The Georgia Straight - Trailblazers - June 4, 2020

FREE | JUNE 4 – 11 / 2020

Volume 54 | Number 2732

ESPORTS HEADSETS

Essential tools for gamers

JOSIE HO

Filmmaker pushes boundaries

Trailblazers Meet some local innovators whose ideas are transforming our city and the country

ISOLATION DIARIES

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DOXA LINEUP

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HANGOVER CURES

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PEYOTE

ESPORTS

Headsets to boost your ESports game

CONTENTS

June 4-11 / 2020

6

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by Mike Usinger and John Lucas

here’s an old saying that goes something like “A poor workman blames his tools.”

Going cheap has definite advantages for those with an endless list of reasons for why they consistently underachieve in life: “It’s not my fault I was dead and buried out in the PUBG parking lot long before I could get on the plane. It was my headset’s.”

Invest in one of the following essential gaming tools and then head into battle knowing that you’ve got the upper hand, thanks to superior gear.

Which is to say that you’ll have to think up a whole new set of excuses.

FOR THOSE ON A BUDGET

AmazonBasics Premium Gaming Headset Is this the most inexpensive headset on the market? No; you can find ones in the $30 range if you’re cheap enough to look that hard. Even those of us with limited funds want something that looks good and works well, though, and this one from Amazon’s house brand fits the bill.

With memory-foam earcups, a padded headband, an omni-directional microphone, and even a desktop mixer, you could probably fool your friends into thinking you paid twice the price. Unless your friends have access to the Internet, in which case the jig is up. ($113.24 at Amazon)

Turtle Beach Recon 70 Gaming Headset We know what you’re thinking: who in the heck would put the word turtle in a headset’s name when only the lightning-quick survive in Call of Duty, Overwatch, and VALORANT? But stop and think about this for a second: have you ever seen the way sea turtles move when they hatch in the sand and have 100 yards to cross to the ocean to avoid becoming bird food? Seriously, we’re talking Usain Bolt after six double lattes. The Turtle Beach Recon 70 is compatible with Dolby Atmos, which accents higher frequencies, alerting you to those for whom stealth is a weapon. Adjustable

By Martin Dunphy, Gail Johnson, John Lucas, Carlito Pablo, Charlie Smith, and Janet Smith Cover illustration by Hanna Lee Joshi

2

By John Lucas and Mike Usinger

4

CANNABIS

When it comes to weed and the workplace, not everyone is smoking from the same bong.

By Greg Williams

The great thing about gaming headsets is that there are options that are designed for every player’s budget. Photo by Nenad Cavoski/iStock/Getty Images Plus

earcups keep you comfortable, while the mike flips up when you need to mute yourself while opening a new bag of Lay’s mid-battle. (US$94.99 at Amazon) FOR THOSE WHO WANT TO FEEL IT ALL

EVERYTHING

50% OFF

WHOLESALE

ORDERS

5

REAL ESTATE

The lack of legislation allowing pets in apartments is contributing to a homeless crisis for felines.

tures include proprietary algorithms and head-tracking sensors, which By Carlito Pablo make it easier to flush out enemies, but, unfortunately, do little to boost 10 LIQUOR one’s chances of scoring a two-week The Internet made it easy for people to look up guest stay at the 100 Thieves Cash information on drinks, spurring a tequila revival.

App Compound. ($279.99 at Amazon) By Mike Usinger

Razer Nari Ultimate Razer boasts that you will be able to FOR THE INDEPENDENTLY “feel every battle” with its Nari Ul- WEALTHY timate. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing depends on just how immersive an experience you’re looking for. The wireless headset is equipped with intelligent haptic technology developed by Lofelt, which transforms the frequencies of game audio into vibrations. The haptic effects vary in intensity and flow from left to right (or vice-versa) to match what’s happening on-screen.

For some, that’s probably a recipe for a heart attack after one too many Red Bulls, but for others, it no doubt sounds—and feels—like gaming Bose A20 Aviation Headset with heaven. ($269.99 at Amazon) Bluetooth Dual-Plug Cable Yes, you read that correctly: this JBL Quantum 800 We all want what the cool kids are is technically an aviation headset wearing, right? And when it comes intended for use by pilots. Why to ESports, few kids are cooler than would you buy it for gaming, you those who spend their days hang- ask? The most likely reason is so ing out at the 100 Thieves Cash App you can go to ESports forums and Compound in Los Angeles. A few tell anyone who might be interweeks back, electronics giant JBL an- ested how much you paid for them. nounced a deal with 100 Thieves to Plus, they’ll make you look cool. be the organization’s official gaming- Like a pilot, y’know? Well, that headset partner. That means that and the fact that the sheer qualmembers of the gaming and lifestyle ity of these noise-cancelling headconglomerate will wear JBL when phones is above and beyond that competing, training, and doing laps of most gaming-specific headsets. in the Cash App Compound swim- You get what you pay for, right? ming pool. The JBL Quantum 800 You might need to invest in an gives you the chance to feel like ES- adapter in order to use the A20s ports royalty with QuantumSUR- with your PC or gaming console of ROUND™ sound technology and a choice—but if you can afford these, 14-hour battery life. Additional fea- you can certainly splash out on an adapter. ($1,395.99 at Amazon)

40% OFF

MON-FRI 9AM-5PM WEEKENDS BY APPOINTMENT ONLY

ESPORTS

If you want to be a competitive gamer, you’re going to need the best gear, including top-notch headsets.

I N V E N T O R Y C L E A R A N C E S A L E

JUNE 5-12, 2020

COVER

Meet some trailblazers who are leaving a lasting mark with their determination and original ideas.

HyperX Cloud Orbit S The name HyperX brings to mind an ADHD-afflicted nine-year-old who’s palmed his meds and shotgunned three bags of Sour Patch Kids, including the sugar at the bottom.

Clouds, meanwhile, were made for days spent lying on your back in the middle of sun-kissed fields and staring at the sky, gently debating whether the cumulus mass overhead looks more like a rabbit or a sonic hedgehog. If you think about it, rationally speaking, there’s no way that the two go together. But locked and loaded with Audeze 100mm planar magnetic drivers, the HyperX Cloud Orbit S headset features Waves Nx 3D technology, delivering superior digital surround sound. Whether you’re playing on PC, Xbox One, PS4, or mobile, that sound is key. Think about how having the hearing of a rabbit is going to elevate your game.

And, no, we’re not talking cumulus rabbits. ($370.07 at Amazon) g

e Online TOP 5 e Start Here Here’s what people are 10 BEER reading this week on 4 CONFESSIONS Straight.com.

5 FINANCE 9 HEALTH 9 ISOLATION DIARIES 11 MOVIES 4 PSYCHEDELICS 11 SAVAGE LOVE SFU expects that 8 SNEAKERHEADS remote learning will

DOXA presents an ode to Peter Wintonick.

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M ACLEODAN DSONS.COM 2 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JUNE 4 – 11 / 2020

MORE eSPORTS ONLINE AT ECENTRALSPORTS.COM

continue until spring.

George Floyd solidarity protest held in Vancouver.

Some Airbnb units are being converted into long-term rentals.

East Van pays respects to beloved panhandler Mike Lorimer.

Seven sex toys that deserve a spot near your bedside.

GeorgiaStraight @GeorgiaStraight @GeorgiaStraight

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SENIOR EDITOR Martin Dunphy ASSOCIATE EDITORS Gail Johnson (Health/Food/Wine) John Lucas (Cannabis) STAFF WRITERS Carlito Pablo (Real Estate) Craig Takeuchi SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT Jeff Li

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Close to shopping. www.pw-shannonmews.com | suites@pw-shannonmews.com JUNE 4 – 11 / 2020 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 3

CANNABIS

Bosses walk a drug-policy tightrope

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by Greg Williams

hen cannabis was legalized in Canada on October 17, 2018, medicinal and recreational users applauded the very progressive move. (Canada was the second country, after Uruguay, to legalize marijuana for recreational consumption.) To celebrate the decision, many individuals could now comfortably sit back and simply decide which strain to roll up.

Meanwhile, professional organizations found themselves rolling up their sleeves to work on creating or updating existing drug and alcohol policies. Unfortunately, however, many have yet to seriously consider them.

Across all sectors, senior leadership and human-resources departments found themselves reflecting upon the following questions: “Do we now need to make any changes to our drug and alcohol policies?”

“How prescriptive do we need to be with our policies?”

“Do we need a policy at all?”

With cannabis legalization, human-resources departments walk a familiar tightrope, one that balances a worker’s rights and needs with an employer’s responsibility to provide a safe workplace. For example, does the employee operate heavy machinery or pilot jets? If so, it is reasonable to suggest that trying to do either of these jobs within minutes of smoking a joint would be unwise, unsafe, and a huge liability.

What if they had consumed cannabis-laden edibles 24 or even 48 hours earlier? How many edibles? Is there a collective agreement in place for the employee in this situation? Is the worker actually impaired? How can I tell? Clearly, this situation is both fraught and complicated.

