower are afraid of playing unconventional settings. The last time they made a stop in Alberta was for a show at North Country Fair, a notoriously damp and muddy weekend of music.

“North Country Fair is really a magical place and experience,” Reisle continues. “I think it was fun to engage with that sort of energy which dictates a different type of show than you would get at a bar that we have no relationship to.”

With a live presence that brings high energy performance art out of a veritable musical melting pot, chances are good that Maria in the Shower’s gypsy sounds have just as much room to move as the travelling band itself.

“We just play music that is fun and we love to play,” Reisle concludes. “If that takes a turn towards gypsy jazz, bluegrass, reggae, or whatever — that’s cool, and we try to do those things as much justice as our own experience allows. […] There’s maybe an art of selling your genre or making up your own genre.

“You just have to say something that grabs people’s imaginations.” from excessive lyrical repetition, but the music itself isn’t bad. Slow, subdued, and smooth, it sounds exactly like what you’d expect a band of depressed ghosts to come up with. Nothing on this CD is happy — let alone “extra” happy — but it does convey some convincingly strong emotion.

The final track, the eponymous “Modern Horses,” is about nine horses that jumped off a Calgary bridge in 2005, and it manages to sound exactly like the depressed love child of sadness, hopelessness, and regret — an accomplishment that doesn’t completely redeem the overall repetitiveness of the record, but still makes it an intriguing listen.

The Gateway

Arts & Entertainment

volume cii summer issue 3

11

A roller coaster of comedic characters in Theme Park theatrepreview Theme Park

Written by David Jacobson Directed by Mark Kenward Starring David Jacobson Runs until August 19 at the Edmonton International Fringe Festival Acacia Masonic Hall (10433–83 Avenue) $10 at the Fringe box office, $7 for students

Alex Migdal Staff Reporter

How do you describe a play with a cast of 11 characters performed by a single actor? While it might throw some for a loop, writer and performer David Jacobson has no problem making sense of his eclectic Fringe debut, Theme Park.

“It’s a perverse, kooky, pitch-dark comedy, but with a twisty film noir-ish plot that all ties together,” he explains.

Don’t worry, Jacobson’s mind hasn’t derailed yet — unlike the amusement park ride in his show, which earns the unfortunate title of worst ride accident ever. That’s where the “twisty film noir-ish” element kicks in. A veteran amusement park detective and his protégé set off to SuperDuper Mega-Marine Coaster World to uncover the truth behind the ride’s demise, encountering a slew of bizarre characters and shady mysteries along the way.

It’s no surprise that Jacobson’s play focuses on outlandish stories and scandals, as he spent years encountering both in his prior life as a reporter.

His journalistic career also exposed him to a strange sort of truth that would ultimately form the basis of Theme Park.

“When I was a reporter covering horrible things, almost within minutes there’d be jokes.

It’s like your psychological immune system kicks in to try and distance those things,” he explains. “I think that’s where the humour in my

show comes from.”

“It’s about horrible stuff […] and yet, at some level, it gets really funny because you can only take so much horrible stuff,” he continues. “I think at a philosophical level, that’s downright true. Boy, life is really just unfair and bad shit happens. How on earth can you respond to it? If you couldn’t laugh, you’d go nuts.”

Thankfully, the show’s 11 characters — all played by Jacobson — provide enough laughter to overshadow the story’s grim nature. They’re as kooky as they come: everything from the head of a public relations firm holding hostages in Rapunzel’s Tower to a marine biologist with an affinity for killer whales.

“Boy, life is really just unfair and bad shit happens. How on earth can you respond to it?

If you couldn’t laugh, you’d go nuts.”

David Jacobson Playwright and Actor, Theme Park

Jacobson spent years crafting the show’s characters through different comedy gigs in San Francisco, allowing him to develop back stories for each one. Although some only make brief appearances in Theme Park, Jacobson describes them all as his “children” and has difficulty choosing his favourite.

“I think one of the fascinating things about solo theatre — what makes solo theatre interesting and unique as an art form — is watching one human being morph into all these different characters,” he says. “I think that at a philosophical, sort of profound level, it shows that we all have these different characters inside of us.”

Audience members can expect to see Jacobson stretching the boundaries of solo theatre,

literally “leaping from character to character to character.”

“The moment I love is when you switch between characters and there’s just something cool about it,” Jacobson explains. “Sometimes it’s confusing when you switch to the new character, because you were so physically and mentally in the other character that it takes a moment to get out of their body and into the other character’s body.”

Although there’s little doubt that the twists and turns in Theme Park will be bewildering, Jacobson stresses that, when it comes down to it, his show is a “full play” with a clear message.

