2004-08-08

A newspaper owned and operated in Newfoundland & Labrador

Vol. 2 Issue 32

St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador

Sunday, August 8-14, 2004

www.theindependent.ca

$1.00 (including HST)

Behind the walls

Ray Guy A Poke in the Eye Page 3

Incident reports filed at Whitbourne centre reveal high rate of abuse among juvenile offenders

By Stephanie Porter The Sunday Independent

A

list of infringements committed by juveniles at the province’s only closed-custody facility for young offenders reads like a parent’s worst nightmare — vandalism, suicide attempts, fist fights, verbal abuse, drug use, even spraying staff with chemical cleaner.

“We’re dealing with incidents like this on a fairly regular basis,” says Marvin McNutt, director of corrections and community services with the province’s Justice Department.

The Sunday Independent obtained the incident reports filed at the Newfoundland and Labrador Youth Centre in Whitbourne for the period of March 15 to June 15 through the Freedom of Information Act. The names of offenders, who by law cannot be named, were withheld.

The 115-page report lists a total of 371 incidents. The bulk of them, about 270 items, were by-the-book strip or visual searches — facility policy for whenever a resident enters or leaves the facility, about an hour’s drive west from St. John’s.

But then there are the others: Nearly

In Camera Regatta Day Pages 11-13

Life & Times Shaun Majumder Page 20

100 episodes of confrontation or misbehaviour, often violent.

The incident list provides a fascinating, sometimes disturbing, glimpse behind the fortified walls of the centre, which houses male and female young offenders.

From March 29: “(Two) residents walked to the front of the unit and started pounding on resident … who was sitting in a chair in front of the TV. Resident remained in the chair and protected his face with his arms as a code 2 was called … both residents were mechanically restrained.”

Also from March 29, a suicide attempt: “Resident … was acting strange. Staff checked room … and noticed resident has a string of some kind wrapped around his neck … String was 11 small, one-inch stripes of towel or facecloth knotted together at six feet long.”

A drug bust on April 21: “At approximately 11 p.m. a shakedown was conducted on the unit. Resident … was found to have a quantity of what appeared to be marijuana mixed with an unknown white powder.”

And this, from June 12: “ (resident) spit up in the air, in an apparent attempt Continued on page 2

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

Riding high Professional motorcross rider Brian Churchill makes a jump on Bell Island. Churchill works for Boondockers, a Newfoundland company that produces sports action videos. Please see story page 24.

Blowin’ in the wind

Turbot swap

Is the appearance of the old pink, white and green a sign of rising unrest, a quaint symbol, or an ‘up yours’ message to Canada?

By Alisha Morrissey The Sunday Independent

Business Summer beer sales down Page 15 Quote of the Week “You guys (The Independent) have speculated far too much for my liking so your interview with me will be factual … look, you broke the story, great work, but the follow up, in my view, was irresponsible, just for the record.

The iceman cometh? Total freakin’ nonsense. That causes me grief.”

— Derrick Rowe, CEO FPI

T

he pink, white and green flies from roof tops, store fronts and residences in the City of St. John’s, but the reasons why vary from blatant nationalism and historical attachment to a cultural revolution and political unrest.

The Sunday Independent knocked on doors recently to learn why the tricoloured flag of old has suddenly become new again.

Bob Arniel, owner and operator of Chef to Go, a cooking company in the capital city, flies the flag from a pole in his back yard. His brother-in-law traveled to St. John’s from Vancouver recently to be married under the flag.

Arniel says his wife’s brother, a true Newfoundlander, wants to live in St. John’s, but can’t make a living here like he can upalong.

Arniel, who’s from Ontario but has been living in the province for 25 years, understands Newfoundland nationalism.

“There’s something really special about this place,” he says. “In the last few years you probably see more of this flag than the newer one. It’s the same thing Quebec has been trying to do, but in a much more democratic way.”

Mike McCarthy of Craigmillar Avenue

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

Bob and Judy Arniel fly the old Newfoundland flag at their downtown St. John’s home.

flies both the Canadian and old Newfoundland flags on his front lawn.

He says the pink, white and green was the province’s flag when it was an independent country, and should still be the official flag today.

Just a few doors down from McCarthy’s home flies another old Newfoundland flag.

The homeowner, who asked not to be

named, says he favours the old flag for its symbolic nationalism.

“Basically I feel not enough has been done for Newfoundland,” says the man, watering his back lawn. “We’re still not part of Canada; we’re still fighting to be a part of Canada.”

He says he’s flown the flag for the past three years to remind people to keep close to their roots.

“We had an identity when we came into Confederation and it totally changed.”

“Are we better off?” he asks. “I don’t think we are.”

The tri-coloured flag was the original symbol of the joining of two largely divided groups.

According to legend, Irish and English unrest in Newfoundland ran rampant in the 1800s. The Irish displayed green banners and the English waved pink. Eventually the two groups begged a resolution from the late-Bishop Michael Fleming, who tied a white handkerchief between the two coloured flags.

Pink represents the Tudor rose of England, white the cross of St. Andrew of Scotland and green the shamrock of Ireland. The Newfoundland tri-colour is the only flag in the world to include the colour pink.

The flag, used to represent the Newfoundland Native’s Society, was present during much of the early history of independent Newfoundland, including the laying of the cornerstone at Cabot Tower.

Captain Bob Bartlett was said to have placed one at the North Pole, and in the 1909 election Robert Bond promised to make the tri-colour the country’s official flag — he lost to Edward Morris.

Continued on page 7

Spanish trawler fished turbot on the Grand Banks; recorded catches as having been landed elsewhere

By Ryan Cleary The Sunday Independent

A

Spanish trawler cited by Canada recently for illegal fishing had attempted to cheat quotas by passing off turbot it was catching on the Grand Banks as turbot from waters off Europe, The Sunday Independent has learned.

Despite overwhelming evidence, the European Union disputes the citations issued by Canada, blindsiding inspectors and leaving officials unsure of their next move.

On July 29, inspectors from the Canadian Coast Guard ship Cape Roger boarded the Spanish factoryfreezer trawler, Dorneda, just outside Canada’s 200-mile limit.

The Independent has obtained evidence that shows the Dorneda’s logbook recorded more than 230 tonnes of turbot in the hold. The logbook also stated the turbot had been caught on the Hatton Bank, a fishing area just west of the British Isles.

The Canadian inspectors immediately knew something was amiss; turbot aren’t found in commercial quantities on the Hatton Bank.

Upon physical inspection, the Canadian inspectors found roughly 50 per cent less turbot in the hold than had

been recorded. Some of the boxes that were said to contain Hatton Bank turbot were actually marked as turbot caught on the Grand Banks.

Inspectors concluded the foreign trawler was trying to pass off the turbot it was fishing on the Grand Banks as turbot from the Hatton Bank.

Inspectors also found a “false bulkhead” in the hull, a bulkhead that hid an empty space. According to the logbook, the entire area was supposed to be filled with British-Isle turbot.

Canadian inspectors issued the Dorneda two citations: One for failing to keep up-to-date ship drawings; the other for failing to accurately record catches on a daily basis.

As it happened, the European Union patrol ship Jean Charcot was in the area.

Inspectors from the ship were called in to confirm the findings of their Canadian counterparts.

The EU inspectors objected with the citations on two fronts: They disputed the existence of a hidden hold because the space was actually recorded on the Dorneda’s blueprints; they also disagreed with the over-reporting of turbot catches, saying the EU allows for Continued on page 2

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Page 2

NEWS

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

‘We don’t do enough training’ From page 1 for it to land on my head. When we returned to the unit … he picked up the spray bottle and sprayed bathroom cleaner in my face. He then proceeded to verbally assault me … resident was mechanically restrained …”

McNutt says events like these are “common” or standard fare for the youth centre.

“You’re dealing with kids who are, by and large, quite impulsive, they fail to recognize the consequences of their behaviour, they haven’t had the same kind of socialization experiences the rest of us have in terms of controlling our impulses,” he says by way of explanation.

“They don’t know how to deal with conflict many times, they’re trying to gain status within their own peer groups and it’s for all of those reasons they get in trouble with the law.”

McNutt adds the file obtained by The Independent is a compilation of notes on uses of force, strip searches, incidents for which a resident was disciplined, or any other events deemed outside acceptable behaviour.

“They’re short descriptions, not

the full report of each incident,” he says.

The youth centre can currently hold up to 40 juveniles. A 10-bed unit was closed earlier this year.

Concerns have been raised since the unit’s closure that harder, more troubled teens are being housed with less disturbed children.

Although many of the events on the incident list are quite severe, McNutt says he’s witnessed the same sort of behaviours since the 1970s, when he was first involved with corrections. “We may actually have less incidents than before, because of the design of the new facilities, smaller units, we’ve more control.”

According to the incident list, over the three-month period there were half a dozen physical assaults, some 25 cases of verbal abuse of staff, and about the same number of refusal of orders by residents. There was at least one fire, and three residents deemed at risk of suicide.

Does McNutt ever worry about the safety of the staff?

“All the time,” he says.

“That’s why we do the training that we do. We don’t do enough training, but we try to give them the self-defence and what we call take down techniques … we train

them not to intervene without the proper backup.

“Of course, if there’s imminent danger, you can’t wait for backup.”

McNutt says the staff are equipped with handcuffs. Leg chains and waist chains are also used when needed.

“… grabbed a spray bottle of window cleaner off the unit table and began to spray its contents at the other residents sitting in front of the T.V. … he threw a school book off the wall and proceeded to yell insults at myself and kick the door.”

During April’s 28-day public sector strike, the regular youth centre staff, including social workers, were out on the picket lines. Management workers, including McNutt, spent time in the units during that month.

The walkout did not start smoothly: On day one, there was a fire in one resident’s room.

“That was very serious,”

McNutt says. “We had two or three assaults … and the flipping of the table in the classroom … and the time the girls, what we call ‘flipped the cafeteria.’

“But quite frankly, I would have expected more incidents.”

Other incidents included: • April 17: “(Two residents) filled up their trays with all varieties of foods available for lunch but did not eat any of it … All of a sudden, she dropped the full tray in front of the boys’ table. Quickly … who was following behind took her tray and tipped it upward and lunged it forward towards the boys from Unit 6 … Immediately (the two residents) began to run wild around the cafeteria until such time as both were restrained by two staff members.”

• May 2: “At 2:40 p.m. … grabbed a spray bottle of window cleaner off the unit table and began to spray its contents at the other residents sitting in front of the T.V. … when asked to remove the belongings from his room he threw a school book off the wall and proceeded to yell insults at myself and kick the door.”

• May 11: “Resident was instructed to complete his daily chore … (staff) smelled smoke and immediately checked the area and

noticed smoke coming from the electrical outlet. Resident … apparently was spraying cleaning liquid into outlet and may have used an object to short the outlet.”

• May 13: “(Two residents) informed myself that they had drunk a bottle of Windex between them. They were both complaining of stomach pain and nausea … both boys taken to the clinic …”

• May 20: “The residents were taking their sneakers off when for no apparent reason (resident one) punched (resident two) in the left side of his face … staff observed that (resident two’s) left eye was swollen and his nose had started to bleed … (Resident) was only concerned with how much time-out he had and didn’t deny striking …”

• May 30: “The unit was asked … if they wanted to go to the gym and four did and four never. There is racial tension on our unit and it is divided. As a result there was various comments passed back towards the natives from the other residents …”

• June 2: “All residents were leaving the vestibule area when … and … began to fight … When questioned, … said that … had been threatening to jump him all weekend and he wasn’t going to wait any longer.”

Trawler incident ‘major scam’: Hearn From page 1 measurements to be off by 20 per cent, a “tolerance” level.

The EU inspectors gave “no weight” to the fact that some boxes of British-Isle turbot were actually marked as having been caught on the Grand Banks.

The Spanish captain convinced the EU inspectors that the boxes were only marked that way because Grand Bank turbot “fetches a better price.” The Dorneda has since moved off the Grand Banks.

Steven Outhouse, spokesman for the Fisheries Department in Ottawa, confirmed details for The Sunday Independent. He says the hidden-space citation was much less serious than the misreporting of Hatton Bank catches.

“The evidence was clear to us when we interpreted it that the turbot was from the NAFO regulatory area,” Outhouse says. “It leads us to be concerned that if ourselves and the EU are interpreting the evidence in such a different way we need to either make sure we’re on the same page … we need to basically make sure we’re on the same page.”

Outhouse says he has no idea how often foreign trawlers may be catching fish in one area, while reporting it caught in another.

“We don’t really have a full idea of that,” he says. “This is a double-edged sword of increas-

ing the enforcement, right? You catch things that could have perhaps been sneaking by before.

“We only know about it when we catch it and we can only catch it when we board ships and actually look for it,” Outhouse adds.

“And if we catch it and nothing is done about it that’s obviously a very frustrating type of situation for us.”

Since the incident, Spain has ordered the Dorneda off the Grand Banks, he says. “Even though the EU inspection didn’t agree with our citations the Spanish government told them to leave … due to the questionable circumstances, they were not allowed back in.”

The federal government began a crackdown on foreign fishing in the weeks leading up to the June 28 federal election. Canada stopped two Portuguese boats in earlier May, at about the same time that Fisheries Minister Geoff Regan announced millions of new dollars for offshore enforcement and surveillance.

Canadian inspectors have carried out 94 on-board inspections of foreign trawlers since May 3, Outhouse says. The stepped-up inspections and patrols have yielded only six citations for fishing violations. No charges have been laid.