On the subject of flying, Manitoba-based airline Calm Air wasted little time in announcing, on October 24, 2018, that it would prohibit all “safety-sensitive positions” from using cannabis within 45 days of flying. At the time, they said this was consistent with practices embraced by WestJet and Air Canada, which preferred not to take any chances with pilots and related positions. Sound advice, indeed.

Let us consider a typical office, where the

Since the legalization of cannabis, many Canadian employers have had to rethink how they balance workers’ rights and responsibilities. Photo by the Cannabiz Agency/iStock/Getty Images Plus

most perilous task staff would normally do is discuss Lannister v. Stark around the watercooler. Even though the responsibilities here are very different from those of a pilot, there are still several considerations, including effects on work performance, accommodation of addiction and medical-use cases, how to handle discipline, and more. Perhaps they need a policy after all.

Ottawa amended impaired-driving laws to coincide with legalization; that way, employers who required staff to drive company vehicles had something to work with. Overall, though, since it has been left largely up to organizations to decide for themselves how to proceed, the approaches vary wildly: an engineering-consultation firm with no history of issues continues to have no official drug and alcohol policy at all while a national telecommunications provider now has a 10-page policy, including an appendix of blood- and urine-concentration limits.

As always, management preferences may play a significant role, and the social stigma around cannabis can still influence organizations and their policies, based on their perception of the issue. An ultraconservative organization, for example, may be afraid to even mention drugs

The Georgia Straight Confessions, an outlet for submitting revelations about your private lives—or for the voyeurs among us who want to read what other people have disclosed.

or alcohol to their employees for fear of leading them astray, whereas the right policy for another company might be to integrate cannabis derivatives into their wellness program and switch to hemp paper for office stationery.

Postsecondary education is often considered a bastion of progressive thinking. What steps are academic institutions embracing? The Southern Alberta Institute of Technology has contented itself with a simple, “Thou shalt not use cannabis on campus,” consistent with municipal bylaws. Yet SAIT has no alcohol policy, despite having a pub on campus. An HR director I spoke with there sensibly theorized that “if an organization has determined they do not currently need an alcohol policy, then there is no need for a specific cannabis policy, either.”

Simon Fraser University states on its website that it permits the smoking of cannabis at “two temporary designated cannabis-specific outdoor smoking areas, separate from those in use for smoking tobacco”. But the link to the two locations is dead. Students are not allowed to be high in class, according to the website.

The British Columbia Institute of Technology has posted a five-page student and employee policy for cannabis alone. Similarly, the

University of British Columbia has myriad pages of policy available on its public site, including a useful section detailing their “Four As” approach: “Assess, Ask, Act, After” for helping supervisors navigate “substance use” on campus or during school-sponsored events.

Similarly, from a student-resource perspective, a “health” tab provides information and support for alcohol, cannabis, illegal drugs, and more.

Speaking of health resources, drug and alcohol policies and disability management often overlap. If an employee has disclosed a substance addiction, an internal health-services department and, possibly, labour relations—as well as a third party like Blue Cross or Sun Life—are now involved.

Measuring or determining impairment is no longer just for police road checks, and WorkSafeBC was ready by July 2018 to help employers determine how to proceed if an employee is suspected of being impaired on the job. It launched an online resource with a focus that was “not so much about enforcement or testing, [but] rather on the issue of assessing functional impairment”, according to its statement at the time. Functional impairment remains the most practical element for a supervisor to consider in the moment, but lack of clarity around quantifying impairment via saliva- or blood-testing remains a controversial conversation for employers, law enforcement, and the country in general.

Employers have many factors to consider when responding to new legislation. As the cannabis industry and cannabis-related issues continue to evolve, we can be certain organizations will continue to amend existing policies and implement new ones to respond to these changes. g

MORE CANNABIS ONLINE AT CANNCENTRAL.COM

Historian sees shift in views on peyote

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by Carlito Pablo

Scan to confess They were right At various times in my life I’ve been criticized as being arrogant and judgemental, both critiques I forcefully rejected. After spending a lot of time reflecting on past situations, both workrelated or personal, I’ve come to realize that those criticisms were accurate. I’m not going to lie to myself and say that I’m never going to be that way again, because I’m realistic enough to realize that it’s not that easy to change thought processes and habits ingrained over a long lifetime. I am however, going to try my very best in the future to be much more aware of what I’m thinking before I speak, and to question why I feel the way I do.

I want to live alone A bachelor suite costs more than 50% of my gross monthly income. And there’s no air conditioning?! The fuck is wrong with this town?

Career change I know masks are a thing for a reason, but I really hate having to wear one for my profession. So much that I am thinking about changing professions to something where I won’t have to wear a mask. I just don’t wanna wear a mask at work for the rest of my life. Who knows how long this will last, 2 months, 10 years...

Wet Door Handle Often when I use the bathroom in my apartment as I close the door my hand comes away wet. Ugh. At first, I thought, maybe it’s just a one-off, or maybe one of the roommates sanitized the door handles. I wash my hands. Ugh. After one of my roommates goes to the bathroom and I use it, yep, wet door handle. Wtf. Dry your hands.

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to post a Confession

4 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JUNE 4 – 11 / 2020

ore than six decades ago, a Canadian chapter of the Native American Church organized a peyote ceremony in Saskatchewan.

Peyote, a cactus found in parts of the U.S. and Mexico, is an essential element in the religious services of the NAC. Eaten or drunk as tea, the plant contains mescaline, a mind-altering organic compound said to have healing and spiritual properties.

As examined in a paper by historians Erika Dyck and Tolly Bradford—Peyote on the Prairies: Religion, Scientists, and Native-Newcomer Relations in Western Canada—the peyote ritual that took place in October 1956 in Saskatchewan provoked controversy.

“The ceremony near the Red Pheasant reserve embroiled the participants in a complex debate about Native religious and political rights, the state’s authority to interfere in these ceremonies, racialized discourses about health, medicine, and addiction, and wider concerns about hallucinogenic substances as agents of moral decay,” Dyck and Bradford wrote in the paper, published in the Journal of Canadian Studies in 2012.

With some government officials focusing on peyote as a narcotic, the political debates, according to the authors, “missed the deeper implications of peyotism on the Prairies”.

“According to members of the church as their voices were recorded and amplified through the medical observers, peyote played a comparatively minor role in stimulating a healing process that began addressing the wounds caused by colonialism,” Dyck and Bradford wrote.

In a phone interview, Dyck, a professor at the University of Saskatchewan, notes shifting attitudes toward psychedelic substances, including peyote.

Saskatchewan-based historian Erika Dyck says peyote occupies an “awkward” category in Canada’s drug laws. Photo courtesy of the University of Saskatchewan

“The image of psychedelics as inherently dangerous or a kind of drug that causes violence is really changing dramatically,” Dyck observed.

The Canadian academic is eager to witness how this emerging landscape will shape future discussions about the use of plants like peyote among some people in Native communities.

“I think it will be interesting to see whether that will again bring out this conversation about Indigenous use of plant medicine, including peyote—and perhaps especially peyote,” Dyck said.

Peyote occupies what Dyck describes as an “awkward” category in Canada’s drug laws. Under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, it is illegal to possess mescaline but not peyote. In the U.S., the NAC is exempted from drug legislation with respect to the use of peyote.

However, the exemption is not granted to all Native American groups.

In January 2020, Santa Cruz in California became the third city in

the U.S., after Denver and Oakland, to decriminalize peyote and other psychedelic plants and fungi.

Dyck said she is unaware of any current peyote use among Indigenous people in Canada.

If there are such ceremonies taking place, the academic said, she assumes that these are not publicized.

“We would probably not hear about them.”

Dyck offered a possible explanation, based on conversations with Indigenous and non-Indigenous groups: “There’s still quite a lot of stigma around it.”

It’s not only changing attitudes toward psychedelics that may shape new discussions around peyote.

Dyck also pointed to the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which laid out in its 2015 report a road map to a better relationship between the country’s Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples.

“There may be a different kind of conversation that takes place in Canada,” she said. g

FINANCE

REAL ESTATE

When sectors sink, even Cats go homeless in housing crunch billionaires get drubbed

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by Carlito Pablo

by Charlie Smith

M

Warren Buffett dumped his airline stocks due to COVID-19. Photo by Aeroprints.com

ultibillionaire U.S. investor Warren Buffett has a way with words.

“I will tell you how to become rich,” he once said. “Close the doors. Be fearful when others are greedy. Be greedy when others are fearful.”

But even Buffett’s nuggets of wisdom didn’t prevent his company, Berkshire Hathaway, from losing US$49.7 billion in the value of its investments in the first three months of this year. That was almost US$700 million per day.

Part of the problem was the travel industry. After the global pandemic crushed this sector, he dumped all of his shares in Delta Air Lines, American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and United Airlines at tremendous losses.