“I think what my show is about is really just how frickin’ crazy the world is and how we all try to make sense of it,” he says. “I think the thing I want [the audience] to say is, ‘Wow, there were a lot of people in that show that were strange, but they could possibly exist.’ ”

Dan McKechnie

HOMETOWN HEROINE k.d. lang returns to Edmonton to close the 32nd annual Folk Music Festival, delivering a performance to thousands of fans at the Gallagher Park main stage.

Sports

sports@gateway.ualberta.ca

monday, august 15, 2011

Puck Bears search for a golden prospect Matt Hirji

Sports Editor

The Golden Bears hockey team are on the hunt for a diamond in the rough.

In the first week of September, the Green and Gold will give the opportunity for students on campus to lace up their ice-skates and take a shot at earning a spot on one of the U of A’s most prestigious varsity teams, hosting open tryouts to make the team. For Stan Marple, newly appointed as the Bears interim bench boss, the chance to come across an athlete who’s gone under the radar is too tempting to let pass.

“You never know who you’re going to find or who might show up. Unless you give people the opportunity, you never know if there is a gem out there.”

Stan Marple Head Coach, Bears Hockey

“I just think it’s important that we give every student who has played at a fairly high level — Midget AAA or above — the opportunity to try out if they so wish. That was the premise behind it,” Marple said. “You never know who you’re going to find or who might show up. Unless you give people the opportunity you never know if there is a gem out there. So, I’ve got to do my due diligence.”

And while finding a walk-on athlete who has the abilities to compete on the varsity ice is a long shot, it’s not unprecedented either. There are countless instances when non-recruited athletes go on to make a splash at the CIS level. And for Marple, a former Puck Bear himself, one story in particular hits close to his heart.

“I played with Cory Cross here a long time ago.

He wasn’t recruited, but was just going to school here and came to try out on the team. Six hundred and fifty NHL games later ...” Marple said, making reference to Cross’s fairy tale rise from walk-on Bear to NHL star. “Those stories don’t happen very often, so I’m not banking on anything. But unless you provide the opportunity, you never find it.”

And the Bears have every reason to keep their ear to the ground. For the second year in a row, the team will be undersized and less experienced than most of their opponents in the ultra-competitive Canada West division.

A heavy turnover of the triumphant old guard — including defensive wizard Kyle Fecho — has left a gap in the Green and Gold roster that needs to be filled with players that can make an immediate impact on the ice. And while Marple

Peter Holmes

is bringing in several high-profile recruits from the WHL ranks, he said that there is always room for an walk-on that shows potential to contribute positively to the squad.

“I just think we need to get a little bit bigger and a little bit tougher to play against. Losing our

top three scorers from last year, we needed to replace some key guys. I think we’ve done that with our new recruits. The guys we’ve brought in are really going to increase our chances to be successful,” Marple said. “And maybe through these open tryouts we might find one more.”

Open tryouts begin in the first week of September, while the Bears training camp begins a week later. After a month of preparation, the Bears play host to the Regina Cougars for their first regular season game of the year on October 7.

Plantinga leaves Volleyball Bears for a career on Canada’s beach team volleyballprofile Mike Plantinga Bears Volleyball

Rachel Singer Sports Staff

Most volleyball players feel at home under the neon lights of a gym, with their feet firmly planted on the hardcourt. But Mike Plantinga doesn’t mind sinking his feet into the sand.

Plantinga, who played for the Golden Bear’s volleyball team last season, is one of four Canadian beach volleyball athletes competing at this year’s Summer Universiade in Shenzhen, China. And while being selected to represent

his country at the games is an achievement in itself, Plantinga is hoping that his experiences at the event will be the launching pad for an appearance at the 2016 Olympic games.

“I’m very excited,” Plantinga said. “I’ve been given the opportunity to train full-time, yearround in beach volleyball with the national team. My goal is to go to the 2016 Olympics.

That’s my immediate goal.”

Plantinga’s recruitment to the Canadian national beach volleyball team started in January when he received an email from the coach of the national team asking if he was interested in playing beach volleyball, partnering with François-Guy Allaire from Quebec.

Plantinga could not refuse the offer and has been in Toronto since the start of June training with the national team in preparation for the Summer Universiade.

But the decision to pursue a career on the

beach means that Plantinga won’t be able to continue his varsity career with the Green and Gold. He has been offered the opportunity to compete on the beach with the blessing of Bears head coach Terry Danyluk.

“I talked to [Danyluk] and he thinks it’s a great idea for me to do it. So I am going to be doing that, moving out to Toronto to be training full-time with the national team,” Plantinga said.

Plantinga first came to the U of A last year with the hopes of continuing to develop his volleyball skills, having played previously at Douglas College, a small post secondary in British Columbia.

Coming to play volleyball at the university was a major change for the up-and-coming athlete, but he said he was able to develop some valuable skills over the course of the year that will carry over into his beach career.