MP Loyola Hearn, Fisheries critic for the federal Conservatives, described the incident

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

Atlantis, a Russian trawler, was in St. John’s harbour last week.

involved with Dorneda as a “major scam.”

“Our Fisheries officers are like the cops who complain about taking a crowd to court only to get a slap on the wrist before landing back on the street again,” he says, renewing his call for Canada to take custodial management of the Grand Banks.

The Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization, which monitors fishing outside Canada’s 200mile limit, is planning to reduce this year’s turbot quota of 20,000 tonnes to 16,000 tonnes by 2007.

A recent report predicts that close to 6,000 direct jobs may be

lost in Galacia, an area of northwestern Spain highly dependent on the Grand Banks fishery, if the turbot quota is cut. Spain is expected to submit a report to NAFO during an upcoming meeting in September asking the organization to take economic considerations into account and review quota allocations.

A DFO report submitted to NAFO last year stated that foreign vessels caught 15,000 tonnes of banned species in 2003 — a move that could endanger the slow recovery of those stocks.

In May, DFO officials accused the crew of the Portuguese trawler

Brites of violating a NAFO moratorium by catching endangered plaice and cod. When the vessel returned home, the Portuguese wouldn’t allow DFO officials to join the inspection. At the same time, the crew of another Portuguese boat, Aveirense, was accused of using a net with illegal small mesh.

The Portuguese government has not charged the vessels and DFO officials say they have received no word on whether the boat owners will be prosecuted.

The two ships are rumoured to be returning to the Grand Banks soon.

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

NEWS

Page 3

A Poke in the Eye

by Ray Guy

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

Bell Island

‘The only sound is the summer wind’ F ifty years ago I spent a school year on Bell Island.

It was August in the small place I lived and the single teacher for the one-room school hadn’t been found. I was going in Grade 11. So I was shipped off to stay with some relatives on that island in Conception Bay. The difference was shocking.

The place I came from had 182 people — I know that because when I couldn’t sleep I counted the people, by name, instead of sheep.

The loudest noises were the church bell on Sunday and the thumping of motorboat engines in the morning.

Bell Island, at that time, had more like 18,000 people. Around the clock, there was a roaring, grinding, blasting as the red guts of the island were gouged out and poured into a constant convoy of ore carriers from around the world.

It was a comparatively rich place in Newfoundland … other people accused Bell Islanders of eating Tbone steaks for breakfast.

But the ferry … after a 10-hour trip to St. John’s on the slow Bullet … made it seem to me like Alcatraz. I arrived at the end of

August with a doleful heart. But when I went away the next June I knew that these Bell Islanders had a pride in and an affection for their rock and community that was a condensation of what all Newfoundlanders have.

Red was the colour. Red dust, red mud, red cars and trucks, red clothes, red grass, red snow.

Seven days a week, dump trucks roared back and forth, steam shovels gouged, strings of tram cars rattled up and down the slopes and the red rocks and dust were poured in a constant avalanche over the cliffs at the back of the island to the ships below.

And on Saturday, the miners soaked and scrubbed the red dust off and headed for The Beach and beer.

It took no imagination to know that this flat-topped island you walked on was being blasted and scooped and shipped away to places where there was coal.

My relatives lived at The Front, a road that ran uphill to a large church where Monsignor Wassaname was the definite ruler.

My lodgings were flanked by Lamswoods and Powers and, a

mile inland, the school, a flat black building that stood in a bog and looked like a factory, was denominated an Academy.

Last week I went back to Bell Island and recognized nothing. Nothing except a few of the “company houses” which once abounded — two storey steep-roofed dwellings with an odd boxy piece running up the ends.

Fifty years later I can see the faces of most of my classmates and teachers; it’s the names that have been lost. Perhaps what I remember most was the movie theatre in the “town square” with the new Cinemascope where we went several times a week after school. That and going home for Easter when hell was the ice that piled up for weeks ahead in The Tickle.

Last week I went back to Bell Island and recognized nothing.

Nothing except a few of the “company houses” which once abounded — two storey steep-roofed dwellings with an odd boxy piece running up the ends.

Couldn’t find the Monsignor’s big church, Lamswood’s store, the old C of E “Academy” … nothing.

I found Lance Cove and Freshwater, one of the few places on the high island where the cliffs break for small beaches; the southern end with a small rolling prairie poised above the ocean; Lighthouse Road on the other end with warnings about the land falling away.

No red, no dust, no roaring, no blasting, not much more than a few thousand aging people. The quiet was shocking compared to my remembered roaration. This was a weekday but Bell Island was like the long sunny silence of an outport Sunday in the 1960s.

The thousands left long ago.

There were a few down on The Beach by the venerable Dicks tavern and restaurant, back from far away for a look around. I overheard one or two say they’d worked down Number This or

Number That mine but their conversations didn’t go much further.

Bell Island died back in Joey Smallwood’s time. Mining towns are like that and so are oil wells.

They begin to die as soon as the first hole is drilled and end when they can no longer serve industry.

But fishing towns and villages are not supposed to be like that at all.

Why then are there so many now in Newfoundland, where the only sound is the summer wind through the grass and the gulls overhead?

Ray Guy’s next column will appear Sept. 5.

Page 4

NEWS

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

An independent voice for Newfoundland & Labrador

P.O. Box 5891, Stn.C St. John’s, Newfoundland A1C 5X4 Tel: 709-726-4639 Fax: 709-726-8499 www.theindependent.ca The Sunday Independent is published

by The Sunday Independent, Inc. in St. John’s. It is an independent newspaper covering the news, issues and current affairs that affect the people of Newfoundland & Labrador.

PUBLISHER Brian Dobbin NEWSROOM Managing Editor Ryan Cleary Senior Editor Stephanie Porter Picture Editor Paul Daly Senior Writer Jeff Ducharme Reporter Alisha Morrissey Layout John Andrews OPERATIONS Operations Andrew Best

Guest Column

Have Newfoundlanders lost their spark?

Consultant Wilson Hiscock Account Executive Nancy Burt nancy.burt@theindependent.ca Circulation Representative Brian Elliott Office Manager Rose Genge E-MAIL Advertising: sales@theindependent.ca Production: production@theindependent.ca Circulation: circulation@theindependent.ca Newsroom: editorial@theindependent.ca All material in The Sunday Independent is copyrighted and the property of The Sunday Independent or the writers and photographers who produced the material. Any use or reproduction of this material without permission is prohibited under the Canadian Copyright Act. © 2004 The Sunday Independent

LETTERS POLICY The Sunday Independent welcomes letters to the editor.

Letters must be 300 words in length or less and include full name, mailing address and daytime contact numbers.

Letters may be edited for length, content and legal considerations. Send your letters in care of The Sunday Independent, P.O. Box 5891, Station C, St. John’s, NL, A1C 5X4 or e-mail us at editorial@theindependent.ca

by Gus Etchegary

A

few weeks before the recent federal election Prime Minister Paul Martin, North America’s largest marine re-flagger, made a statement in Charlottetown declaring Canada would implement custodial management on the Grand Banks and protect our diminishing fish stocks from those marauding foreigners.

That’s it! We have had enough, says the prime minister, Newfoundlanders and Labradorians have had it up to their ying yang and Canada is going to stand on its two feet for a change and stop the carnage once and for all.

For the next several weeks John Efford and Bill Matthews pranced across the public stage and repeatedly informed all and sundry that our leader has spoken: Custodial management is not just on the horizon, it will be implemented as soon as the people of our province see the light of Liberal wisdom and elect them to a solid majority. They were joined in the crusade for greater pensions and Andre Ouellett-style expense accounts by the new Martin stars and also some lesser lights. Norm Doyle and Loyola Hearn escaped the red sweep and survived the onslaught.

Three months pass.

The prime minister has since discovered the phenomenon of overfishing not only applies to the Grand Banks, but all over the world. Therefore he must appoint Nova Scotian Geoff Regan again, this time to lead a crusade by major fishing nations — such as Spain, Portugal, Greenland and Denmark — to halt overfishing and save that valuable source of protein to feed the hungry world in the years ahead. Regan was recognized as

the logical choice to lead the fray because of his major contribution, through NAFO, in curbing overfishing by the European Union countries and thereby setting a shining example for those fishing pirates.

Unfortunately, someone forgot to tell the Spaniards, Greenlanders, Icelanders and other EU countries.

Since the Liberals were re-elected they have not only gone on a spree of breaking every NAFO conservation measure in the book, but also erected false bulkheads in factory freezers to hide the “baby” turbot.

They have also threatened to fish 10 times the quota of shrimp that spill over from inside the 200-mile line from 3L fishing zone.

Is there no one in a position of leadership who feels even the slightest obligation to demonstrate to our children and grandchildren the mettle of our forefathers that formed the culture, heritage and strength of character that made us a proud people?

On top of that, the Spaniards are scheduled to make a pitch to NAFO members in September that the province of Galacia has 6,000 persons directly dependent on Grand Bank turbot and another 24,000 employed in the goods and services sector, which serves the Galacian industry. They will insist that biological constraints must be

secondary to socio-economic demands. You people from Newfoundland must understand the Galacians depend on that turbot resource in order to survive!

DFO to the rescue.

Since the Liberals were re-elected custodial management, somehow, was lost in the shuffle. Efford and Matthews disappeared into the woodwork, except for the occasional reminder by Efford that “he is our representative in cabinet.”

One would have thought that Matthews, after scurrying across the floor, would have at least made parliamentary assistant to the Fisheries minister since the fishery is more important to this province than all other East Coast provinces combined.

No such luck. We are not even entitled to a voice in trying to solve the greatest problem facing this province in 2004 — salvaging what’s left of what was once a huge fishery and our economic base to provide jobs, pay taxes and maintain our population.

To add salt to our wounds, in recent weeks we have had both Regan and other high-ranking bureaucrats announce on TV and radio that Canada has not given up on NAFO and will work hard in the next two or three years to make the commission fulfill its mandate; that we must go the diplomatic route and convince those naughty foreigners they must behave in future and forget the fact there is an objection procedure in NAFO that allows them to break every rule in the book with impunity.

How any fisherman, plant worker, union member, government official, politician or member of the public worth their salt can sit

and listen to such unadulterated garbage is beyond me.

Isn’t there a spark left in a Newfoundlander in a position of leadership that will cause him or her to rise up and tell the Regans, Martins, Effords and Matthews of this world where to go? Is there no one in a position of leadership who feels even the slightest obligation to demonstrate to our children and grandchildren the mettle of our forefathers that formed the culture, heritage and strength of character that made us a proud people?

Have these insincere and weakkneed politicians and bureaucrats beaten us to the point where we are really and truly prepared to accept Employment Insurance as a way of life for current and future generations of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians?

One thing is certain, unless the fishery is restored to 1970 levels in the near future, rural communities of this province will continue to be abandoned and another 60,000 people will move to other parts of Canada within 10 years.

Time is running out for the future of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Gus Etchegary Fisheries Crisis Alliance

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

NEWS

Page 5

Rural disparity Political districts beyond the overpass may dwindle given population decline

By Jeff Ducharme The Sunday Independent

boundary change until there’s a 25 per cent drop in population.

“As long as that reality and ural Newfoundland will practicality doesn’t get lost in lose and St. John’s will the figures and statistics game … gain if the provincial gov- in urban settings they could literernment follows the letter of the ally walk their district in an hour, law regarding legislation that from one end to the other,” says governs how electoral bound- Parsons.” aries are determined.

The commission is overseen According to the formula (a 10 by the provincial Justice Departper cent drop in population or ment. According to a spokespermore) prescribed under the legis- son, a report on the redistribution lation, 11 rural districts — out of of boundaries is expected in the the current total of 48 — could fall. find themselves declared null Parsons says there’s more to and void given Newfoundland redistribution than just numbers. and Labrador’s population drop. In urban settings, he says MHAs The districts include Baie don’t have to be concerned with Verte, Bellevue, Burgeo-LaPoile, such things as fire departments Cartwright-Lanse au Clair, For- that are paid and run by the tune Bay-Cape La Hune, Hum- municipalities. ber Valley, Labrador West, “Out in my area, if I have 10 Lewisporte, Placentia-St. communities, I have 10 fire Mary’s, St. Barbe, departments. and The StraitsThey’re all volunWhite Bay North “If you’re doing it teer as opposed to are all on the bub- on representation, usually paid ble. employees and But a number of there should be less they don’t have the seats in a rural districts, mostly gear, for example, urban, could be the that urban settings area because winners under have there’s less demand typically redistribution. The where municipal for the services of taxation is possipopulations of the districts of Cape ble,” says Parsons. the MHA.” St. Francis, Con“So the MHA — Kelvin Parsons plays a major role ception Bay South, St. John’s West, in that regard tryVirginia Waters ing always to get and Waterford Valley have some money to give these local increased in population by at service districts, to give these least 10 per cent. smaller towns, some basic mini“I have no problem if the ratio- mum of fire protection.” nale that’s used to justify the size Parsons contends that if there (of a district) makes sense, but I are changes to be made to the don’t believe in change for the alignment of districts, it’s the sake of change,” Kelvin Parsons urban districts that should be told The Sunday Independent. reduced.