This episode speaks to the importance of understanding sectors, particularly for novice investors. Those who invested in the tech stars a few years ago—such as Facebook, Amazon, and Apple—have made a killing. But for those who bought shares a year ago in Canadian cannabis companies, it’s been a dreadful time.

It’s not always easy to know which sector an industry like airlines falls into. One of the biggest fund companies, Fidelity, states on its website that there are three main classification approaches: the Global Industry Classification Standard (GICS), International Classification Benchmark (ICB), and Thomson Reuters Business Classification (TRBC).

“TRBC and GICS classify airlines as part of the Transportation subsector or industry, and to Industrials at the highest level, with other passenger transportation and delivery service firms,” Fidelity states. “TRBC further segments companies at the lowest level, into those providing transportation or as those providing airline or airport services. ICB, on the other hand, puts airlines into the Travel and Leisure industry.”

For that reason, Fidelity advises that people who invest using a sector-based strategy should try to understand how individual companies may be classified.

“This can be especially important when investing in funds that are designed to track certain sectors or industries, since the fund or index could be based on one of these various classification systems,” it says.

The GICS is broken out into 11 sectors, with 24 industry groups, 69 industries, and 157 subindustries, according to the Investopedia website.

It’s possible to invest in mutual funds that focus on individual GICS sectors such as information technology, utilities, real estate, materials, energy, and industrials. Other sectors in the GICS include consumer discretionary, consumer staples, health care, financials, and telecommunication services.

Be fearful when others are greedy.

Be greedy when others are fearful.

– Warren Buffett

Anyone who wants to see how good they are at sector investing before putting down any real money can play Investopedia’s Stock Market Game. Players receive $100,000 in virtual cash and can test their trading skills on the website against thousands of others around the world.

“Have you thought about buying stock in a certain company but just didn’t have the cash to make a trade?”

Investopedia asks. “Or perhaps you heard news about a company and thought to yourself that the stock price was poised to rise? Or maybe you have always just wanted to know more about picking stocks? Thanks to virtual stock exchange technology, stock market simulators (aka stock market games) that let you pick securities, make trades and track the results—all without risking a penny—are as close as your keyboard or cell phone.” g

eople are not the only ones becoming homeless.

Pet cats are also feeling the brunt of the housing crunch, according to the Vancouver Orphan Kitten Rescue Association.

Maria Soroski cofounded VOKRA in 2000 with Karen Duncan, and she is a witness to how this situation has been unfolding. She said that during the past three years, she and her organization have seen more cats being abandoned by their owners.

“They come to people’s houses, scratching on their door, looking for food,” Soroski told the Straight by phone.

In many cases, people call VOKRA and volunteers come to pick up the cats. They are either spayed or neutered, and homes are found for them.

“A lot of the neighbours will say to me that people moved out, they left their furniture in the yard and they left the cat,” Soroski said.

Soroski said that much of this is because of the housing situation. “It’s very hard to find housing in Vancouver that allows pets,” she said.

As well, people move elsewhere because housing in Vancouver is too expensive. “Some people have no choice but to just leave them [cats] behind,” Soroski said.

According to Pets OK B.C., 75 percent to 97 percent of rentals in the province have no-pet policies.

In 2018, the organization and other related groups proposed a change in tenancy legislation to the provincial Rental Housing Task Force.

Under the law, a landlord can prohibit pets or demand a pet damage deposit not greater than half of the monthly rent.

However, the rental task force did not include amending the tenancy law in its recommendations when it submitted its report to the provincial government in 2018.

According to a City of Vancouver annual report on its housing strategy, rental vacancy rates in purpose-built rental housing “remain extremely low”.

The vacancy rate was 0.8 percent in 2018 citywide, which was slightly lower than the 0.9 percent rate in 2017, the report noted.

“There is evidence that the existing rental apartment stock may not meet the needs of all Vancouver households, including families—in 2016 there were over 29,000 renter families with children in the city, but only around 18,500 2- or 3-bedroom purpose-built rental units (market and non-market) in 2018,” the report stated.

Housing costs also continue to rise across various housing types.

Average private market rents increased by 6.4 percent between 2017 and 2018, according to the city report.

Meanwhile, the same report stated, benchmark prices for condominiums in East Vancouver increased by 5.7 percent in the same period and had risen by 19.5 percent between 2016 and 2017.

An orphan-kitten rescue group says some tenants abandon pets when they move.

Moreover, it noted that the number of sheltered and unsheltered homeless residents increased from 2,138 in 2017 to 2,181 in 2018.

Getting a firm grip on the number of homeless cats, however, is not easy.

In 2012, the Canadian Federation of Humane Societies released a report about cat overpopulation. The CFHS research found that there were an estimated 10.2 million owned cats in Canada at the time.

According to the group, “owned cat population is growing at a rate faster than the number of households across the country”. Shelters are at or near capacity, and this is “exacerbated by the fact that twice as many cats as dogs are being brought in for care”.

“Extrapolating the data provided, it is projected that more than 600,000 homeless cats in Canadian shelters did not find new homes in 2011,” the CFHS report stated.

“Unfortunately, more than 1/3 of

the cats surrendered to shelters were surrendered due to issues of housing including rental agreements, landlord conflicts and moving, followed by the animal taking up too much time or responsibility,” the report continued.

Cats are more popular than dogs as companion animals in Canada, according to the organization.

VOKRA’s Soroski recalled that when she and Duncan started their group in 2000, most of the calls they got were about feral cats. These are cats born outside people’s homes that grow up without human ownership.

According to Soroski, calls about tame cats that have been lost or abandoned have increased over the years.

“So I get a call from somebody, and there’s a tame mommy and her kittens in their yard; I go get them,” Soroski said. “Or if it’s a tame, adult cat by itself, I go get them. And we take them and spay and neuter them, and find them homes.” g

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JUNE 4 – 11 / 2020 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 5

feature

Trailblazers march to their own beat From Indigenizing the city to saving seahorses, innovators are determined to improve our world

Ginger Gosnell-Myers played a leading role in the Canada 150+ celebrations; Tierney Milne’s murals are impossible to ignore (photo by Dylan Hamm); Amanda Vincent studies seahorses in their natural milieu.

GINGER GOSNELL-MYERS Indigenous storyteller

d ONE OF VANCOUVER’S most influential Indigenous voices, GosnellMyers, doesn’t describe herself as an academic. This is in spite of being the Indigenous fellow, decolonization and urban Indigenous planning, with SFU’s Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue. Nor does she consider herself to be an urban planner, even though she’s had as much of an impact on the Indigenization of the city landscape as anyone working in the city planning department.

No, Gosnell-Myers, who’s a member of the Nisga’a and Kwakwaka’wakw nations, calls herself a “storyteller”.

“I’m hoping to use my skills in dialogue and engagement—and in research—to give everybody a picture of the Indigenous city,” GosnellMyers tells the Straight by phone.

In her former role as the City of Vancouver’s first Indigenous relations manager, she played a leading role in opening up dialogue between the city government and the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh, which led to the Vancouver becoming a City of Reconciliation and hosting the landmark Canada 150+ celebrations in 2017. Unlike in other cities where the focus was primarily on the history of the Canadian nation-state, Vancouver paid homage to its Indigenous history and culture with a gathering of canoes by the Vancouver Maritime Museum, the Drum Is Calling Festival, and the city’s second Walk for Reconciliation. She cited Indigenous Fashion Week as another example of an important event showcasing Indigenous heritage and culture.

“Every major city centre across this country has their own version of community and culture that brings them together on a regular basis,” GosnellMyers said. “Most Canadians just aren’t aware of this.”

She hopes to change this through her fellowship. And she said that for any municipal government, the first goal should be raising awareness.

“There’s a reason why the City of Reconcilation framework had, as one of its three foundational pillars, cultural competency—for staff and for Vancouverites,” Gosnell-Myers noted.

“A lot of our efforts were targeted at increasing people’s cultural awareness and competency to engage and work with Indigenous communities more effectively.”

The plazas on the north side of the Vancouver Art Gallery and outside Queen Elizabeth Theatre each received Indigenous names, as did the nə́ca?mat Strathcona library branch

and Xpey’ elementary school on East Hastings Street. The Vancouver park board voted to conduct a colonial audit with a view to better reflecting the Indigenous history of the lands it oversees. And the Vancouver school district erected new totem poles outside its head office at the corner of West 10th Avenue and Fir Street.

Several years ago when she was working doing a landmark project on urban Indigenous people for the polling firm Environics, GosnellMyers was able to demonstrate the importance of culture. This was accomplished by asking people if they knew about their family tree.

“People who said they knew their family tree very well or fairly well were more likely to say that they were happy in their lives, they were more likely to volunteer, they were more likely to vote, they were more likely to have finished postsecondary education or be in the process of completing postsecondary education.” she recalled.