“At the U of A I struggled a little bit, but I

found a rhythm and started playing a lot better, but it was a little too late so I didn’t get to see much floor time there,” Plantinga said.

“The stuff I learned at the U of A from playing and the coaching has drastically improved my beach volleyball game because I was playing with the best players in all of Canada. My passing, my setting, my court vision got a lot better.”

Danyluk helped and watched Plantinga grow and develop his skills as an indoor player and said that Plantinga made great strides throughout the year, and will do well pursuing a career in beach volleyball.

“He was a good addition to our team last year and it’s too bad that he won’t be back [...] His heart was being outside and I wish him all the best. If you love something as much as he loves beach volleyball I am sure that he is going to do well,” Danyluk said.

The Gateway

Sports

volume cii summer issue 3

13

When athletes triumph over the summer heat As September draws closer and we prepare for the return of winter sports, we reflect on summer’s greatest triumphs Sports staff

Group Commentary

I scored a run in my softball league last week and it was quite possibly the pinnacle of my athletic life. Not impressed? Neither was The Gateway’s sports staff. Here’s their list what they call the more impressive moments to have ever happened in summer sports… I’m still not convinced — my infield hit was pretty remarkable.

At least my mom said it was. And she’s the most loveliest person I know.

Matt Hirji Donavan Bailey at the Summer Olympics Storming down the straightaway on a humid night in August at Atlanta’s Olympic Stadium during the 1996 Olympics, Donavan Bailey made history. In a blaze of camera flashes, the Jamaican born, Canadian transplant leaped out of the blocks and ran faster than anybody ever has. Reaching a top speed of over 43 kilometers per hour, Bailey claimed the title of world’s fastest man.

All it took was 9.84 seconds for Donavan Bailey to find his way into the collective imagination of all Canadian sports fans. The screams of excitement let out by Bailey after passing the finish line were echoed by all those Canadians watching the event — including my nine-year old self, who from that day on wanted to run faster than the wind to claim Olympic glory one day.

Justin Bell

Aaron Yeo

Heckling an Edmonton Capital

The Canucks win the 2011 Stanley Cup

I have a horrible confession to make — I don’t like summer sports. It’s not that I don’t like temperate sports (I love soccer, and football is fun), but when the summer hits, I’d rather be out throwing a frisbee rather than sitting inside watching sports.

But my favourite summer sports memory happened right here in Edmonton. Last year, in an attempt to get drunk for cheap and watch some fireworks, a few friends and I headed over to watch the Capitals play what some would call baseball.

After two hours and three innings, we started to get bored and the initial joy of watching baseball while drinking wore off. With another two hours until fireworks kicked off, we had to find something to do in order to pass the time during the nauseatingly slow game of “baseball.”

So we heckled. The brunt of our aggression was focused on Willmington, Delaware native Cliff Brumbaugh. Or, as we referred to him, BRUUUUUUUMBAUGH! Hours of boring, unaffiliated, bush league baseball are only made tolerable by reminding the players that they are going nowhere in life and their best days are behind them.

We even discovered that the iPhone makes the perfect companion to the art of heckling. How else would we know that Cliff Brumbaugh had come from Delaware and that he once played ball in Japan?

Unfortunately, the fireworks were not worth the long wait and we ended up leaving the game sober. But halfway through the seventh inning, after hours of sustained berating, Brumbaugh finally looked up and smiled.

It made my summer.

The Vancouver Canucks had come a long, long way, and everything was in place for a chance at hoisting Lord Stanley’s cup this summer.

In the team’s 40th anniversary as a franchise, the twin prodigies Daniel and Henrik Sedin had become leading stars in the league after being drafted together in 1999 in one of the most stunning drafts in sports history. The two Art Ross trophies, Hart Memorial, and Ted Lindsay awards from the pair in the last two years showed just how far they had come. It had been 18 years since the cup was last in Canada, and 17 since the Canucks’ last finals appearance.

Adding to the momentum, Vancouver had held the Winter Olympics a year before; when Calgary and Montreal held their Olympic games, they won the cup the following year.

It was a record that made NHL fan assume that it was the Canucks destiny to lay their paws on the cup.

And when the Canucks clinched the Presidents’ Trophy title, they showed that they were ready to dominate the postseason. They weren’t going to take no for an answer. The Stanley Cup was coming back to British Columbia.

It was time to reclaim what belonged to Vancouver. They beat out the feared rival of the past three years, the Chicago Blackhawks, in a nail-biting seven games. After downing the Predators in six, Vancouver took on the San Jose Sharks in five game, claiming Western Conference victory. So when it came down to a Stanley Cup final game seven at home, it’s only natural that they be drinking champagne on the streets of Vancouver with all the respectful, non-rioting fans of the Green and Blue.

They won the cup...right?

Right?

14

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