Parsons, the Liberal MHA for “If you’re doing it on reprethe district of Burgeo-LaPoile, is sentation, there should be less likely to see the boundaries for seats in a rural area because his district redrawn. there’s less demand for the serA commission has already vices of the MHA,” says Parbeen set up to look at boundary sons. “It’s another service (to changes, but its report is more rural Newfoundland) that you than a year overdue. would have cut in terms of the “Then it takes a year or 18 representation.” months for the House to deal People in rural districts see with it … and that doesn’t allow their MHAs as more of an much time for anybody who’s ombudsman than those who live an incumbent MHA or anybody in urban areas. who wants to get involved to “He doesn’t waltz into his know what the boundaries are regional health care centre and going to be of the next provincial make a complaint or make an election,” says Parsons. inquiry or whatever, he picks up Torngat Mountains is exempt the phone and calls his MHA,” from the changes because of its says Parsons. “So are we going remote location. Rural districts to look at it strictly in terms of that are located on the coast, iso- numbers … or are we going to lated areas, or ones that are geo- look at it in terms of what the graphically vast will not face a MHAs do?”

R

Ryan Cleary’s column will return next week

Photo by Jeff Ducharme/The Sunday Independent

West coast Adventure Luiz Antonio Barbosa of Team Peru makes his way up the hill from the beach in Flat Bay after the dory leg of the Adventure Racing World Championship was cancelled, due to rough seas. The bikes were to be taken by the teams across the bay in the dories to Stephenville. The teams biked from Flat Bay to the finish at Marble Mountain outside Corner Brook.

Rant and Reason

by Ivan Morgan

There are scarier things than a chainsaw madman

A

while back some people who are important to me asked me to watch a horror movie with them. Just between you and me, I don’t think horror movies are scary.

Puerile, immature, stupid, tedious — those are words I could use, but scary? I don’t think so.

But it was important to them that I watched, and they are important to me, so . . .

I believe the film was The Ring. Certainly it was filled with gruesome images (yawn). I admit it made me jump a couple of times. But in truth, I have to confess, the scariest thing was the lead actor’s performance. Poor woman could not have acted her way out of a wet paper bag. Truly frightening.

Yet that didn’t seem to matter to anyone else who watched with me. They were all freaked out, which was weird because they had all seen the movie before.

There was talk of losing sleep.

There was an animated discussion about what images disturbed them the most. It was almost like they enjoyed being scared. Was it the creepy guy? Was it the horse falling off the ferry? (That was pretty damn grisly.) Was it the dead girl rising from the well?

What was the scariest?

It was fun watching them being scared, but none of it scared me even a little. I have been like this since I was a little kid. Ghosts and goblins, witches and the like — whatever. I don’t care.

Does this make me brave?

Nope. I just have a different scare quotient (for want of a better term). There are things that do scare me to death. I told my movie friends what they were. I think they thought I was nuts.

You be the judge.

One of the scariest movies I

have ever seen was The Killing Fields. To me it perfectly caught the utter brutal chaos of civil unrest. The first scene of Saving Private Ryan always chills me — as I know that I could have very easily have found myself in one of those landing craft. Dying for a worthy cause is a frightening thought; dying for no good reason at all is too horrifying to contemplate. Any movie that deals with Vietnam scares me to my core. I bet I will soon be scared to death watching movies about the invasion of Iraq.

Some political history scares me to death. Read about Lenin and the Russian revolution. Try and get your head around the idea of mass death for the betterment of humanity. Read about Stalinist Russia. Read about China under Mao. Read about the rise and fall of Adolf Hitler. That is the stuff that makes me lie awake at night and worry.

As part of my day job, I talk to high school students about the dangers of hate and intolerance.

When I am in the mood, I try to explain Cambodian Communist Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge to them.

I get a sea of blank faces. I talk slowly.

“They decided to rebuild society as an agrarian-based commune. To do that they emptied the cities and tried to kill everyone who could read.”

Hello? These people were truly out of their minds.

Nothing. Even pictures of the Holocaust don’t always register.

You can see it on the students’ faces. That was long ago and far away. What does this have to do with us? That scares me witless.

On a lesser scale, local stuff can really worry me. I have a recurring image I would love to turn into a movie. It involves Joe Smallwood and his henchmen on

the morning they signed the disastrous Churchill Falls deal. I see them walking confidently, in their suits, into the meeting where we were all well and truly rooked. I see it in slow-mo kind of way — a Reservoir Dogs pastiche — with them walking towards the camera, talking and laughing, perhaps Papa got a brand new bag playing as the score. Foreshadowing, I believe, is the technical term. Cut then to mouldering bridges, shabby schools and pot-holed highways. Why doesn’t this image frighten the wits out of anyone but me?

Suspending disbelief is the key to enjoying a good horror movie.

A guy with a chain saw chasing a cheerleader is frightening to people because it does not stretch their imagination. They can see how that could happen — no matter how horrible it might be.

The rise to power of a religious fanatic or political zealot they don’t find as scary. The prospect of the spectacular waste of human life and resources does not frighten them. They do not worry about the ease with which our political system could be hijacked by a few “true believers” set on imposing their vision, their idea of right and wrong on all of us. A movie like that they would find boring.

How’s that for a frightening thought?

Ivan Morgan can be reached at imorgan@elvis.com

Page 6

NEWS

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

Opinions Are Like...

by Jeff Ducharme

Remembering a brave soul S

ome of the more interesting things in this business are the souls you meet along the way. Holding a tape recorder or a camera allows one to revel in the best, and quake from the worst that society offers. But it teaches one to look beyond the cover and into the pages of the book for what makes something good or what turned it bad.

Even Hockey Night in Canada’s Don Cherry, as much as a vexation to the spirit as he is, has more good than bad — though there is likely a special place in hell reserved for his tailor. When Cherry dies, they should bury his tailor with him so as to put a final end to that crime of fashion that has been perpetrated on TV viewers for so long.

Corner Brook lost a sort of Don Cherry this week. Long-time Humber Log columnist Claudine Wall lost her valiant battle with cancer. With Claudine, you either loved or hated her — there was no middle ground.

The people who bothered to look beyond became endeared with a spirit whose love knew no bounds. If you were only allowed to have one friend in this world, Claudine would be a good choice.

She was opinionated and pulled no punches. If she thought it needed to be said, it was said and it was said loud enough so everyone heard.

Claudine knew Corner Brook; its movers and shakers, its lost and disenfranchised. If there was something happening in the west coast city, Claudine knew all about it.

To call Claudine a tireless volunteer would be an understatement, an injustice. She spent countless hours working for the Lion’s Club and various other charities in an effort to make her corner of the world a better place for all those who chose to live there. Nothing could be more laudable.

The picture that I will always have of Claudine, as will many in Corner Brook, is her work with The Children’s Wish Foundation.

Every year tens of thousands of dollars are raised to grant the wish-

es of sick children by a very small and dedicated group of volunteers — Claudine was one of the most dedicated.

We had already talked on the phone and she told me about how her cancer had returned. She had already gone through one hellish battle, and now there was to be another one waged.

I co-hosted the telethon with Claudine one year and she was the general in that studio, giving marching orders to anyone close enough to listen. She was a bear in front and behind the camera.

Things got done when Claudine was around. Children’s dreams were fulfilled when Claudine was around.

Just a few weeks ago, Claudine tracked me down and came to visit me at our new offices in St. John’s.

We had already talked on the phone and she told me about how

her cancer had returned. She had already gone through one hellish battle, and now there was to be another one waged. This battle didn’t last long. After getting the news from the doctors in St. John’s, she made her rounds to visit and say goodbye. But Claudine never once let on to me that this might be a fight she would lose. She smiled her gutsy smile and told me not to worry. Even when the tears rolled down my cheeks, her eyes stayed dry. As one would expect, she was more worried about me than herself.

Claudine hugged me. She kissed me on the cheek and she disappeared around the corner. There are many souls in this world that I have felt privileged to meet and Claudine is certainly one of them.

Many of us don’t go bravely into that deep dark night, but Claudine knew no other way. With Claudine’s battle over, Corner Book has lost one of its dearest and bravest souls.

Jeff Ducharme is The Sunday Independent’s senior writer. jeff.ducharme@theindependent.ca

Pay your taxes or take your chances; land for sale in Harbour Grace

By Alisha Morrissey The Sunday Independent

B

argain basement prices — everything must go. The Conception Bay North community of Harbour Grace was having a problem with residents defaulting on property taxes and has decided to take a tough-love approach with land owners.

“Pay the taxes or we’re going to sell your land,” says Lester Forward, town clerk.

The Harbour Grace council decided to draw a line in the sand when it came to approximately 40 properties in the town.

On Sept. 8, a public tax auction is scheduled to sell off the land to help the town recoup unpaid taxes. All the tax bills date back to

before 2000.

The number of properties on the auction block may have already changed, Forward says, pointing out that if a property owner comes forward and pays the tax bill before the auction date the property will be taken off the list.

The majority of the properties are vacant and only eight to 10

have houses on them. All but one of the houses are also vacant — and have been for a long time, Forward says.

He says the owners of the properties may never come forward — not because they fear the tax man — but because they don’t know they own any land.

“There may be no one living with the legal title to the land,” he

says. “Nobody’s going to pay taxes because nobody owns it.”

This is the third such auction, one was held in 1988 and another in 1994. Forward says the town won’t make a profit on the land.

Instead, the money raised is expected to just cover the cost of lost taxes.

“They either pay it up or they loose it.”

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

NEWS

Page 7

‘People are Newfoundland proud’ From page 1 Now the official colours of the Royal St. John’s Regatta, the Star of the Sea Society and the Swiler’s Rugby Club, the pink white and green is appearing everywhere.

The Downhomer Shoppe and Gallery has sold more than 78 flags of all sizes since January.

Owner Ron Young says it’s the beginning of a movement.

“There seems to be a trend of ‘Up yours Canada,’” he says with a smirk.

Donna Hearn, the store’s manager, says the flag and merchandise showing off the pink, white and green are the top sellers at the tourist shop.

“I think that people are Newfoundland proud,” says Hearn. “I don’t even know if it has to do with Confederation or not.”

In the first issue of The Sunday Independent last October, historian John FitzGerald wrote of the history of the flag and pointed out that the pink, white and green is older than the Irish flag by five years and that after 160 years of

history the original Newfoundland flag has still not been officially recognized.

He says the latest craze of flying the flag, of representing it on coffee cups and licence plates, is a form of cultural nationalism.

“I’m afraid that our culture and history is being forgotten and misrepresented.”

— Dr. John FitzGerald

“It will continue to be controversial because history is controversial,” he says, “History is all bout interpretation.”

FitzGerald, too, flies the flag.

“I’m afraid that our culture and history is being forgotten and misrepresented.”

One such misrepresentation is calling it “the republic of Newfoundland flag.”

“Newfoundland was never a republic,” FitzGerald says.

As to why the flag was never

adopted, he says the question relates to a host of symbols.

The head of a caribou, for example, is carved on hundreds of graves of Newfoundlanders who died overseas. Then, instead of the caribou, the puffin was declared Newfoundland and Labrador’s official animal.

“Someone in Toronto came up with that one … it’s because puffins are cute and you kiss them and drink an awful concoction and pay five dollars and that’s what our culture has come to,” says FitzGerald.

Brenda O’Reilly, owner of O’Reilly’s Irish Newfoundland Pub on George Street, flies the pink, white and green alongside the Irish flag outside her bar.

“Because we’re a Newfoundland bar,” she says, when asked the reason. O’Reilly says Irish/Newfoundland roots are “long settled.”

Newfoundlanders tend to be history oriented, she says, adding that in her travels she has not

Reforms or cuts?

Whichever way it’s viewed, health care in this province is destined to change: Marshall She calls the process “reviewing best practices.”

“One of the areas that I expect we will be announcing fairly shortly is a reorganizahe province will spend an estimattion of the board structure.” ed $1.6 billion this year on a healthMarshall wouldn’t speculate as to care system it can no longer afford, whether any future federal and Health Minister Elizabeth funding for the province will Marshall says the only solution make its way into the healthis reform. care system because no money To that end, the provincial has yet been approved and disgovernment may close some cussions are still ongoing. existing health care facilities or “The premiers of all the possibly build new ones. provinces will be meeting with In an interview with The Sunthe prime minister in Septemday Independent, Marshall ber, when they will be talking names one such initiative “locaabout health care and health tion of services. care funding,” she says.

“We are looking at where our In last week’s edition of The health care services are provid- Elizabeth Marshall Sunday Independent, Premier ed around the province and Danny William’s said any new federal determining exactly where those services money for health care won’t necessarily be should be located and exactly how we should be delivering those services,” says directed there. Rather, he said new funds would be put into government’s general Marshall.

“If we’re going to construct new facili- revenue pot.

Williams made the comments following ties, where is the best and most logical a recent meeting of premiers in Ontario in place to construct them?”

Government has also brought in external which they called for a national pharmacare consultants to review various health boards program.

The premier was optimistic over the posaround the province in an attempt to consolidate or streamline the system. In its first sibility of a new countrywide drug plan, budget in March, the Danny Williams which would remove the responsibility of administration announced plans to save drug costs from the province and lead to between $10 million and $14 million by improved standards.

For now, Marshall maintains that all consolidating some of the 14 health boards. efforts are focusing towards reform in an At the same time, a number of health-relatattempt to cut costs and improve efficiency. ed construction projects were cancelled or The results of the reviews of the healthput on hold.

Marshall mentions the Western Health care boards are still pending, and no cuts or Care Corporation and the Grenfell Associ- changes will be made until the final reports ation, both in western Newfoundland, as are in. The reports are expected by September. two that are currently under scrutiny.

By Clare-Marie Gosse The Sunday Independent

T

seen the flag fly anywhere but St. John’s — and doesn’t expect to.

“The majority of St. John’s voted against Confederation.”