“They’ve seen themselves advancing in their jobs. There were so many other indicators of a healthy life that came with knowing who your family was and knowing where your family came from. It’s super interesting.”

artist was soon participating in the larger #MAKEARTWHILEAPART effort organized by the Vancouver Mural Festival, an event that helped the young artist realize her dream of painting on a massive scale, starting with her first public wall in 2016.

The Montreal-born Milne had pursued science and psychology for her first degree, realizing her main interest was in applied psychology and the way it intersects with visual communication. That took her to the IDEA School of Design at Capilano University.

From there, work at lululemon athletica led to her creating her first mural in 2015—a vivid black-and-white depiction of houses and stores in the yoga brand’s office waiting area.

She was hooked on the large format that has become her main gig—at outdoor festivals, hip offices around town, and even private homes. “I love that every project is so completely different,” she says, pointing to the height or the texture of the surface. “All these factors come into play, so the mix is different every time. It’s so nice to have the impact of a big scale.”

by Charlie Smith

TIERNEY MILNE Muralist

d VANCOUVER ARTIST Tierney Milne has been a maverick in turning mural-making into a career— and she’s been one of the key forces helping to beautify the city during pandemic lockdown.

Trained in psychology and known for her playfully geometric designs and mood-lifting palette of colours, the muralist found herself uniquely positioned to help the community in a time of struggle. Milne ended up painting her brightly hued, bevelled texts across hundreds of square metres of boarded-up windows during the crisis: the soft-coaxing “DO THE BEST YOU CAN” on West Hastings’s Dressew Supply; the comforting “WE ALL SEE THE SAME MOON”, paraphrasing a quote from novelist Haruki Murakami, on Robson Street’s Plenty store; the reassuring “ÇA VA BIEN ALLER/IT’S GOING TO BE ALRIGHT” on the same street’s Indigo store; and several more.

With all her indoor commercial projects on hold, she had felt like she had to do something. “I reached out on Instagram and said, ‘If anybody has a small businesses that they want painted, I have gallons upon gallons of paint,’ ” she tells the Straight, then adds with a laugh: “The response was immediately overwhelming.” The

6 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JUNE 4 – 11 / 2020

If anyone has a small business that they want painted, I have gallons upon gallons of paint.

– Tierney Milne

Among her favourite creations: the mural she and letterer JP painted on a circular basketball court on Great Northern Way (for lululemon), and the dizzying mix of shapes and patterns that dance across the 5,500-square-foot face of the threestorey office building at 877 East Hastings, part of the mural fest’s Strathcona celebration last June.

At the same time, the artist has kept busy with other media, driving her business through her eye-candy Instagram account. She’s created everything from stop-motion animations for commercial clients to design collaborations with a cellphone-case company and laser-cut wood assemblages for galleries. But perhaps her most unusual commission of late is an abstract array of pink, turquoise, navy, and white on a toilet seat and lid for France’s artful Tohaa Design.

“I got an email in broken English

from a man in Paris who said he had a toilet company, and I was like, ‘Is this real?’ ” she recalls. “They looked so beautifully produced I said yes, and they let me do basically whatever I wanted.”

As the world starts to open up and Milne prepares to go back to her steady stream of commercial mural projects, she reflects that five years ago, she never could have pictured herself spending most of her days on ladders and lifts, applying paint to giant walls.

“I felt like I was more of a delicateflower artist, and now I’m sharing a studio with guys who are really rough and tumble and I’m using these crazy lifts,” she says, speaking of her space near Olympic Village, which houses other mural artists. “We often hire each other to paint on each other’s projects, and we’ve all painted in the festival for various times. It’s been really horizon-lifting.” As for the rest of us, it’s been spirit-lifting.

by Janet Smith

AMANDA VINCENT Marine biologist

d AMANDA VINCENT didn’t set out to become the world’s foremost authority on seahorses and their conservation.

The UBC marine biologist was researching the evolution of sex differences in animals while studying for her PhD in zoology at Cambridge University in England.

“I had a ‘save the world’ fervour,” Vincent told the Straight by phone.

Because seahorses have the unique distinction of the male becoming pregnant and giving birth, Vincent decided to look into the little-known fish.

“That’s what I studied for my PhD,” Vincent said, “never dreaming…”

After her degree, Vincent saw a billboard in Germany that advertised seahorses from the Philippines as a treatment for impotence, selling the tiny creature’s effectiveness “for men with weak tails”.

The nonsensical claim launched Vincent on a years-long research project into illicit seahorse commerce that took her throughout Asia and opened her eyes to a thriving hidden trade that involved tens of millions of seahorses every year in about 80 countries.

Besides traditional-medicine uses, seahorses were also being hunted for the aquarium trade and to be sold as gift-shop curios.

“We’ve never been rude or dismissive of traditional medicine,” Vincent said of her work in convincing some big distributors and sellers of seahorses to embrace a conservation ethic. “Our approach is to reduce overuse or overexploitation.

“The seahorses were the jumpingoff point.” she said of a career that gave her academic fellowships in Europe and Australia, six years at Montreal’s McGill University, and a professorship at UBC’s Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries, from where she also directs Project Seahorse.

Vincent was the first researcher to study seahorses underwater, and she has recorded a few other firsts as well, with one of the more notable ones being when she spearheaded an international effort in 1996 to get seahorses included on the influential International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List for animals at risk of extinction.

Six years later, she helped get sustainable and legal export limits set for the international seahorse trade by the United Nations Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species.

The tiny animal was the first marine fish to be granted that consideration.

And now the Kitsilano resident and single mother of two has become the first marine conservationist to win the prestigious Indianapolis Prize, sometimes referred to as the Nobel Prize of international animal conservation.

Vincent won the Indianapolis— which is awarded every two years and comes with US$250,000 in cash—not only because of her decades of work directed at saving seahorses globally, but also because of her many projects that have helped spawn conservation efforts to aid other ocean animals, such as rays and sharks, and preserve coastal habitats for innumerable marine species.

“It’s the biggest award in my field, internationally, so it’s huge,” Vincent noted. “It’s very much a result of massive cooperation and a great team.

And it’s given us a platform to discuss marine issues.”

As for her work’s value outside of animal conservation, Vincent said: “I think we’ve been able to use seahorses to enable people to relate to marine life as something more than food and commodities.”

by Martin Dunphy

SUSGRAINABLE

Beer waste experts

d WITH SUSGRAINABLE, Marc Wandler and Clinton Bishop are conquering some mighty societal issues: food wastage and diabetes.

Their weapon? Delicious baked goods made of beer “waste”.

It took the friends, roommates, and business partners more than two years to figure out how, but they managed to come up with a way to quickly dehydrate malted barley that’s otherwise see next page

discarded during the craft-beer-making process. Beer uses sugars from barley, leaving fibre and protein behind.

The pair transform that “spent” grain (the brewers’ term defining when they are done with the grain) into their signature “upcycled barley flour”.

The flour is high in plant-based protein and fibre and low in sugar.

The two also argue that the product is good for the planet, with approximately 650 tonnes of spent grain produced by craft breweries nationwide every year otherwise being thrown away. Why waste it, when you can turn it into flour and make everything from vegan old-fashioned cookies and banana bread to rosemary focaccia and artisan sourdough?

Wandler and Bishop met nearly four years ago, when they were both working at Alberta Health Services. Wandler was an exercise physiologist, and many of his clients were diabetic.

“Most people are aware that diabetics are unable to regulate blood sugar, and while most people know they need to avoid sugar, another key but less communicated piece is that they need to increase their fibre intake,” Wandler tells the Straight.

“Our flour is virtually absent of sugar and loaded with fibre.”

He first learned about beer waste through a school project and had questions for Bishop, whose family farms barley.

As talk progressed, the entrepreneurial idea behind Susgrainable was a “no-brainer”. The hard part was figuring out the logistics involved in making upcycled barley flour.

“First, we need to establish our brewery partners’ brewing schedules and coordinate it with our partners who assist with the contract drying,” Wandler explains. “We have an eight-hour window to dehydrate as much product as possible, so the clock starts ticking the minute we grab the wet spent grain. Once the grain is dry, it is shelf-stable, and we can mill as needed.”

To date, Susgrainable has worked with Faculty Brewing Co., R&B

BARINDER RASODE CEO, Grow Tech Labs

Marc Wandler and Clinton Bishop create some mighty fine treats with leftover products from craft brewers. Mona Lavina founded an online art museum devoted to connecting people to Filipino heritage. Photo by Filipino Canadian Art Museum

Brewing, the Parkside Brewery, Monkey 9 Brewing, and Dogwood Brewing, all in the Lower Mainland.

That list is likely to get longer as the company grows.

Working out of Coho Commissary, the company has also launched its own online shop at www.susgrainable. com/. The site lists goods for delivery and pickup, as well as retail partners, “who could definitely use support right now”, Wandler says. “Farmers’ markets are also great way to get the product during the summer season.

There is the benefit of having all your questions answered there, too.”

by Gail Johnson

MONA LAVINA

Museum founder

d ONE OF THE most enduring stories in Philippine folklore is the creation of the first man and woman. He was called Malakas, or “Strong” in English, and she was Maganda, the “Beautiful” one.