Andrew Colford, a resident of Victoria Street, says he would rather fly a flag that represents the “nation” than the province.

“Canada is broken and until it’s fixed ...”

He looks up at his pink, white and green. alisha.morrissey@theindependent.ca

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The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

Rumours confirmed FPI goes on record with planned sale of U.S.-based marketing and value-added arm

By Stephanie Porter The Sunday Independent

F

ishery Products International has finally confirmed what The Sunday Independent reported last May: The company is looking to sell 40 per cent of its American operations.

“FPI Limited … confirmed, in response to recent media reports, that it is considering a proposed income trust transaction involving its U.S.-based Marketing and Value-added … Group,” read the press release, issued Aug. 6.

Although The Sunday Independent has published three stories on the upcoming changes to the company, FPI’s CEO Derrick Rowe declined comment until now.

He describes the sale as “another form of unsecured debt financing.” Under the proposal — currently being reviewed by the provincial government — a Canadian-based, publicly-traded income trust will be established to acquire 40 per cent of the marketing and value-added arm, currently based in Danvers, Mass.

This part of the business is vital to this province’s fishing industry.

Much of the fish processed in Newfoundland and Labrador is shipped to the American-based operation for further production.

It’s then marketed, from the U.S., across North America.

The main reason for the proposed change, Rowe says, is to allow FPI to pay down some $30

million in debt it carries on its Newfoundland-based fishing assets.

“We’ve incurred a significant amount of debt here in Newfoundland to modernize our business, something we had to do, in our view, to remain competitive — but something that is clearly more debt than we’d like to have,” Rowe says.

“By reducing the long-term debt, it gives a whole lot more flexibility and viability to the Newfoundland operations.”

FPI is the province’s largest fish processing company, employing more than 2,600 workers, most of whom work in eight plants around the island.

“We are not selling off our marketing arm, we’re not losing control of our marketing arm, we like it, we’re keeping it, we’re finding a way to raise money to grow it and reduce debt in Newfoundland.”

— Derrick Rowe Speculation about potential buyers has been swirling since the story first broke. An Icelandic company and competitor, Icelandic Freezing Plants Corpora-

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

FPI’s CEO Derrick Rowe

tion, was rumoured to be quite interested.

Rowe bristles at the suggestion.

“This is a public offer, this will be sold by retail brokers. We expect to have many hundreds of shareholders,” he says.

“I can’t tell you the Icelanders won’t by a share, but I would be shocked if they did. Why would they? Why would they finance us? They get no control, they get no say, it’s bizarre, it’s just so silly.”

Rowe says he’s only too aware of the concerns that have been raised about the sale. Some worry Newfoundland and Labrador’s fish plants will not receive the same support under a restructured marketing arm.

“The problem with FPI is we can’t disclose until we reach a certain point,” says Rowe, “and it’s not hard to find someone to say, ‘Oh this is terrible because they’re going to sell off the marketing arm.’

“We are not selling off our marketing arm, we’re not losing control of our marketing arm, we like it, we’re keeping it, we’re finding a way to raise money to grow it and reduce debt in Newfound-

land.”

Rowe maintains the company will retain control of the remaining 60 per cent of the operations, and elect a majority of the boards of directors.

FPI’s current proposal is the second to be given to the provincial government for approval. The first version, submitted last May, was turned down.

The company is subject to the FPI Act, which prevents any shareholder from owning more than 15 per cent of the company. It also prevents FPI from selling substantial portions of its operations.

Fisheries Minister Trevor Taylor says the province is in the midst of on-going discussions with FPI. “At this point, what they’re proposing is being evaluated by our officials, our internal legal council, we have also sought some external legal advice on this … we are not in a position to tell them yes or no (yet),” he told The Independent.

“Anything they propose would have to be … in the best interests of the fishing industry of the province, for the rural areas of the province.”

Taylor says the government understands the need for FPI to raise capital, pay down debt, and make new investments.

“I’m not sure what I’m allowed to say … the FPI act is all about ownership and control, so you can handy about guess the kind of discussion that we would have had … There’s an acute awareness of the value of maintaining access to and a strong presence in the market, the only question is how best to do that.

“Some would maintain the best way to do that is by growing a company, some would maintain it’s best by having what you have.”

Taylor says he hopes the issue, now ongoing for three months, will be taken care of in short order.

As for Rowe, he seems to be patiently biding his time.

“The government will make up its mind in due process,” he says.

“They have been asking an extraordinarily large number of questions — we have a business savvy legal-minded premier who knows how to ask tough questions and expects proper answers.

“What they’re going to do when I can’t tell you.”

Baby Natalie progressing Happy Valley-Goose Bay

By Bert Pomeroy The Sunday Independent

A

baby girl from Happy Valley-Goose Bay who was given little hope of surviving more than a few hours continues to defy all odds.

Baby Natalie, as she has become affectionately known, is daughter of Lloyd and Barb Wolfrey She was born 15 weeks premature.

The Sunday Independent featured a story of the first week of the baby’s life in the July 2531 edition (Small wonder, page 1).

At the time of her birth on July 13, Baby Natalie weighed just over one pound, four ounces and measured one foot long. As a micro-preemie, the smallest of all premature Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

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babies, doctors told the Wolfreys their first child would, in all likelihood, die within minutes of her birth.

That was nearly a month ago. Since then Baby Natalie has received a blood transfusion, her heart and oxygen levels have improved, a brain bleed appears to have gone and she’s now recovering from a surgery to correct a heart defect.

“She’s doing really well,” says Lloyd.

“Doctors are really impressed with her progress.”

The baby has also gained more than onehalf pound, notes the proud father, and “she’s starting to grow some hair.”

The Wolfreys continue to live in St. John’s with their daughter and look forward to taking her home to Labrador in a couple of months.

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

NEWS

Page 9

‘Arbitrary deadline’ Premier won’t be rushed to sort out finances; denies his offshore oil and gas companies involved in Lower Churchill contract

By Ryan Cleary The Sunday Independent

T

he management team looking after Danny Williams’ personal finances may keep missing the deadline to meet conflict of interest regulations, but the premier says he won’t be rushed.

Williams, a millionaire lawyer who owns a number of companies involved in offshore oil and gas development, also says he isn’t in a conflict regarding work being carried out for the province on the feasibility of transmitting power from the Lower Churchill.

“I’ve got to do this right and I’m not going to rush it and come up with a load of agreements or roll out stock at a point in time when it’s not the right time to do it,” Williams told The Sunday Independent.

“I’ve got to maximize it because I’ve worked too hard to put it together.

“And I personally, quite frankly, (am) making a big personal sacrifice with the job I’m in. It’s rewarding if I can get the job done, which I certainly hope to get the job done, but on the other hand I can’t take 50 years, 55 years of accumulating assets and just write it off for some arbitrary deadline that gets set.”

Wayne Green, the province’s commissioner of member’s interests, had given Williams’ financial management firm a deadline of July 31 to address concerns regarding the premier’s personal assets.

Green wanted Williams to take certain measures — including the establishment of a blind trust — to avoid possible conflicts of interest.

As of Aug. 6, Green’s concerns still hadn’t been addressed. Reporting to the speaker, which Green has hinted at doing in the past, can result in possible fines or suspension.

Williams reportedly met the requirements of the act that tracks the financial interests of MHAs by the April 1 deadline, but Green asked for further action to be taken in regards to the management of certain assets.

Green told The Independent he was expecting a telephone call Aug. 2 from an official of a firm representing the premier, but the call never came. The official apparently went off on three weeks holidays.

GARY PERRY

“I’ve got to do this right and I’m not going to rush it and come up with a load of agreements or roll out stock at a point in time when it’s not the right time to do it.”

— Danny Williams Green says he tracked down another official representing Williams’ interests and was told the holdup is with a third-party bank.

Green says he will only file a report with Speaker Harvey Hodder’s office as a last resort.

Green was cryptic in his explanation of what’s causing the delay.

“At the end of the day all the pieces have to come together.

What’s bothering me is, to a large extent, they’re independent pieces and what’s really hard for me to understand is why independent pieces seem to be all delayed,” he says.

“I don’t understand why interests that seem to be independent of each other in terms of course of action all seem to be delayed.”

Williams has an investment portfolio of numerous companies, including well-known firms such as BCE Inc., Torstar Corp., Gillette Co., and Canadian Imperial Venture.

Williams also owns a company called Spectrol Energy, an offshore oil and gas supply and services company with contracts in the province, Nova Scotia, the North Sea, Texas and Asia.

Williams is also tied to Atlantic XL, a Dartmouth-based company that provides engineering products and services for oil and gas companies, utilities and industry resource clients. The company does work with the Sable natural gas project off Nova Scotia.

Further, the premier owns OIS Fisher, an offshore oil and gas supply and services company.

The province has hired a consultant to examine the Atlantic Canada underwater route for the transmission of power from the Lower Churchill. Williams’ government won’t name the consultant, although officials have denied a

753-3030

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

Premier Danny Williams and wife Maureen. Williams’ personal finances have yet to be cleared by the conflict of interest commissioner.

charge by the Liberals that Fortis is involved.

Opposition leader Roger Grimes has called for Williams to release the name of the consultant, the terms of reference for the contract and costs associated with the work.

“The secret nature of this proposal is very suspect. If there is nothing to hide, the premier must come forward and release these details immediately.”

Williams says companies he’s involved in aren’t involved in the Lower Churchill project, although he isn’t 100 per cent sure.

“I can’t give you a carte blanche as to what they’re doing for two reasons: First of all, I don’t know what they’re doing and I don’t really care, it’s none of my business.

And secondly, it’s in a blind trust, I don’t know anyway.”

Williams says Spectrol Energy

and Atlantic XL have been in the control of a blind trust for four or five months, during which time he’s had no active involvement.

“There is nothing there of any conflict whatsoever because none of those companies came across my desk as being involved,” Williams says.

“You have to understand a blind trust is a blind trust. They do what they’re going to do, but I would see it on the other end. If they (companies he’s involved in) were surfacing as part of a consortium then I’d flag it and that hasn’t happened, and they’re not involved.”

Williams, who built Cable Atlantic into one of the largest communications companies in Atlantic Canada before it was sold to Rogers Communications, still holds shares in Rogers. He’s working on a strategy on how to deal with certain assets like the Rogers shares.

“I’ve hired the best people in the country and in the business that I can get to do this and they’re not ready to close it,” he says. “And it’s not something that you can put an arbitrary deadline on and say, ‘OK this is going to happen on July 1, July 31 or April Fools for that matter.

“It takes time and I’m not going to do it and place it in jeopardy for myself or for my family. That’s the bottom line on that and people have to accept that.”

Page 10

NEWS

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

West Words

by Frank Carroll

How to destroy rural Newfoundland

L

ooks like folks on the Baie Verte Peninsula are just going to have to start committing more crimes.

According to the provincial government, the number of cases heard in Springdale provincial court declined by 50 per cent in the past decade. Given the decrease and the province’s financial state, the Danny Williams government decided it would be cost effective to close the Springdale courthouse and transfer cases to Grand FallsWindsor.

Some Springdale residents aren’t too happy about it. During a small protest recently held in the town, NAPE representative Robert Cater described the closure as part of “a vicious attack on rural Newfoundland.”

I know I’ve only just recently built a column around a Simpsons gag, but Cater’s comments remind me of another. And I just can’t resist.

You see, on The Simpsons the U.S. Republican Party headquarters are located in a castle straight out of a classic horror movie. Such notable Republicans as Monty Burns, Krusty the Clown and Dracula can be found there plotting to stiff taxpayers and destroy

the environment.

At one meeting, former Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole reads from The Necronomicon, a mythical book of black magic that appeared in the writings of H.P. Lovecraft and in The Evil Dead movies.

I can just picture our own rightof-centre cabinet, all decked out in hooded cloaks, feverishly trying to devise ways to destroy rural Newfoundland.

Dark Lord Danny addresses his evil minions thusly: “Now that we’ve finally decided on a way to stick it to Springdale, brother Ed Byrne will close the meeting with a reading from The Satanic Bible.”

So that’s what they’re calling the Tory Blue Book these days.

Seriously though, the idea that our government is deliberately attacking rural Newfoundland is just as absurd as Bob Dole reading from The Necronomicon. (Now, Donald Rumsfeld I can see.)

Government’s decision to close the Springdale court was motivated by a desire to be responsible with the taxpayers’ money, not out of some callous disregard for rural Newfoundland. If the number of cases being heard in Springdale

does not merit a courthouse, why keep it open?

Springdale is a service centre for the Baie Verte Peninsula, so I guess some residents feel threatened by the loss of the government service. But a court house exists as a means to administer justice, not as an economic asset.

Not even government’s staunchest critic would say the closure of the courthouse and the subsequent loss of one job will devastate the Springdale economy.

But the recent protest was not so much about the closure of the courthouse as it was a signal to government that it should go no further in slashing services. It’s as if the demonstrators were saying, “Imagine how angry we’ll get if you try to close a school or a clinic.”

In that sense, your heart has to go out to people who fear for the future of their communities. Take out a courthouse and, well, people can mail in the money to pay a traffic fine. Take out a school or a clinic, and they start moving away.

So, I think that while many Newfoundlanders can understand why the Williams government is shutting down the courthouse in Springdale, they can also

Waiting game West coast chicken farmers still waiting for word on compensation

By Ryan Cleary The Sunday Independent

P

romised a prompt answer to their request for compensation, west coast chicken farmers who lost their shirts when the industry collapsed in 2000 are crying foul over the provincial government’s failure to deliver.