The legend predates the arrival of western colonizers, who brought with them the sword and the Christian cross during the 1500s.

Even though the tale of Malakas and Maganda shares similarities with the biblical story of Adam and Eve, there is an important distinction.

Unlike Eve, Maganda emerged whole along with Malakas when a bamboo

stalk was split in half. She didn’t need to be fashioned out of a man’s rib.

It’s a story that speaks about the equality of men and women, and their shared role in humanity. Because of its timeless message, it is apt that a groundbreaking Filipino culturalheritage project is drawing inspiration from the symbolism of Malakas and Maganda for its inaugural event.

In December 2019, just weeks before the world became aware of the novel coronavirus, Mona Lavina founded the Filipino Canadian Art Museum.

It’s an online art gallery and history museum that uses tools of the digital age, not only to reach more people, but also to push creativity in previously undreamed-of realms.

“We need to engage people in new ways,” Lavina told the Georgia Straight in an interview through a Facebook chat.

On June 11, the Filipino Canadian Art Museum will unveil its maiden project, Strong and Beautiful: Cultural Treasures From the Philippines.

Strong and Beautiful is a virtual exhibition of traditional Filipino clothing, jewellery, bamboo and rattan craft items, video and photos, and works by B.C.-based visual artists Charlie Frenal and Ovvian Castrillo Hill.

“Understanding that cultural heritage preservation is a global issue led me to think about how I can value my own heritage and promote

it in Canada,” Lavina said.

The concept for the online art gallery and history museum started back in 2013, when she began her graduate studies through distance learning with the University of the Philippines.

She thought about a web-based educational site about Filipino heritage dedicated to children in Canada.

Children are a huge part of Lavina’s professional and personal life. She worked in communications for almost a decade at the B.C. regional office of UNICEF, and she’s now a multicultural curriculum developer with UNICEF Canada. She’s a mother to two young and artistically inclined daughters.

Her second-generation Filipino Canadian children helped develop the Strong and Beautiful exhibition.

Last year, Lavina curated a couple of Filipino cultural exhibits in Kamloops, where she and her family are now based. The shows were so wellreceived that people encouraged her to organize travelling displays.

In a moment of brilliance, the idea of an exhibition on the road and an educational website about Filipino heritage for children in Canada fused into the Filipino Canadian Art Museum project.

“Art and culture, for me, are the best ways to connect with heritage in positive and memorable ways,” Lavina said.

by Carlito Pablo

d NEATLY SUMMARIZING Barinder Rasode and her accomplishments in just a few sentences would be impossible. She served two terms as a city councillor in Surrey, for starters.

An advocate for women in leadership positions, Rasode is one of the founders of the conference series SheTalks, in which inspirational women share their stories. She is also the CEO of Grow Tech Labs, which provides services for legacy cannabis businesses that want to enter or expand their reach in the regulated marketplace.

When the Straight reaches her at her office—which, in what will come as no shock in these pandemic days, is currently in her bedroom—Rasode says that one principle has guided her in all of these varied ventures.

“Serving community, and building community, is really important to me,” she says. “So, whether it was being a volunteer with the RCMP or advocating for women or for better transportation in Surrey, or in my role on the police committee advocating for more community-based policing, I have asked myself this question quite a bit: how can you be doing so many things, and what’s your core value that you go back to, to make sure you’re doing the right thing?

And that is being a part of mobilizing change that serves the community or builds a better community; that’s what I’m really driven by.”

Rasode is justifiably proud of her work in the cannabis sector, and a large part of that has been normalizing the use of cannabis as medicine, which lifts the stigma from both those inside the industry and those who rely on what it produces.

“People don’t need to mask or hide the fact that they’re consuming cannabis, so we’re seeing more seniors who are open about cannabis use,” she says.

“I’m definitely seeing more women in my circle who now do say that they use cannabis for insomnia or issues related see next page

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Barinder Rasode advances equality for women and weed users, while Josie Ho boldly mixes East, West, and rock ’n’ roll in Habit.

from previous page

to menopause or as an anti-inflammatory for aches and pains. And I do think that it took very different voices to move that needle, and I was just one of the voices in that space.”

What has Rasode especially animated these days is the work being done at the privately owned plant-science research centre that Grow Tech and ETC3 (Emerging Technologies Centre of Canada and China) operate on the UBC campus. “We’re working with cannabis, psycho-active plants, and psychedelics, and a lot of traditional medicines that came out of either Ayurvedic or Traditional Chinese Medicine, or most Indigenous cultures around the world,” she explains, noting that, although a large body of research on psycho-active plants does exist, much of it has been ignored or suppressed due to the legal status of the substances in question.

That, of course, is starting to change, as evidenced by high-profile studies on the uses of psilocybin and MDMA to treat PTSD and other conditions.

“Now, when we face before us a horrid opioid crisis, and people are rightly no longer trusting pharmaceuticals for wellness—both because of their addictive qualities and because of the side effects—people like me are searching for something new to be able to treat

medical conditions,” says Rasode.

Born in India, where plant-based medicine has been practised for centuries in the Ayurvedic and Unani traditions, Rasode says that the subject hits especially close to home for her.

“The concoctions my great-grandmother or grandmother would cook up for ailments—everything from a cut to a headache to anxiety—they worked, and they made sense,” she says. “All of that was shut out, so opening the door is really important.”

by John Lucas

JOSIE HO

Movie producer, actor, singer

d ACTOR, FILM PRODUCER, and rock musician Josie Ho may show extreme daring in her indie-driven movie projects, but when it comes to COVID-19, the artist is uncharacteristically risk-averse.

Yes, a bit of that practical sense was instilled by her best-known role—playing Li Fai’s sister in Steven Soderbergh’s eerily prescient 2011 pandemic movie Contagion. But she reveals it’s also been bred into her by living in Hong Kong, where she’s currently spending lockdown. (Normally she splits her time between there and Canada.)

“I’m a germophobe!” she reveals from the Pacific Rim metropolis, ex-

plaining she’s been spending quarantine reconnecting with family and reading new scripts for 852Films, the company she cofounded with her husband, fellow actor Conroy Chan Chi-Chung, and Andrew Ooi. “I think any strange thing can happen now when I’ve seen how this impacted the globe. In Hong Kong, we learned a lot from SARS: keeping our hands clean, not sitting with shoes on the seats on public transit are all important issues in everyday life. I’ve been wearing a mask when travelling, since my job is to travel through the world to work.”

Daughter of recently deceased Macao casino magnate Stanley Ho, Ho has seen her main mission for the past decade has been forging a new kind of film with 852Films. The company came roaring out of the gate in 2010, with the slasher flick Dream Home, a black, bloody satire in which Ho’s character goes on a murderous rampage when house-sellers refuse her offer.

Most recently, the company produced, and Ho starred in, Habit, a film done shooting but now temporarily in limbo due to the pandemic. The offbeat Janell Shirtcliff–directed feature follows a wild L.A. party girl with a Jesus fetish who becomes involved in a drug deal gone wrong, disguising herself as a nun to escape. Ho relished rubbing shoulders with rock royalty

WITH C N A E R P ❤ E O O PE N WITH

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• Support Local • Be Kind • Sanitize ∙ Shop • Stock Up • Self Care • Gift • Chill Out • Dine Out • Work Out • Take Out • Unwind

TO HELP OUT Visit these 22 neighbourhoods in Vancouver and support local business!

Cambie Chinatown Collingwood Commercial Drive Downtown Dunbar Village East Village Gastown Hastings Crossing Kerrisdale Kits on Broadway Marpole Mount Pleasant Point Grey Village Robson South Granville South Hill Strathcona Victoria West 4th West End Yaletown

#OpenWithCare 8 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT JUNE 4 – 11 / 2020

like Bush singer Gavin Rossdale and Kills legends Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart, who also star: she says they got along well and spoke the same “rock language”. When Habit finally comes out, you’ll recognize Ho by her wicked beehive hairdo as Queenie Lee (appearing in one still, flashing the devil horns, with Hince’s Badass Cowboy character).

Elsewhere, under the 852 umbrella, Ho produced, directed, and acted in the documentary-style Finding Bliss: Fire and Ice, which follows her and her big-name Hong Kong musicscene friends on a journey to find real happiness in Iceland.

“Our vision is to bring more East-West elements to local Hong Kong films so that it can also sell in the West,” Ho explains. “Our goal is to push every boundary within our legal realm. Has it been a task?

Yes, but we’ve had many mentors who gave us advice.”

Among the other projects Ho had in what was shaping up to be a busy 2020 was the planned release of Rajah, an 852Film and Margate House feature she shot in the jungles of Sarawak, Borneo, with star Jonathan Rhys Meyers. In it, she plays

Madame Lim, lover to his Sir James Brooke. She describes shooting in the lush rainforest an “absolutely blessed and a joy”.