“Government is doing to us the one thing they said they wouldn’t — dragging us down the road and keeping us waiting,” says Kim Legge, spokeswoman for the 10 west coast chicken farmers.

Indeed, Natural Resources Minister Ed Byrne told The Sunday Independent in last week’s edition he would have a response to the farmers by Aug. 3, a pledge he failed to deliver on.

“Everyone will have to wait until next week,” Byrne said in a July 30 interview. As it turned out, Byrne was unavailable this past week. “The minister will speak to you next week,” was all a spokesperson would say.

Legge said the farmers met with Byrne in early May, at which time they outlined their case for compensation.

“He (Byrne) appeared to be very empathic to our situation,” she says. “He had a good understanding of what went down and the one promise that he made to the group was that he would get back to us in as timely a manner as possible.

“So we waited on hands and kept our mouths shut.”

Until now, that is.

“We keep getting the runaround from department officials.

We can’t even get in touch with our MHA, Kathy Goudie. She won’t return our calls.”

Ten west coast chicken farmers, most of whom were based in Howley just outside Deer Lake, went under in 2000, three years after the former administration of Brian Tobin closed the Corner Brook slaughterhouse.

As a result, the farmers were forced to truck their chicken to the abattoir in St. John’s. It wasn’t economical to do so, however, and Integrated Poultry Ltd., a company owned by the farmers, went out of business.

Integrated Poultry was a private company, but the farmers say their hand were held, every step of the way, by the province.

The Roger Grimes administration saw merit in their case and signed off on a letter last fall agreeing to pay the farmers $200,000 each in compensation.

The letter was drawn up on Sept.

29, the very day Grimes called the provincial election.

The compensation came with a hitch in that the money would

only be paid this year and only if the Liberals won last fall’s provincial election.

Williams didn’t have to live up to any promise he didn’t make.

Fearing the Liberals would lose the election and suspicious the Grimes’ government was trying to quiet them down in the heat of an election, the farmers went public with their story and a question about the letter was raised during last fall’s televised leaders’ debate.

The farmers see the letter as an admission of liability.

“We still have the letter saying government would pay the farmers $200,000 apiece … as to whether it carries any legal weight we’re not sure, but we’ll pursue it if we have to,” says Legge.

empathize with townspeople wanting to draw a line in the sand.

Residents of western Newfoundland sure can empathize.

They have already drawn their own line when it comes to a possible reduction of health-care services.

The Western Memorial Health Care Corporation has proposed a number of cuts in the region, including the removal of surgical units from Stephenville and Port aux Basques. It also proposed removing an obstetrics unit from the Stephenville hospital.

Earlier this year, hundreds of Stephenville and Port aux Basques residents attended public meetings to protest the proposed measures.

The government responded by commissioning an independent report by a consulting company known as the Hay Group. That report is due in a few weeks.

Health Minister Elizabeth Marshall recently visited the Stephenville hospital and the Codroy Valley Medical Clinic.

While it was somewhat comforting that the minister would take the time to visit these facilities, her comments to the media were less reassuring, given the timing.

The community newspaper in

Stephenville quoted Marshall as saying that increased federal funding would not be enough to solve Newfoundland’s health-care problems. Changes are coming. It’s just a matter of how far they will go.

It would be foolish to prejudge the Hay Report or government’s response to it. But I can easily predict the response of western Newfoundlanders if the report upholds the health care corporation’s proposed cutbacks.

Only so far, and no further.

Frank Carroll is a journalism instructor at the College of the North Atlantic’s Stephenville campus. frank_carroll_nf@yahoo.ca

Shipping News Keeping an eye on the comings and goings of the ships in St. John’s Harbour. Information provided by the Coast Guard Traffic Centre.

MONDAY, AUGUST 2 Vessels arrived: Atlantis, Russian, from Flemish Cap; Atlantic Eagle, Canada, from Terra Nova; Maersk Chancellor, Canada, from Terra Nova; Maersk Placentia, Canada, from Hibernia; ASC Sanderling, Canada, from Halifax; Atlantic Kingfisher, Canada, from Terra Nova; Atlantic Osprey, Canada, from White Rose Oil Field; Ocean Prawns, Canada, from Harbour Grace.

Vessels departed: Atlantic Eagle, Canada, to Terra Nova; Cabot, Canada, to Montreal; Ocean Prawns, Canada, to fishing.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 3 Vessels arrived: Emma, Norway, from sea; Vizconde De Eza, Spain, from sea.

Vessels departed: Atlantic Kingfisher, Canada, to Terra Nova; Atlantic Hawk, Canada, from White Rose; ASL Sanderling,

Canada, from Corner Brook; Maersk Cancellor, Canada, from Grand Banks.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 4 Vessels arrived: Atlantic Kingfisher, Canada, from White Rose.

Vessels departed: Maersk Placentia, Canada, to Hibernia; Charles Darwin, Britain, from sea.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 5 Vessels arrived: Stena Forteller, Sweden, from Montreal.

Vessels departed: Atlantic Kingfisher, Canada, to Terra Nova.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 6 Vessels arrived: Maersk Placentia, Canada, from Hibernia; Maersk Chancellor, a from White Rose.

Vessels departed: Atlantic Hawk, Canada, to Terra Nova; Stena Foreteller, Sweden, to Montreal; Atlantic Eagle, Canada, to Terra Nova; Irving Canada, Canada.

August 8, 2004

Page 11

The Sunday Independent

IN CAMERA

Once more around the pond The only thing more successful than the186th Royal St. John’s Regatta, a Newfoundland tradition, is sure to be the 187th

M

orning fog hangs on the hills surrounding Quidi Vidi Lake in St. John’s and even at 8 a.m. there’s a string of people, shoulder to shoulder, lining the head of the pond.

The first race of the day begins with the usual gunshot. Frenzied ducks fly off as the rowers glide down the first leg of the race.

The 186th Royal St. John’s Regatta has officially begun.

The shells turn the buoys. Heading back up the pond there’s little graceful, besides the stroke, about these rowers, redfaced and strained.

Another shot is fired, signaling the end of the race, and five pairs of arms fly up faster than the ducks that took off just a few minutes before. The families and friends of the rowers clap and cheer as they take their time, savoring the victory, back to the boathouse.

Coxswains can be heard over the din of the crowd, shouting encouragement to their crews.

For many, however, the regatta isn’t about the races.

It’s a day for riding on Daddy’s shoulders.

When he gets tired there are ponies to ride.

It’s a day for eating overpriced hot dogs,

Photos by Paul Daly / Story By Alisha Morrissey

Continued on page 12

Page 12

‘Look what I’ve won’ From page 11 French fries, cotton candy and even Indian food ($10 for the full-meal deal).

It’s a day for jumping inside inflatable castles (sliding down the Titanic was particularly popular), playing games and winning stuffed prizes.

The regatta is a day most St. John’s residents look forward to, a mid-summer holiday to spend with family.

Two hours after the start of the first race, the walkway circling the lake balloons to 10- or 15people deep. A steady stream of regatta goers make their way lakeside.

Mothers and fathers carry heavy backpacks, gripping their children’s hands. Little girls clutch their change purses and boys beg another toonie from dad (most everything costs $2).

“Let me out,” shouts one little boy from the confines of his stroller.

“Look what I’ve won,” shouts an older kid making his way to his parents.

The concession booth operators have begun shouting to the crowds, and there’s a little light drizzle.

More than 190 booths were erected this year, although the regatta committee is unable to say how many represented a charity.

“Prize every time,” a ticket seller shouts into the swelling crowd. “Ten cents a ticket — 10 for a dollar,” a woman taunts the crowd. “Don’t you want to win a prize for the pretty lady you’re with, you know she wants a teddy bear.”

Suddenly, there’s a downpour, but no one runs to take cover, most don’t rush to leave. Many of the thousands of people surrounding the pond pull up hoods and shake umbrellas to life.

“As long as the winds stay down,” says one woman, passing by.

The Wonder Bolt Circus performs several free shows throughout the day. Fun Factor teaches a bible class with a puppet show, and the Church Lads Brigade band plays from the bandstand as they have for 40 years.

The regatta is a St. John’s tradition. Residents are guaranteed to bump into someone they know and probably haven’t seen for years.

The rain clears shortly after 2 p.m. and the heat becomes unbearable. Hundreds of people are already downing beverages in the beer tent.

“Another walk around the pond and we’ll go home,” one woman says to her son.

“Mommy can I have a balloon?”

“No,” says the woman, obviously frustrated by the crowd — and expense.

Near the boathouse, St. John Ambulance workers mill about. Correctional officers from Her Majesty’s Penitentiary congregate outside a door to the prison, people watching.

The RV park on the other side of the pond boasts licence plates from Nevada, Alberta, Tennessee and Indiana.

By late afternoon, the sun is still blazing and the line-ups have become too long for some to tolerate. Mothers and fathers appear to have become almost as cranky as their kids, babies squeal in their strollers and teenagers gather in groups, talking on cell phones.

At various points around the lake it’s almost impossible to pass by.

Some pack it up and head home only to realize they’re parked a half-hour walk away.

Later in the evening the championship races begin and the shells again take their place at the starting line.

Another gunshot rings out. All eyes are on the boats and the crews they hold. The crowd hollers and cheers.

The winners: NTV crew in the senior male race with a time of 4:22; Jungle Jims takes the women’s race with a time of 5:06.

Only a few thousand are left around the pond by the end of the races. They mostly congregate at the boathouse where medals are draped around the necks of champion athletes.

All along the edges of the pond concessionaires begin tearing down booths and packing up their wares.

“Another walk around the pond and we’ll go home.”

IN CAMERA

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

IN CAMERA

Page 13

Page 14

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

Gallery Stephanie Barry Visual Artist

H

aving a new son has changed both the amount of time Stephanie Barry can spend on her artwork, and the themes she finds emerging in it.

“He does put a mega-crimp in the work,” she says with a laugh. “Work has scaled back a lot … but he has taken my work in a completely different direction. I like to think my work is a lot more celebratory than it once was.”

A graduate of the Anna Templeton Centre’s textile studies program, Barry tends to incorporate a number of different media and techniques in any one piece: Natural dyes, hand and machine embroidery, photography, collage, weaving, even objects she’s gathered outdoors all find their way in her work.

“I started off using Japanese paper and embroidery almost exclusively,” she says from her home in St. Michael’s on the Southern Shore. “In the past two or three years I’ve started to use digital transfers, and I’ve been doing a lot more of my own photography to do them. Like I said, the work is becoming a little more personal.”

For example, Barry photographed a pile of oranges in her kitchen, transferred the image to fabric, then embroidered over one single piece of fruit.

“It worked,” she says. “I don’t know why but it did. That’s one of my most recent pieces.”

Barry has always turned to her immediate environment — her home, and the land, beach and ocean near it — for inspiration. As a new mother, she says she’s looking at things even more closely.

“It’s finding interest in everyday things,” she says. “The things I look at every day and then, one day saying ‘Oh wait, just look …’

“One of the things you hope to do as an artist is find something so familiar to people and present it to them in a new way that makes them think twice about it or gives them a new connection to it.”

Baby Aiden is 11 months old. “I’m blessed beyond belief,” Barry says.

“He does all those things you want babies to do — sleep through the night, great temperament …

“This has been a real growth period. The effects of it are probably yet to be seen, totally.”

— Stephanie Porter

The Gallery is a regular feature in The Sunday Independent. For further information, or to submit proposals, please call (709) 726-4639, or e-mail editorial@theindependent.ca

August 8, 2004

Page 15

The Sunday Independent

BUSINESS & COMMERCE

Blame it on the rain Poor weather in early summer caused dip in beer sales; breweries wish for sun

By Alisha Morrissey The Sunday Independent

decline in sales over the past 10 years could be demographics — an aging population, and the fact cold beer on a hot day is that people seem to be more mindjust the fix, but a chilly, ful of their health. Crummell notes early summer left brew- that Molson’s market share has eries in the province parched for been growing about one per cent a better sales. year in recent years.

Breweries saw an almost four David Rees, owner and operator per cent decline in beer sales of Quidi Vidi Breweries in the between April and early August. capital city, says his sales improve Danny Crummell, sales manag- in the summer — regardless of the er with Molson Breweries in St. weather. Tourists prefer to try a John’s, says the province’s beer local brew over a beer they can industry sold 157,000 hectolitres drink at home, he says. of beer to this date in 2003, and Because of the interest from only 153,000 hectolitres over the tourists, Rees says summer sales same period this year. at Quidi Vidi are relatively higher The difference works out to than those at Molson or Labatt. roughly 122,000 dozen bottles of He says the proposed beer.

Molson/Coors merger should also There was some speculation help his business. that a rise in the price “I’ve had so many of booze in early May people say that since caused the slump, but Coors has taken over “We have that theory was disMolson that really we only had two credited when recent should be drinking weeks of industry stats indicatmore Quidi Vidi beer ed beer sales are flat. summer so far.” — supporting the Crummell says he local.”

— Molson sales thought crossing the While Rees doesn’t “$20 threshold” for a manager Danny expect an immediate dozen beer would change, he has no Crummell have been directly doubt a merger will linked to the slight bolster the local brewdecrease in sales. ery.

“When we dig deeply we found Beer drinkers in this province we sold more 12 packs than we are the second largest per capita did last year,” he says. consumers in the country after Twelve packs made up half the Quebec. Statistics and sales show retail beer sales in the province for Newfoundlanders and Labradorithe past few years. ans prefer light beers to traditionAs a result, the relatively small al products with five per cent alcodecline has mostly been blamed hol content. on the weather.

“The consumer, ultimately, is “We have only had two weeks the one who decides what they of summer so far,” Crummell told want to drink,” says Crummell.

The Sunday Independent.

Fifty per cent of all beer prodAnother factor in the slow ucts purchased in the province are

A

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

light products.

Molson Canadian is the current favourite in the province with 17 per cent of market share. Coors Light comes in second with 15 per cent, followed by Canadian Light

and Labatt Light tied in third place at 14 per cent.

Crummell says local beers like India Beer, Black Horse and Dominion are seeing renewed interest and their sales figures are

rising slowly, but surely.

Both brewers — Molson and Quidi Vidi — say the reason drinkers in the province prefer Continued on page 16

Page 16

BUSINESS

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

Network growing U.K. aerospace show yields opportunity for Atlantic Canadian businesses

By Stephanie Porter The Sunday Independent

H

oward Nash says the recent Farnborough International Air Show in England was “the most amazing thing” he’s ever seen in his life.

Nash, president of St. John’sbased Northstar Network, Ltd., was part of an ACOA-sponsored contingent that attended the air show a couple of weeks ago.

About 35 government aerospace and defence industry representatives were part of the Atlantic Canadian trade mission.

By the very nature of Northstar Network, Nash was representing a whole lot more than himself.

Northstar is currently made up of some two-dozen organizations, from the education, manufacturing and high-tech sectors. Twentythree are from Atlantic Canada, one is from the U.S. (providing better access to American contracts), and one from India. (India has some of the cheapest rates for e-learning technology in the world, Nash says.)

Together, the Northstar Network boasts a wide range of manufacturing and engineering skills — and well over 2,000 employees.

Nash was skeptical heading to his first Farnborough show. He was well impressed with what he found.

“The whole show is on four or five acres of land, plus each company there has half a dozen planes, a half-dozen helicopters … it makes the Shearwater air show (in Nova Scotia) we go to every year seem like a drop in the bucket.”

He plunks a stack of business cards as thick as a fist on the table beside him. “There are tremendous opportunities,” he says.

“These are the ones that represent serious opportunities for us.”

He pulls out a typed report, single-spaced and several pages long.

It’s his travel report — which he’s not at liberty to share, given the sensitive and technical nature of some of the projects he’s working on.

He does offer a couple of examples of successes he gathered through his days of back-to-back meetings.

“I brought back a potential software contract, from a company called Vega UK, who I’d met with in the U.S. a couple times before.

We were talking Joint Strike Fighter,” Nash says, referring to a major defense contract the Network is vying for a piece of.

“We were talking bidding those contracts together, we’ve shared intelligence. We were talking about some of (Vega’s) in-house work — saying they’re really backlogged on preparation.”

Nash saw an opportunity. He pointed out the difference between the British pound and the Canadi-

an dollar.

“I was asking, why aren’t we getting more work in Canada? I was saying in Atlantic Canada we have some of the cheapest rates in Canada for electronic contracting … combined with the dollar we should be able to save you some money.”

The Vega representative made a phone call, then gave Nash a disc.

If he was able to find a way to beat the company’s current rate, that contract was his. And others would follow.

“It is a good opportunity for them to outsource to us. It makes

‘Newfoundlanders want the party to last a little longer’ From page 15

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

Howard Nash, president of Northstar Network Ltd.

“People are beginning to realize that beer doesn’t have to taste the same,” he says, adding sales of light beer is because people think they can drink imported beer are low in the province, although that more without getting as intoxicated. may be beginning to change.

“Newfoundlanders want the party to last a little In fact, imports represent only three per cent of longer,” says Crummell, whose sales here compared to mainland brew of choice is the full-bodied Canada where it’s 10 per cent.

Canadian Light. “They want to According to industry statistics, “Its common knowledge only 20 per cent of beer consumed remain in control.”

Over at Quidi Vidi Brewery, that when the sun shines in the province is sold at licensed Rees says the No. 1 seller — establishments like restaurants and the beer flows.” making up 75 per cent of sales — bars. The other 80 per cent is sold — David Rees, owner is actually three beers. at retail stores.

Honey Brown, Northern Light Beer drinkers may be hoping and operator of and 1982 battle it out for the top for more sunny days for barbeques Quidi Vidi Breweries spot every week, says Rees, who and patio parties, but Rees and on a hot day likes to kick back Crummell are counting on it. with a refreshing Honey Brown “It’s common knowledge that Light. when the sun shines the beer flows,” Rees says.

He says the micro-brewed beers are doing better The Labatt sales representative was out of the now. province and unable to comment.

sense for them to do business with us … and vice versa.”

Then there was the conversation Nash had with the head of a U.K.based engineering firm, Stirling Dynamics. Stirling was the one to approach Nash to talk about submarines: The company is trying to sell an automatic steering system into Canada.

“It looked to him that we have the right mix of companies to do the retrofit,” Nash says. “So we sat down and talked; a good meeting that will result in business for a lot of companies in Atlantic Canada.

“It just goes to show the power

of the network — it solves all their problems.”

In other words, Nash says, the aerospace and defence industries are alive and well in Atlantic Canada. As is Northstar’s evergrowing network.

At the air show, Nash sealed a deal with Wiebel Aerospace of Prince Edward Island. Wiebel is now part of the network, and the network now reaches into all four Atlantic provinces.

“Atlantic Canada isn’t a very big place,” says Nash. “But together (Northstar Network) can be a very big company.”

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

BUSINESS

Page 17

‘Ripple effect’ Crab fishery closure will have impact on hundreds of plant workers and fishermen — not to mention next year’s quota

By Alisha Morrissey The Sunday Independent

T

he crab fishery on Newfoundland’s northeast coast may have closed in late July but it will be the fall before the province has a handle on the number of workers affected and the full economic impact.

Eight crab plants are directly impacted by the fishery closure, which scientists called for, given the high rate of soft-shelled or molting crab. Considering crab is often trucked to more plants around the province for processing, the shut down will have an even broader impact.

Hundreds of plant workers aren’t expected to land enough hours this summer to qualify for Employment Insurance benefits, although the province’s Fisheries Department won’t have an exact number until September when it mails out its annual labour market survey.

Fisheries Minister Trevor Taylor says he’s concerned about the fishery, which had troubles with soft-shelled crab since it opened in May. “Any time there’s a loss of a few pounds of crab, that has a ripple effect right through the industry,” he says, adding there will likely be a dramatic decrease in next year’s crab quota as a result.

The fishery’s early closure resulted in about 1,600 tonnes of crab being left in the water, with a landed value of an estimated $8.9 million.

Taylor says government is currently assessing employment levels throughout the industry, hoping to find a short-term solution for the displaced workers.

“So (in the) short term, we’re not sure yet, but in longer terms there’s not enough crab to sustain 35 crab plants of Newfoundland and Labrador,” he says.

Taylor says there are too many fishermen and plant workers for such a small amount of crab.

“If we don’t have enough crab for 35 plants in today’s quota, how can we have enough crab for 35 plants in next year’s quota when we know, whether we want to admit it or not, that the quota is going to be substantially lower than what it is right now?”

Taylor says he would like to work with the union, government and industry to take a look at an early retirement package, but the federal government, which traditionally pays for such programs, will have the ultimate say.

Taylor says he’d like to see the industry consolidated through natural attrition “so that they don’t have to depend on these bloody make-work programs at the end of the season.”

Make-work programs, he says, are a necessary evil.

“I find them extremely distasteful … it’s belittling to have to participate in them and it’s very difficult, by the very nature, to get any long term benefit out of them,” he says, “but you can’t on one hand screw up an industry and then on the other hand tell the people that are in it that they’re on their own.

“We’re overfishing these areas,” says Taylor. “The crab that’s in the water, we can harvest it all in the short term or we can

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

decide to harvest it over a little longer period of time. These are just management decisions — if there’s no recruitment we’re going to fish the population down anyway.”

The minister agreed with the fishery closure, as opposed to “killing all the fish for no reason.” Taylor says there is little

fisherman can do now besides cross their fingers and wait for recruitment.

“You can’t count your chickens before they hatch, you can’t count your fish before they’re caught either, but you know, we’ll have to see.”

Dave Taylor, a crab scientist with the federal Department of

Fisheries and Oceans in St. John’s, says crab are molting earlier this year. Normally, soft-shelled crab begin to show up in traps between July and August.

“I think that what’s happening

is you’re having what’s called a density dependent effect.”

Taylor (no relation to Trevor) says there’s more food and space for the population. Crab need space and food energy to complete the arduous process of molting and it’s his theory that instead of a portion of the population molting, the entire crab population is doing it at the one time.

“The fact that they’re getting lower catch rates now and the fact that there’s a high prevalence of soft shell would tend to indicate, on the surface at least, that there’s a lower abundance of commercial size crab then there was,” he says.

“Now whether that translates as the stocks being in trouble, a failure coming into the fishery, we don’t know.”

Generally, when fishermen run into soft-shell crab 85 per cent of the quota has already been caught, Taylor says. Also, when harvesters run into soft shell they tend to move their traps a few miles to avoid the delicate fish.

“But this year, even in moving their traps many times, they still encountered soft shell, and when they didn’t encounter soft shell they ran into low catch rates,” Taylor says, pointing out the real problem.

“The important thing in closing the fishery the way we have is that we are avoiding a lot of potential mortality for the crab that are left out there … getting most of the soft shell crab back in the water and having them survive is virtually impossible.”

The best case scenario, says Taylor, is that most of the softshell crab thrown back lived. The worst case is, crab that were returned to the water had a high mortality rate.

“The trends we’ve seen since the beginning of the season until now are leading to an assumption that on their (fishermen’s) part, they are probably not mistaken, there’s certainly less crab out there now than there was last year.”

WANTED The Sunday Independent is growing and requires friendly, energetic, self-starting individuals to fill positions with our company. These people are strong team players who thrive in a fast-paced, changing environment. They rise to a challenge and are eager to take on new responsibilities.

Advertising Sales Representative(s) Duties to include, but not limited to: • Identify and pursue new advertising sales opportunities; • Maintain and grow client relationships; • Provide a superior level of customer service to all clients; • Ensure that all documentation is up to date, accurate and submitted in a timely fashion Requirements: University degree in business or marketing would be an asset; Proven experience in print advertising sales; Ability to work well in a dynamic environment; Working knowledge of the Microsoft Office suite If this opportunity seems suited to you, then please forward your resume in confidence to: The Sunday Independent, P.O. Box 5891, Stn CSt. John’s, NL, A1C 5X4 We would like to thank all applicants however only those selected for an interview will be contacted. No telephone calls please.

August 8, 2004

Page 18

The Sunday Independent

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

Jim Walson/AFP Photo

King’s College in London, England

‘Inspiration for change’

Matthew LeRiche is searching for rebels, insurgents and revolutionaries in London.

Voice from away

By Matthew LeRiche In London, England For the Sunday Independent The following is a letter home from a member of the so-called brain drain.

S

itting in an obscure dusty corner of a library pondering one’s self worth, continuously begging family, friends, banks and anyone who has money, for money, is the typical story of a student. The difference is, I get to study in swinging London.

It’s not the swinging London of the 1960s. It’s a fusion of old and modern, of different cultures, of different ideas. For me, London embodies what it is to be cosmopolitan, where a globally focused culture embraces diversity.

The guy at the local Halal joint (code for fried chicken) just got in from Kabul, the woman across the street is hosting five of her relatives from Uganda, and my flat mates

are all from different places: Texas, Belgium, Sierra Leone, Brazil and Germany. How can someone with a passion for learning and a desire for knowledge not go to a place like London?

As I eat lunch in the King’s College (University of London) student union pub looking out at the Thames I can’t help but think about the many other colonials who came to England to study so they could return and build their new world.

At the same time, I think about the monumental period in which I am living and the new world that is currently emerging. I think of home and what I would like to see change; I think of others who are working for change in their homes and around the world and am inspired.

Studying war and development has given me a particular vision of change and at least a basic understanding of what motivates people to demand change. My research, working towards a PhD, focuses on two groups of people who represent the cutting edge of change:

Insurgents and humanitarian aid personnel.

How these two groups — soldiers and humanitarians — interact is key to understanding human ingenuity and our capacity for

As I’m certain my flat mates would attest, I have been a competent ambassador for Newfoundland.

When two visiting friends from Mount Pearl asked my Texan flat mate if he knew about Newfoundland, he responded: “I think I know more about Newfoundland now than I do about Texas.” good and evil. They are at work deconstructing the status quo of the 20th century and building a

new order, hopefully an order like the one in London; preferably a little less expensive.

I am determined that Newfoundland must be part of this emerging world and we must begin by embracing our political power. At home, when I speak of change or of asserting ourselves on the national and international stage, I am often rebuffed by cries of political inefficacy. We don’t have enough MPs. Our population is too small. No one cares.

Bollocks! I have met people from places more politically disaffected than Newfoundland who are changing things and contributing to a vision of a cosmopolitan world, from members of women’s groups in Africa working to further HIV/AIDS education, to Roberto, my Brazilian flat mate (and barroom poet) who will return to Brazil to teach and practice law in the endeavour to better the lives of Brazilians.

I wish I had space to tell the stories of all of the people I have met in London, from British generals,

former IRA operatives, Sudanese politicians and brilliant intellectuals to former soldiers and homeless people who have lost hope. All of these people reinforce the new reality I see emerging.