All the while, the former Cantopop singer has been rocking out as lead vocalist of Josie & the Uni Boys, an alt five-piece whose packed prepandemic live concerts were known for psychedelic visuals and driving guitars. (Hit YouTube for a clip of the band’s Purple Psycho Experience Concert for some idea.) “I was a pop singer before, but I felt I like harder things,” she reveals.

Jumping from head-banging to acting, producing, and other pursuits seems to have become as second-nature to Ho as leaping easily between the worlds of Asia and North America.

“In Hong Kong, there are tons of singers who are brilliant actors as well,” Ho says. “So there was no transition for me, except being a singer and an actor has only given me more inspirations. I do musicals and stage plays, plus TV series too.

“My mind is a soaking pot of inspirations and celebrations of intelligent characters created by spontaneous people.”

S neaker HEADS OUR WEEKLY PICKS from the world of kicks.

c THE DEETS: The original ’70s Superstars get a new style kick with the extra lift of platform soles, debossed white leather, and a funky, fuzzy, tiger-meets-zebra–print heel patch (in off-white and black). The serrated three stripes and iconic toe cap are a nod to Superstar originals.

Think fashion runway meets basketball court ($140).

by Janet Smith

c RANDOMNESS: Everyone from Versace to Bottega Veneta and Khaite are showing the cult catwalk prints this year, and Cardi B, Rihanna, and all things Kardashian have been wearing leopard spots and zebra stripes head-to-toe. Then again, you could blame it all on Netflix’s Tiger King. Either way, these kicks show a little goes a lo-o-ong way. c STOCKISTS: Adidas.ca, drops Wednesday (June 3) at 10 p.m.

Pacific time. c SOUNDTRACK: With apologies to Carole Baskin: “I Saw a Tiger” by Joe Exotic.

by Janet Smith

Vancouver’s businesses are opening with care and can’t wait to see you again (This story is sponsored by Vancouver BIAs.)

W

ith local retail businesses and restaurants closed during the pandemic, Vancouverites have been encouraged to stay home and fend for themselves. But let’s be honest: a mug filled with drip coffee from your kitchen pales in comparison to the double-shot vanilla latte from the café down the street.

Furthermore, sushi made at home tastes absolutely nothing like the melt-in-your-mouth rolls you get at the nearby Japanese restaurant. It’s safe to say that everyone is looking forward to the reopening of Vancouver’s beloved businesses.

On May 29, Vancouver’s 22 BIAs (Business Improvement Associations) unveiled the “Open with Care” campaign that encourages Vancouverites to shop local as businesses reopen with customer and staff safety top of mind.

As businesses carefully open and adjust to the new normal, it’s important that visiting customers remain mindful and patient—we are all in this together. With Vancouver businesses increasing sanitization practices and many implementing the use of PPE, customers can return to their favourite boutiques, watering holes, and eateries with confidence.

Vancouver’s residents can resume their hobbies of patio drinks in the sunshine and happy-hour munchies without worry.

Whether you’re itching to do some retail therapy or need ingredients for a physical-distancing BBQ that you’re hosting, look to the local businesses. Supporting Vancouver’s unique stores, grocers, and restaurants

BIAs want shoppers back in local stores.

Photo by Jade Stone Photography

during this uncertain time will keep our communities strong.

“With businesses taking necessary precautions to keep their staff, customers, and the community safe, we can all rest assured that health and wellness are the top priorities for reopening,” says Vancouver mayor Kennedy Stewart. “We should be proud of our local entrepreneurs and continue supporting our city’s amazing businesses, restaurants, and shops as we move forward together.”

Vancouver’s charm comes from its independently owned, one-of-akind stores and restaurants. Instead of ordering items from Amazon or making a box of Kraft Dinner for the hundredth time, make a conscious effort to shop local and support our economy.

For updated hours and information on the businesses in your community, contact the business directly or visit your BIA’s website. g

HEALTH / LIVING

Four ways to diminish Exercises to improve the cycling life the misery of hangovers

N

by Gail Johnson

A

ow that the weather is getting warmer and drier, you’re ready for more frequent rides on your road bike. You’ve got the gear (do not overlook the importance of padded shorts for long cruises), and the gears are good to go, too.

If you want to up your cycling game this year, consider adding these exercises to your workout routine.

by Carlito Pablo

nyone who ever drank a wee bit too much knows what it’s like the following morning. It’s not at all pleasant. From headaches to cramps, nausea, fatigue, diarrhea, and tremors: these are some of the most common symptoms of a hangover.

To relieve some of the misery from the previous night’s pleasure, a number of things can be helpful.

ALTERNATING LUNGES WITH HAMMER CURLS

HYDRATION

Alcohol is a diuretic. Drinking makes you pee. When you urinate more, you become dehydrated. You lose electrolytes, which are essential minerals that are vital to many bodily functions.

That’s why you feel fatigued when hungover.

Drinking fluids will restore the balance in your body. To make up for lost minerals, taking electrolyte-rich drinks like Revival is an option. (Revival, described as the favourite rehydration and recovery drink in the U.K., is an orange-flavoured drink.)

Smoothies offer a morning-after jolt of health. Photo by Denis Tuskar/Unsplash

gut cells that make up a significant part of the body’s immune system.

While nursing a hangover, loading up on Doctor’s Best vitamin C and other similar supplements can boost the body’s ability to ward off illnesses like the common cold. There are many foods rich in vitamin C, like broccoli, kale, oranges, peppers, tomatoes, and strawberries.

SMOOTHIES Other foods rich in vitamin C inAlcohol lowers blood sugar in the clude cantaloupe, cauliflower, kiwi body. A quick scientific explanation: fruit, orange juice, papaya, bell pepalcohol is metabolized by the liver. The per, and sweet potato. liver also produces glucose. When you drink, the liver has to process the alco- SLEEP Alcohol makes you sleep, but findings hol. It has to work harder.

With low blood sugar, you feel weak. suggest it’s a restless sleep. Alcohol But with a queasy stomach, you don’t reduces the duration of the rapid eye feel like eating. Smoothies are an an- movement stage of sleeping, which swer. They’re nutritious and delicious. is deep sleep. This explains why you That’s why blenders, like an Oster or a wake up tired after a night of drinking.

The only solution to this is going Ninja, are a must in the kitchen. back to sleep, but blocking the daylight IMMUNITY can sometimes be a challenge. A Manta Alcohol affects the body in many Sleep Mask could be useful. Manta ways. One is that it weakens immun- Sleep Masks feature adjustable eye cups ity. When alcohol passes through the and promise to provide true blackout gastrointestinal track, it damages the for deep sleep in any environment. g

This simple multitasking exercise will strengthen your quadriceps, gluteal muscles, hamstrings, abdominal muscles, and biceps.

Holding a dumbbell in each hand, take a giant step forward with your left foot. Keeping your torso straight (rather than leaning forward) with your front knee directly above your ankle, drop down toward the floor.

Hold the lunge at the bottom while you do your hammer curls, bringing your hands—with your thumbs up, not your palms up as with a regular bicep curl—toward your shoulders.

Slowly lift back up and repeat on the other side. Be sure to keep your shoulders down and retracted (never hunching) and avoid jutting your chin forward throughout.

For the hammer curls, keep your elbows tucked in by your sides and be sure not to bend your wrists. Avoid any swinging motion or momentum in the arms and shoulders; your body shouldn’t be swaying or rocking.

Begin with eight lunges on each side every other day. Build up to 10 or 12.

HAMSTRING CURLS

A group of three muscles on the back of your leg that run from the thigh to the knee, the hamstrings work in unison with the quadriceps on the

Workouts can reduce the risk of cycling injuries. Photo by Beau Runsten/Unsplash

front of the leg to help you move. It’s natural for people’s quadriceps to be stronger than their hamstrings; the hamstrings should be about 50 to 80 percent the strength of the quadriceps, ideally at about 70 percent, according to the Journal of Athletic Training. If the hamstrings are too weak (or too tight), injury can occur.

One of the best ways to target these muscles is to do hamstring curls using a large exercise ball (a.k.a. a Swiss ball). Lying on your back with your arms by your sides, rest your calves atop the ball. (You could have the back of your ankles on the ball if you’re comfortable with this exercise.) Lift your hips up off the ground and, keeping them elevated, draw your knees toward your chest, then back out. Repeat up to 20 times every other day, being sure not to let your hips sink to the ground.

Gradually build up the number of curls over time.

If you don’t have an exercise ball, you can do another version of this exercise on a noncarpeted floor.

Wearing socks or booties over your

runners, lie on the ground, lift your hips off the floor. Draw your heels in toward your torso and out again, keeping your hips elevated throughout. As with any exercises, you should never feel pain or discomfort in the lower back.

V-SIT

Also known as the boat pose, this exercise will work some of your abdominal muscles (transversus abdominis).

Start by sitting on the ground.

Lean back, keeping your torso straight and your shoulders back (rather than rounding through the upper body). Extend your legs out in front of you. If comfortable, keep the legs straight; again, any discomfort in the lower back is a red flag. Options are to bend the legs or to keep the feet on the floor while leaning back. Hold for 10 seconds and repeat anywhere from three to 10 times and build up to longer durations. You can do this daily, but remember to work other parts of your core too (abdominal, pelvic-floor, and back muscles). g

The Isolation Diaries: the Darlings

by Janet Smith

podcast of interviews recorded in the ‘70s and ‘80s with movers and shakers of the LGBTQ+ rights movements in the U.S. from the ’40s to the ’90s. I highly recommend, especially to queer folks from my generation.”

MC: “I’ve been really into Midnight Gospel; it’s like a visual podcast set to a millennial psychedelic sci-fi trip with philosophical ramblings and cute characters. Sasha Velour’s Nightgowns on Quibi, and also Terrace House because I love reality TV that isn’t centered around conflict and abuse.”

CREATIVE OR LEARNING OUTLET

T

Clockwise from left: The Darlings’ Continental Breakfast, Maiden China, PM, and Rose Butch have been getting by through music, podcasts, and makeup artistry.

he Isolation Diaries reach out to Vancouver’s creative sector to find out what it’s watching, how it’s coping, and where it’s finding inspiration.

beautiful, high-calibre drag videos that rival the multibillion-dollar music industry fills me with pride I can’t describe. Also, mothering my house plants and shaving my eyebrows off.”

CB: “I’ve been listening to music THE ARTISTS constantly. I find monotony in TV The Darlings are a multidisciplinary, and film sometimes because I strugnonbinary drag performance col- gle to see the representation I’m lective based in Vancouver. They are: looking for in my art intake.”

Continental Breakfast (Chris Reed), PM (Desi Rekrut), Rose Butch (Rae SOUNDTRACK Takei), and Maiden China (Kendell PM: “Isolation by Kali Uchis. The title Yan). You’ve seen their full-length in- is very fitting for this time, but this stallations everywhere from the 2019 music washes over and just makes me PuSh International Performing Arts so happy. It is light and bubbly, and Festival, to the Transform Cabaret very well-written.”

Festival. More recently, they’ve created MC: “For an emotional joyride I turn two quarantine-specific digital shows; to pretty much everything by Antony and the Johnsons, or Hopelessness by see them on Facebook and Vimeo.

ANOHNI.” NO. 1 THING GETTING YOU THROUGH

MC: “I’ve been ruminating on the resilience of the queer community pushing their art forms through new mediums and making it WERK and that excites me beyond belief. Seeing folks like Kendall Gender and Boss create

STREAMING NOW

RB: “Podcasts are my number-one medium to consume, and usually it’s something related to true crime but I just got hooked on Making Gay History. It’s a gorgeous oral-history

PM: “I’ve been dancing a lot more than I have in the past couple of years.

I always held my movement to a high standard, and gave up the desire to make it my full-time profession because doubt crept in. For whatever reason, research feels more poignant during this time. I’ve been improving, filming, and learning from myself without judgement from teachers or other people.”

MC: “I did a 40-day quarantine-draglook series on Instagram and that provided me so much solace for the beginning of this wild experience....I learned a lot about texture, unconventional materials, and makeup for camera vs. the stage. I’m also slowly practising my Mandarin and plan to start sewing soon!”

SURVIVAL TIP

RB: “Stay connected with folks that you love, drink water, be kind to one another.”

PM: “Do what you need to do to survive during this time. Although everyone is in this ‘thing’ together, each quarantine will look different. Just because you’re not ‘doing’ or ‘practising’ in quarantine doesn’t make the work you’ve done any less. Each person is in this, grieving, together.

Don’t try and replicate others to try

and feel fulfilled.”

MC: “In relative terms I’m very lucky to be in a country that is providing social assistance during a time of mass unemployment, so I think being mindful of what privileges I have in my position has been keeping me somewhat level through all of this.

I live with high anxiety and depression and the best thing I’ve been able to do is take every day as it comes by listening critically and thoughtfully

to my needs as a means of being conscious of what I want my life to look like. Stay inspired, establish your boundaries, cultivate change.”

CB: “Stay informed on what is happening in the news but try to focus on ways of keeping the people in your life safe. Past a certain point, scrolling through the news will only cause anxiety and you need to provide yourself with things that you enjoy. Pornhub Premium is free right now.” g

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DRINKS

Tequila is a surprisingly versatile spirit

H

by Mike Usinger

ola, liquor nerds—it’s that time when we do our best to turn you into a 21st-century version of Francisco “Pancho” Morales. Actually, scrap that, because after reportedly inventing the Margarita at Tommy’s Place Bar in Juárez, Chihuahua, in 1942, Morales somehow became convinced it would be more fun to be an American milkman than a mixologist. Some people have it all, and then pitch it away.

Today, we’re talking tequila, once disparaged as nothing more than an instant just-add-salt-and-lime-wedges party starter. Admit it: there have been countless times you’ve hit the town for drinks with friends and kicked things off with seven or eight shots of Jose Cuervo. One minute you’re in Yaletown, the next you’re waking up in a Papalote Reposado is one of the great building blocks of a Tommy’s Margarita. field outside of Tijuana wearing noth- to come from Weber Blue agave two months and a year in oak barrels, ing but a tattered Señor Frog’s som- plants grown and harvested in desig- añejos between one and three years, brero and a “One Tequila, Two Tequila, nated Mexican states. The agave and extra añejos three years and up.

Three Tequila, Floor” muscle shirt. heart—known as the piña and typAs man wearing many hats— For decades, tequila was some- ically weighing 80 pounds and up— mixologist, corporate liaison for the thing shotgunned. Thankfully, these is removed eight to 12 years into the Canadian Professional Bartenders are more civilized times, and the plant’s life, cut up, and then roasted in Association, and principal of SoverMexican spirit is viewed with a rever- a furnace to turn starches into sugar. eign Wine and Spirits—Jon Smoence typically reserved for whiskies.

B.C. liquor stores for years mostly lensky knows his liquor. In an interAficionados praise complex flavours carried mixtos, meaning a tequila view with the Straight, he suggests (often from aging the spirit in oak that’s just 51 percent from the agave that, for the longest time, most of us casks) andWomen's knockout bouquets (typ- Heart plant, with didn’t know what good tequila was.

Battered Support Services of Richmond - AIDSthe Societyremainder pulled provides an free daytime & evening support groups operates afrom confidential support group for persons ically almost earthy sweetness). other sugar sources­ — usually So how did we get to where we (Drop-ins & 10 week groups) for women abused by with HIV/AIDS, or persons affected Smooth mellow are emotional buzzwords— are today? “What changed, really for their intimateand partner.

Groups provide (family, sugar friends or cane. care givers) by the disease. support, legal information & advocacy, For info - 604-277-5137 radically Discerning consumers now look the entire liquor industry, was that— safetydifferent planning, and from referrals. when tequila www.heartofrichmond.com For more information please call: 604-687-1867 burned like holy water during the for a product that’s 100 percent agave. tongue in cheek­ —Al Gore invented Distress Lineof & Suicide Prevention Services exorcism Regan MacNeil.

Reposado tequilas contain extracted the Internet,” Smolensky says with a NEED SOME ONE TO TALK TO? ByusMexican law,confidential all tequilas have agave juice that has rested for between laugh. “The Internet gave us liquor Call for immediate, free, and non-judgemental support, 24 hours a day, everyday.

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TOMMY’S MARGARITA

60 ml of your favourite 100 percent agave tequila (I like Papalote Reposado or Tequila Ocho Blanco) 30 ml fresh-pressed lime juice 15 ml high-quality agave nectar Salt Rim a rocks glass with salt. Place all ingredients in a shaker with a pinch of salt, shake, pour over fresh ice.

Garnish with a lime wheel. Enjoy! g

by Mike Usinger

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for a premium bottle like an El Tequileño Reposado Rare or Tequila Ocho Extra Añejo Single Barrel, you can take a break from working the bar at home and sip it like a top-drawer scotch.

“There’s a certain prestige that’s developed for drinking premium tequilas,” Smolensky says. “The development of the añejo and extraañejo categories helped draw away scotch drinkers and whisky drinkers and cognac drinkers, because it was something brown and aged in barrels that was familiar to them.”

Feel like firing up the shaker?

Here’s Smolensky’s favourite riff on a classic. “Let’s go with the Tommy’s Margarita,” he says, “founded by Julio Bermejo of Tommy’s Mexican Restaurant in San Francisco, home of possibly the best tequila selection in the world. Tommy’s just celebrated their 55th anniversary, and Julio is a good friend of mine. This is easy as heck to make, and is probably the most famous Margarita riff in the world.”

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nerds more access and more information and more education about the different ways that tequila can be perceived and drunk. That created a demand.”

The rise of mixology and knowledgeable bartenders has also raised our understanding of what tequila has to offer. The more demand grew, thanks to consumers educating themselves, the more Mexico and its producers mobilized to fill that demand, leading to more options at liquor stores.