I think the story of my flat mate Jiwoh captures where my inspiration and motivation to continue my studies comes from. He escaped the war in Sierra Leone, went to high school in North Carolina, and university in Texas. He was a computer programmer, but decided to leave the profession to study economics so he could return to Sierra Leone and help rebuild his country.

Most people in North America, even Europe, only hear about Africa in crisis, war, AIDS, famine.

Through Jiwoh I have seen that Africans and Africa are much more. I have seen in Jiwoh what it takes for a society to elevate itself; he gave up a very lucrative career to do what he can to help his country and people.

Continued on page 19

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The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

INTERNATIONAL

Page 19

French photo legend Cartier-Bresson Dead PARIS (Reuters)

F

renchman Henri Cartier-Bresson, widely regarded as one of the great photographers of the 20th century, has died aged 95.

The publicity-shy Cartier-Bresson, a founding member of the Magnum picture agency in 1947, died in the south of France. The cause of his death was not immediately announced.

Cartier-Bresson made his name partly by being in the right place at the right time, a knack that enabled him to develop his talent for capturing on celluloid what he called the “decisive moment.”

During a career in which he traveled to 23 countries, Cartier-Bresson documented the Spanish Civil war, the liberation of Paris during the second world war, the death of India’s Mahatma Ghandi and the fall of Beijing to Mao Zedong’s forces in 1949.

In 1954, the Frenchman also became the first Western photographer allowed into the Soviet Union after the death of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin the previous year.

Thirty years later, Cartier-Bresson packed away his Leica camera and switched to the other passion in his life — drawing.

Last year, the national library hosted a retrospective of Cartier-Bresson’s work, grouping 350 classic shots and drawings almost 30 years after he gave up photography.

Reuters Photo

‘It stupefies people’ Russian parliament passes measure sharply limiting when beer ads can run MOSCOW The Associated Press

T

hanks to hip advertising and trendy breweries, beer’s popularity has soared in the land of vodka.

But Russia’s brewers have hit a snag: The lower house of parliament passed legislation recently that would put some of Europe’s toughest restrictions on beer ads.

The move reflects growing concern about alcoholism and lawlessness in Russia — and underscores the tremendous impact that the abstemious president, Vladimir Putin, is having on a country with unwanted notoriety as a global capital of vice.

If the measure gets upper house approval and is signed into law, no beer ads at all would be allowed on TV or radio from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. At other times, the ads couldn’t show humans, animals or animated characters or imply that beer is connected with social or athletic success — restrictions that also were extended to beer ads for newspapers and magazines.

Lawmakers cited public concerns about growing alcoholism and youth drinking, and some regional lawmakers are pushing for a ban on drinking in public.

“The situation is very critical.

We may lose an entire generation,” says Mikhail Grishankov, deputy head of the security committee in the State Duma, parliament’s lower house.

Beer is sold around the clock at kiosks that have sprouted on almost every street corner, costing as little as 15 rubles for a half-litre bottle, or about 50 cents a pint. And Russians can be seen drinking beer almost anywhere — on the subway, on the sidewalk — and at almost anytime — before work, on lunch break, at day’s end.

Lawmakers accused brewers of trying to woo young drinkers with some of Russia’s most sophisticated advertising clips.

Klinskoye beer raised complaints with spots featuring young people racing out to get beer, and the Tinkoff brewery was pressured into pulling some sexually provocative ads, such as one featuring a man lying down with two naked women.

Vladimir Antonov, general director of the Ochakovo brewery, says the legislation would put brewers at a disadvantage against other alcoholic products.

Makers of vodka and other hard liquors have long been forbidden from advertising on television, but in print they are allowed to use images of people as long as they are over age 35.

“We would not be able to use in our ads even our own bottles, unless we change the main image of our label,” Antonov says, referring to the company’s bearded man logo.

The regulations also could undermine beer companies’ sponsorship of sports events on television.

The Russian Brewers’ Union tried to head off the legislation with an agreement not to target young people, and industry leaders remain hopeful parliament’s upper house or Putin will water down the restrictions, which are tougher than those the government had sought.

Vodka, which carries a harder alcoholic punch, remains “cheaper for people wanting to get drunk,” says Alexei Krivoshapko, a consumer analyst with the United Financial Group in Moscow.

“From this perspective, what the Duma has suggested looks like they don’t really care about the health of the nation, but rather they care more about the profits of the vodka companies.”

Hard liquor — mostly vodka — accounted for 60 per cent of Russian alcohol sales in 2002, but its market share slipped below 58 per cent last year, according to the market research firm Biznes Analitika. By comparison, beer sales in the second quarter of this year grew seven per cent from a year earlier.

Societal attitudes to drinking appear to be changing. In opinion polls, Russians regularly praise Putin’s dislike for heavy imbibing, and the rumoured drunken binges of his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin, embarrassed many Russians.

Even firebrand legislator Vladimir Zhirinovsky, who is known to like a drink, offers a dim view of beer. It “stupefies people — they grow fat from this,” he said on Ekho Moskvy radio.

Newfoundland ambassador comment “you need to stop worrying about what others think of It is this inspiration I wish you” is in order. everyone in Newfoundland could Maybe we should stop worryexperience. I am certain we ing about “our place in Canada” would have little problem taking and just begin acting, as Jiwoh or our destiny into our own hands Roberto are. Decisions need to be and grasping the power we do taken and leadership exhibited for possess if we could just translate anything to change. the intense love of NewfoundIt is in diversity that the land I see in so many people dynamism of London is found; when I am home into real action, this is why London is swinging. as Jiwoh is doing.

Unfortunately, since 9/11, the These are not Madrid train one-sided converbombing, and the sations. As I’m When two visiting fear that has been certain my flat propagating since mates would friends from Mount then, London is attest, I have been Pearl asked my Texan less open. People a competent flat mate if he knew are more afraid. ambassador for I hope the about Newfoundland, inspiration Newfoundland. for When two visiting he responded: “I think change exhibited friends from I know more about by all the immiMount Pearl Newfoundland now grants and all asked my Texan those studying at flat mate if he than I do about Texas.” the universities knew about Newhere overcomes foundland, he this so London responded: “I think I know more can remain a place that continues about Newfoundland now than I to welcome all us colonials, as do about Texas.” well as those from everywhere Not to mention the evening else, searching for the tools to spent discussing fish politics with build a new world. a relative of the Icelandic minisMatthew LeRiche is working ter of fisheries — over a pint at toward a PhD at the Department the pub, of course.

I’ve realized that I often steer of War Studies, King’s College, conversations toward topics relat- University of London. He is also ing to my home province. We working for Justice Africa, a seem to have a need for others to humanitarian advocacy organiknow about Newfoundland. zation as well as Conciliation ReMaybe it’s an inferiority com- sources, a conflict resolution plex, maybe our intense pride. I organization. matthew.leriche@kcl.ac.uk am not certain, but I think the From page 18

August 8, 2004

Page 20

The Sunday Independent

LIFE & TIMES

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

‘Connection to the place’ Newfoundland-born comic Shaun Majumder’s settling into Hollywood — but he’s still in awe of his native home

By Stephanie Porter The Sunday Independent

S

haun Majumder says his Los Angeles home “seems really far away” now that he’s back in Newfoundland. Although he insists it’s never been his dream to live in Hollywood, he paints a pretty picture of his new base — the work is good, and even when it’s not, there’s surfing, mountains, a great apartment, plenty of opportunity, lots to do and an awesome girlfriend to do it with …

Faraway for a moment, Majumder snaps abruptly back to the present. The popular comedian — and native of Burlington, Baie Verte Peninsula — is between scenes for Hatching, Matching, Dispatching, a pilot television show set in the wonderfully familiar surroundings of outport Newfoundland.

Hollywood’s great and all, Majumder says, but at this moment he’s feeling a little overwhelmed, just trying to absorb the scenery around him.

“It’s not bad, sitting on the top of a hill, overlooking Torbay … I’m so happy to be here,” he says, relaxing cross-legged in the grass.

It’s a perfect summer night, warm

and still.

“I’ve shot (in Newfoundland) before, but for me right now, the scenery is the hugest thing, taking it all in is stunning because I have such a connection to the place.

“Every time I’m home I get distracted, I don’t want to do any work, I just want to sit on a rock and stare out there.”

He speaks earnestly, but it’s hard to take Majumder seriously. He’s in full costume: Ratty clothes, muddy face, and spectacularly grimy teeth.

His role in the Mary Walsh and Ed MacDonald-penned Hatching is a sweet but daft — and dirty — gravedigger.

Majumder is only involved in the last two days of the eight-day shoot; he was previously in Montreal, working with the annual Just For Laughs comedy festival for two weeks. When he wraps this project, he’s heading to Burlington for a visit. He and his father just bought a house in the old hometown, and Majumder is eager to check it out.

Although Majumder took to the stage for the first time in Grade 7, it wasn’t until the summer after his first year as a science major at Dalhousie University that he realized performance was his passion.

Majumder paid his dues as a stand-up comic on comedy nights at various clubs, then cut his teeth as part of the touring Second City comedy troupe and the sketch comedy group The Bob Room.

“I don’t want to host …

I mean it’s great work, but you can host everything in Canada and make a living and I don’t want to do that.

I want to act.”

— Shaun Majumder He’s become a regular host and performer at the Just For Laughs annual festival in Montreal, and appeared in a handful of feature films and television programs.

Majumder has been one of the hosts of This Hour has 22 Minutes, led the YTV program Uh-oh’s Slime Tour, hosted a series of Just for Laughs specials on CBC television. He’s also hosted comedy variety nights across the country, arts awards shows, and this year’s East Coast Music Awards show in

St. John’s.

In other words, his face is out there. The hosting gigs are good for that kind of exposure. And it’s not that he doesn’t like doing it …

“I have found myself hosting a lot,” he says.

“I don’t want to host … I mean it’s great work, but you can host everything in Canada and make a living and I don’t want to do that.

I want to act.”

Then, perhaps wary of biting the hand that may feed him again, he adds: “I won’t say no to hosting things, of course … but at least in L.A. you can do both. I don’t want to be limited.

“In Canada, you just reach a certain point and you run out of stuff to do. You run out of opportunity — or the opportunity changes.”

Going Stateside wasn’t Majumder’s original goal. But as he traveled back and forth across Canada, it slowly became apparent that the best chance for his dream career lay in California.

“It’s kind of like a Newfoundlander going to Fort Mac, you’ve got to go where the jobs are,” he says. “I always wanted to do make ’em ups and tell stories and do acting for television and film and write and do everything I can. And

it’s all down there.”

Majumder’s next Hollywood gig is next month, when he re-shoots another pilot television episode.

(After the first round of shooting, the producers fired one of the main actors — and it’s back to scene one.) Once called Nevermind Nirvana, the potential series is now dubbed Nearly Nirvana.

And then there’s some time in Halifax on the horizon, as he reprises his role on This Hour has 22 Minutes.

Mary Sexton, one of the producers of Hatching, Matching, Dispatching, abruptly arrives to give Majumder a hug and to request a photo with one of her current stars.

“We got him back,” she says with a grin. “Now he’s not leaving … we want you for the series.”

Majumder smiles back. “I’d love to do it — if the schedule allows for it,” he says.

Later, he notes he’s already learned to roll with the punches and be open to change.

“The industry is up and down and I accept that,” he says. “But (L.A.) is good, everything is good down there. As long as I’m in the mix, it’s good for me.

“But then, it’s also good to be home.”

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

LIFE & TIMES

Page 21

Standing Room Only

by Noreen Golfman

The writers of Woody Point Why this weekend marks the beginning of a new literary tradition in this province

L

ast week, if you were lucky or devoted enough, you caught Paul Moth, the irrepressible host of CBC Radio’s brilliant new summer show, Sunny Days and Nights, describing his experience of attending a writers’ festival. Listening to Paul week after week is like examining the underside of Freud’s sofa. It’s dark, strange, and scary. All the stuff you’d normally keep in the privacy of your own brain is exposed for the world to share. Never mind Sunny Days and Nights: Being Paul Moth is more like it.

And so there he was, a talking id, wandering beyond the familiar boundaries of the Hundred Lakes region to record a bunch of writers reading their own work. If you understand Paul then you can imagine his candid reactions to the splutterings of a poet rapping about her menopause, another of the “sound” variety imitating the pitter pats of rain, and yet another author whose prose piece on the endlessly fascinating subject of himself gave new meaning to the term narcissist.

Fortunately for Paul — and us — he was able to distract himself from the relentless tedium with a randy temptress who mistook him for Thomas Pynchon: With his encouragement, of course. Frankly, I laughed so hard at these misadventures I practically soaked my Margaret Atwood Society undergarments.

Well, some things are easier to mock than to do. I am writing this

J

column on the eve of attending such an event, the Writers at Woody Point Festival (could I make that up?).

This week about a dozen or so of Newfoundland’s finest writers, give or take an Irishman, will gather in the exquisitely beautiful Bonne Bay area of the island to showcase their past, current, or barely germinating work. The festival is being organized by the Friends of the Woody Point Heritage Theatre and if I hadn’t composed that very phrase myself I might have thought it came from the pen of Stephen Leacock.

Some people would rather put pins in their eyes than attend such a thing. Why? Well, if God had wanted writers to read aloud He wouldn’t have invented those mini book lights.

There is something quintessentially precious about a writers’ festival in 2004, and no amount of hype or scenic beauty can alter that fact. Think of it: You send out press releases, put up posters, call your friends, and raise some money to hear a bunch of wellknown writers reading. Some peo-

ple would rather put pins in their eyes than attend such a thing.