For those working on their home mixology skills, the beauty of tequila is its versatility. If something calls for gin or whisky, your can probably experiment by swapping in tequila.

“You can play a bit of Mr. Potato Head with tequila when it comes to classic cocktails,” Smolensky says.

“You can put tequila into a Martinez cocktail, which is traditionally gin and sweet vermouth and maraschino and bitters. Replace the gin with tequila and you get this kind of grassy, earthy, dry characteristic that’s really appealing.”

Smolensky suggests Olmeca Altos Plata or Papalote Blanco as goodvalue starter tequilas, and Tequila Ocho Reposado or Aha Yeto Diva as smart options for those willing to go a little higher on the price point.

There is, of course, no need to shotgun any of the above while shrieking “Tequila might not be the answer, but it’s worth a shot.” In fact, if you’re feeling extra flush and willing to spring

“The flavour profile is clean, light, crisp and easy drinking beer (4.5% alc./vol. | 9 IBU). It is brewed to be accessible to all levels of beer lovers.”

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If the goal is to be accessible to beer disciples of all levels, then you won’t go terribly wrong with a lager, which is pretty much the most popular style in North America. (Molson, Miller, and Coors didn’t get to be industry

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We are here to help you from being overwhelmed.

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Living with IBD can often be overwhelming, but you're not alone! 3rd Wed of each month the GI Society holds a free IBD support group meeting for patients & their families to come together in an open, friendly environment. 7:00pm at #231 - 3665 Kingsway. For more information call 604-873-4876 The Compassionate Friends (TCF) Burnaby TCF is a grief support group for parents who have experienced the loss of a child, at any age.

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Intimacy and hot sex don’t always jibe Opening with Wintopia, DOXA gets set to stream

by Dan Savage

b HERE GOES: I’m a 32-year-old gay male and I have trouble staying out of my head during sex. I feel like there may be many issues. The one nonissue is everything works fine on my own.

When I’m single or “available”, I am okay. Let’s be honest: I’m a slut and I enjoy it. But when I invest in someone, when I’m trying to have an actual relationship, the sex suffers. With a partner I care about, I feel nervous. I feel small, both mentally and physically. And I worry my dick is small. I’ve measured and photographed it, so I know better, but something in me is always asking… Are you really enough?

I’m currently in an open relationship with a guy I’ve known for a decade. He’s amazing. Often I’m hard AF just sitting there relaxing with him.

But the closer we get to actually having sex, the more nervous I become. I even stop breathing consistently. It’s almost like I feel ashamed to want someone so much. Or something? It’s frustrating because I would love nothing more than to fuck like rabbits until we were both exhausted. I love him and I want to be able to please him sexually! Our intimacy, our conversation, our connection—everything else is so strong.

But I feel like my problem will kill any future I might have with him. I have considered the idea of therapy, but the idea of talking to some stranger about my sex life face to face is just daunting.

- Dazed In Love

wanna talk with a therapist about your issues—which touch on more than just sex—but you’re willing to talk to me and all of my readers about them. I realize it’s a little different, DIL, as you don’t have to look me in the eye while we discuss your dick.

But there are therapists who specialize in helping people work through their issues around sex, and they’re usually

So you don’t

Dan Savage advises a correspondent who has an irrational fear of being seen.

pretty good at setting nervous new clients at ease. They have to be. So I would encourage you to have a few sessions with a sex-positive queer shrink. Talking about your dick with a stranger will be awkward at first, of course, but just like eating ass, DIL, the more you do it, the less awkward it gets—and after a few sessions, your therapist won’t be a stranger anymore.

In the meantime, DIL, go ahead and blindfold your boyfriend—if he’s game, of course, and I can’t imagine he wouldn’t be. You seem to have an irrational fear of being seen. If your boyfriend were to get a good look at you naked, DIL, especially if he got a good look at your dick, you’re convinced he would suddenly conclude—even though he’s known you for a decade and is obviously into you—that you’re not “enough” for him. So don’t let him get a good look. Blindfold that boy.

Don’t lie to him about why you want to blindfold him—tell him you feel a little insecure—but bringing in a blindfold makes working through your insecurities into a sexy game.

Being able to have sex with the boyfriend without having to worry about him sizing up your cock will free you to enjoy sex, and who knows? After a

M

by Janet Smith

ira Burt-Wintonick’s ode to her late father, pioneering nonfiction director Peter Wintonick, will open this year’s DOXA Documentary Film Festival.

Her NFB-produced Wintopia is described as “part Utopian odyssey, part mourning ritual”, as the young filmmaker traces the life of her father, who made the iconic doc Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media with Mark Achbar. There will be a live, moderated Q&A with Burt-Wintonick and special guests on June 20.

Amid pandemic restrictions, the 19th annual DOXA fest—which was originally to have run in May—will stream entirely online from June 18 through June 26. The programming, geo-blocked to B.C., boasts more than 64 films from across Canada and around the world, and includes livestreamed events. Films will be available to stream for the duration of the fest dates, and virtual tickets will be limited.

A B.C. spotlight features several Vancouver-based filmmakers, including Greg Crompton, whose feature Eddy’s Kingdom is about businessman Eddy Haymour and the extreme methods he used to construct a Middle Eastern-themed amusement park in the Okanagan Valley in the 1970s.

Tony Massil will see the world premiere of The End From Here, about three reclusive men who live in the geopolitical anomaly of Hyder, Alaska (a spot that straddles the B.C. border).

Short films also include Josephine Anderson’s On Falling (which recently premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City), a profile of three professional women mountain bikers. And in another local connection,

Wintopia is an ode to Canadian director Peter Wintonick, made by his daughter.

Sky Hopinka debuts the poetic małni - towards the ocean, towards the shore, spoken almost entirely the near-extinct Indigenous language of Chinuk Wawa and rooted in the origin-ofdeath myth from the Chinookan people in the Pacific Northwest.

Renowned cinematographer Iris Ng—who’s lensed everything from 2018’s Shirkers and 2019’s Toxic Beauty to the wildly popular Netflix docu-series Making a Murderer—hosts a master class on June 21.

Unique views from the far corners of the world include My Darling Supermarket’s musical ode to grocery-store clerks in Brazil; Sankara Isn’t Dead’s portrait of Burkina Faso from the perspective of a young poet named Bikontine; Stateless’s deep dive into the complex history and present-day politics of Haiti and the Dominican Republic through a grassroots election campaign; and Landfall’s kaleidoscopic essay on Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.

The schedule, tickets, and much more are at www.doxafestival.ca/. g

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few hot sex sessions with your sensory-deprived boyfriend, your confidence may get the boost it needs.

And even if your dick was small— which it isn’t, DIL, and you’ve got the measurements and photos to prove it—you could still have great sex with your boyfriend. Guys with dicks of all sizes, even guys without dicks, can have great sex. And if you’re still nervous after blindfolding the boyfriend and worried you’ll go soft, DIL, you can take the pressure off by enjoying sex acts and play that don’t require you to be hard. You can bottom for him, you can blow him, you can use toys on his ass, you can sit on his face while he jacks off, et cetera. There’s a lot you can do without your dick.

Zooming out, DIL, intimacy and hot sex are often negatively correlated: meaning, the more intimate a relationship becomes, the less hot the sex gets. Anyone who has watched more than one American sitcom has heard a million jokes about this sad fact. People in sexually exclusive relationships who still want hot sex to be a part of their lives have to work at solving this problem with their partners.

But if you’re in an open relationship and can get sex elsewhere.

The more invested people are in someone, the higher the stakes are; the longer they’re together, etcetera, the less arousing sex is for them.

Most of the people with this problem are in monogamous relationships and, judging from the jokes on sitcoms, they’re utterly (but hilariously) miserable. You’re not in a monogamous relationship, DIL, so if it turns out you’re incapable of having great sex with a committed partner—if you can’t manage to integrate those things—you don’t have to go without great sex. You can have intimacy at home and great sex elsewhere. g

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The Royal Vancouver Yacht Club (RVYC) has proposed a project to expand the marina by 13.3%, add an additional 47 moorage slips, and reconfigure and upgrade the marina’s facilities improving the design and introducing best in class environmentally sustainable practices and materials. The proposed project will replace ageing infrastructure, increase boater safety in Coal Harbour by improving entry and exit points from RVYC, and better serve members and visiting tourists.

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Visit royalvan.com/CHExpansionProject to: - learn more about our proposed project - review our application and technical assessments - follow the links to register for a webinar - complete an online feedback form Join us for one of two online webinars: • Tuesday, June 16, 2020 3:00 pm to 4:30 pm • Wednesday, June 24, 2020 6:30 pm to 8:00 pm Submit your questions or comments by email or phone if participating online doesn’t work for you: Email: CHExpansion@royalvan.com Phone: 604.224.4400 Please provide your feedback before Tuesday, July 7, 2020.

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