Why? Well, if God had wanted writers to read aloud He wouldn’t have invented those mini book lights. Sure, one famous writer breezing through town every now and then is one thing, but a whole flock of them at once?

In spite of these reservations, there are several reasons why the first of what should turn out to be a major annual west coast summer event is going to work. A tradition of literary weekends has flourished for some time in Corner Brook, the annual March Hare being an obvious sign of interest in books and the people who write them. This year Michael Ondaatje dropped in to mingle with the Byrnes, Maggs, Walshes, and Paynes.

People turned out to listen, revere, get autographs, advice and maybe even drunk for several days of high-minded fun. Our writers have been sharing prestigious shelf space with award-winning national and international authors for over a decade and when any one of them shows up at a mainland ceremony a party is sure to follow.

So it’s not difficult convincing distant fellow scribes to hitch a plane to Deer Lake to experience a little writerly hospitality. Who knows who might show up this year? Shelagh Rogers of CBC’s Sounds Like Canada is hosting the whole event, soon to be playing on a bandwidth near you.

A Newfoundland writers’ festi-

val also means a Newfoundland music festival, and so any self respecting program will feature, as this week’s does, a representative sample of what would cost you good money in a Toronto pub.

Pamela Morgan will charm the jackets off every book while The Cormiers are sure to bring down the bar with more than one moving version of Salt Water Joys.

There will be a lot of listening, yes, but there will be more talking, schmoozing, spinning, and joking, maybe even a little prevaricating — all taking place before and after and sometimes even during some of the readings, sometimes with glass in hand, raised and foaming.

Did I mention the bar? A writers’ festival without a well-stocked watering hole is, well, a Salvation Army prayer meeting. Not one of us is going to a Salvation Army prayer meeting; therefore, we will gather long into the night to talk not of metaphors and punctuation but of literary gossip, political shenanigans, and memorable occasions.

Indeed, we will create our own memorable occasions. Oh sure, we are bound to hear some newly minted words from the talented likes of Michael Crummey, Leo Furey, Lisa Moore, Bernice Morgan, Donna Morrissey, Ed Riche, and Des Walsh, but sharing impressions about the readings is far more interesting than the forced concentration of listening.

After all, a writers’ festival is a little like one of those all night

band competitions, with each contestant determined to win the hearts and minds of its audience.

Everyone will need to perform better and more dramatically than anyone else. One anticipates the possibility of anything from an indiscreet performance to a stunning surprise. It’s all part of the unspoken spectacle of expectation.

Moreover, Gordon Pinsent will be standing in for an ailing Wayne Johnston, raising the standard of dramatic potential and no doubt giving us all something special to talk about.

Finally, the event will come to a guaranteed rousing conclusion when everyone gathers at the Seabreeze Lounge in Woody Point to celebrate the life and work of Al Pittman in ways Al would surely appreciate. They don’t make writers festivals like that anywhere else. I bet even Paul Moth would have a good time.

Noreen Golfman is a professor of literature and women’s studies at Memorial University. Her next column appears Aug. 22.

Jack to NYC

ack-Five-Oh, written by Andy Jones and Philip Dinn, is being remounted at the LSPU Hall Aug. 17 and 18. The play will be performed for two nights at the Lincoln Centre in New York the following week.

Jack-Five-Oh is dubbed a Newfoundland folk tale odyssey. The story was adapted for the stage from the collected stories of Freeman Bennett from St. Paul’s, Elizabeth Brewer from Freshwater, and Pius Power from South East Bight.

Jack-Five-Oh is directed by Jillian Keiley and features Philip Dinn, Mercedes Barry, Daniel Payne, Leah Lewis, Susan Kent, Gregory King, Geoff Panting and Cheri Pynn-Dunne.

Folk festival

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

The Ray Walsh Family Band performs a blend of traditional music on the opening night of the 28th annual Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival in Bannerman Park, St. John’s.

Page 22

LIFE & TIMES

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

On the Shelf

by Mark Callanan

Dreams that survive the night Newfoundland: Journey into a Lost Nation Michael Crummey & Greg Locke McClelland & Stewart Ltd., 2004

N

ewfoundland: Journey into a Lost Nation is the latest in a range of coffeetable volumes focused on the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. The book begins with a 28 page essay by the celebrated poet and novelist Michael Crummey. At its heart, however, are more than a hundred photos by Greg Locke, a photojournalist who, over the course of his career, has worked abroad for such distinguished magazines as Time, Maclean’s, and Der Spiegel.

But this new book differs from your standard tourist fare in its focus and intent. Journey into a Lost Nation is the chronicle of a way of life that, since the collapse of the North Atlantic cod fishery and the moratorium imposed in 1992, has been fast disappearing. It is a book that concerns itself not only with changing traditions and the day-to-day struggle of modern Newfoundlanders, but also with the uncertainty of a future that may or may not be ours. As such, it is more social commentary than memorabilia — though with Crummey’s delicate prose style and Locke’s beautiful photography, it is equally successful as both.

As Crummey suggests in his introduction, Locke’s photographs are of two varieties: “The picture that perpetuates the Newfoundland

stereotype — the spectacularly moody landscape, the snow-covered outbuildings, the grizzled fishermen” and “the unvarnished documentary shot revealing a Newfoundland rarely acknowledged in the photography-book genre.”

And he’s right — while there are photos here that would not at all be out of place on a postcard or in a souvenir book, there are a great many others that, because of their apparent spontaneity, are more documentary than picturesque, the photographer himself “a participant, and not necessarily the one with the best view of the proceedings.”

Apart from brief trips around the bay, I grew up entirely in St. John’s. My mother was born in Bonavista but moved into town in her late teens to go to high school.

She stuck around and met my father there years later while working at the National Film Board.

This shouldn’t really concern you much except to indicate that my life, having been lived almost exclusively in the city, is not one traditionally equated with Newfoundland.

I have never caught a cod in my life. I have only once been in a boat smaller than, say, the Bell Island ferry. I couldn’t tie a knot to save my own life, much less anyone else’s. And I’m certain, if offered a gutting knife and a fish, I’d come out of the equation with less digits than I’d started with. Put me on a postcard and you wouldn’t know me from any other mid-

SUNDAY INDEPENDENT CROSSWORD CLUES ACROSS 1. Midler 6. Competently 10. Constructed 14. A domed or vaulted recess 15. Fastener 16. Flightless birds 17. Tended 18. No-shows 20. Amalgamations 22. Disposed to please 23. An unfledged or nestling hawk 25. A collection of things sharing a common attribute 26. Sleep gear 30. Equalisers 33. X X X 34. Wrap 35. Parts per billion, abbr.

38. Wax 42. Used to cut and shape wood 43. Airs

44. Spanish city 45. Enchantress 46. Playful 48. Fires 51. Greek portico 53. Identity 56. In a way, coastal 61. Lovin’ Spoonful leader, John ___ 63. Russian ballet company 64. Clabber 65. Having essential likeness 66. Fill with high spirits 67. Greek goddess of youth 68. Offered 69. Measuring instrument CLUES DOWN 1. Used in medicines and perfumes 2. A sword similar to a foil but with a heavier blade

20s youngster in the anonymous mass that is modern North America. Yet I have never felt like anything but a Newfoundlander.

“It’s difficult to explain to ourselves, let alone to outsiders, what gives the communities and the people here their particular flavour,” Crummey writes at one point in his essay. He then refers to a quote from writer Lisa Moore: “We’re all agreed there’s someSolutions on page 26

3. Russian title 4. Ringing sound 5. Regard highly 6. Arthropod genus 7. Founder of Babism 8. Hartmann, actress 9. Mass of matter 10. Aluminum and chromium 11. Rhizopodan 12. Fights 13. Curves 19. The ___ Creed 21. A shag rug made in Sweden 24. Pollen-producing organs 26. Nine banded armadillo 27. In a way, chopped 28. Expresses surprise 29. Residue 31. Bird genus 32. Tell on 34. Used esp. of vegetation 35. Structure

resembling a hair 36. Lodgings 37. Ho-hum 39. Waders 40. Volt-ampere 41. A ridged fabric 45. One of two Houses 46. Electrically charged atom 47. One who dissembles 48. Hieronymous __, painter 49. Apply oil 50. Skewered meat 52. MT 54. Jab 55. Small deer of Japan with slightly forked antlers 57. Fissures 58. Towards the mouth 59. Island north of Guam 60. At all times 62. Type of gift

thing to it, this Newfoundland thing, but we’re at a loss to say exactly what it is.” It is this indescribable quality that comes across so well in Locke’s photography.

Though there are many wonderful pictures in this book, Bingo Palace is by far my favourite. It’s a shot of an old woman foregrounded at a long table in a bingo hall, presiding over her cards, dabber poised in her right hand as it

hovers in the air, left hand reaching for the cigarette in her mouth to take a drag. She’s a fierce creature in her black tam and floral print dress, her face creased into a frown. From the angle we’re given, she appears to be alone, despite the presence of other women in the background. This is the photo I come back to most often. It reminds me of my own grandmother. At times, she had something of that same fire in her eyes — at other times, something of the sadness that comes from living in a world that has changed so much you barely recognize it.

But there is a light at the end of the tunnel, Pratt’s immortal “doors held ajar in storms.”

Despite the plangency of much of what is written and said about Newfoundland these days, there remains hope. Locke’s pictures tell us so. You have only to look, for example, at the child cutting tongues on page 97, his unwavering gaze at the camera, to know that the future, the future of this place, this home, is in capable hands.

Mark Callanan is a writer and poet living in Rocky Harbour. His next column appears Aug. 22. He can be reached at callanan_ _@hotmail.com

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

LIFE & TIMES

Page 23

A ‘big’ concern A quarter of children overweight; medical association president calls for action

By Clare-Marie Gosse For The Sunday Independent

O

ne in four preschool children in this province is overweight or obese, according to a study released this week. The news didn’t surprise the president of the Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Association.

Dr. Andrew Major says the study simply confirmed a problem doctors have long since been aware of.

“This is an issue that’s been of great concern to us for a couple of years now,” he says. “It’s something our health promotion and wellness committee is actually examining — how best to try to promote good health in terms of weight control.”

Concerns over childhood obesity were raised anew following the release of a recent study carried out at Memorial University. The results show that over a quarter of children between ages three and five in Newfoundland and Labrador are overweight or obese.

Major says the medical association would like to see federal funding go towards financial support for low income families unable to afford healthy food, and a new mom education program. Both topics were key areas of discussion at a recent board meeting.

“Each child every year sees approximately 10,000 commercials for poor nutritional value foods,” Major says. “So they’re inundated with advertisements for poor food. It’s cheaper, there’s easy access, and there’s less activity, so it’s a very difficult problem.”

Major says calls to increase physical education in schools aren’t going to help the preschoolers. He says future federal government education programs within preschools are needed to target toddlers.

“Personally, I think it starts even earlier, because everyone who has a child, it seems we’re very pleased to have a big healthy baby, and at a very early age parents will say, now he’s 20 pounds’ at six weeks old, like it’s a very good thing.”

Major says emphasizing sensible eating habits in pre-natal classes might be worth considering.

“We really need to get out the message that when people are pregnant they don’t need to put on as much weight as they often do,” he says.

“Women are gaining much more weight than they have in the past. I think that in itself doesn’t make big children, but it’s the whole concept of trying to maintain a healthy weight for yourself as an example for the children when they’re born.”

Excessive advertising, TV, video games, and concerns over supervision lead to modern day lifestyle problems that children years ago didn’t face.

“The world has changed,” Major says. “When we were young we were out all the time because our parents considered it safe, now when we have children, we generally accompany them wherever they go and it tends to make it more difficult to keep them active, and it tends to mean more organized activities versus free play activity.

“The basic problem is, we eat more now than we did, so, how to eat less and eat more healthy and be active, how to get that practicality into our children? This is a big concern for society.”

Local news. Human interest stories.

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The Castle leads the high-end building boom in Logy Bay.

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

Castles in the (Logy Bay) air

By Clare-Marie Gosse The Sunday Independent

H

ow does living down the street from J-Lo sound? Not too out of the ordinary in L.A. perhaps, but a bit unbelievable if that street happens to be in Logy Bay. Rumours are rife within the municipality of Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove about huge stars moving in. The sprawling homes that are accumulating along the coastline just keep getting bigger and better, and one particularly highprofile building project located on Marine Drive is really giving the gossips some fodder.

It looks like an opulent, Arabian castle, and with the money involved in a house like that, there seems to be no limit to speculation as to who might start building next.

The owner of the castle — as it’s been locally dubbed — is James Zaleski, founder and CEO of an international engineering company in California. He recently gave an interview about the building project on the local CBC Radio show, On the Go, but as his architect Roman Halitzki explains to The Sunday Independent, he’s beginning to regret being so open.

“The owner asked me to tell media that we’ve had a problem with excessive interest, excessive attention, being drawn to the project,” he says. “It was causing a range of security and other concerns and the CBC interview seemed to have worsened conditions significantly.”

Halitzki, a local architect, takes care of all Zaleski’s correspondence and any issues regarding the property. Zaleski currently resides in the States, and it’s

generally assumed the castle will be used predominantly as a summer home for himself and his wife.

“He was complaining to me that the rumour mill had him dead, had him whale watching in Trinity last week, all of this stuff…” says Halitzki, shaking his head.

“The rumour’s been that William Hurt bought a piece of property and … someone said that Jennifer Lopez bought a piece of property,” — Robert Roche, mayor of Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove Besides running a “very complicated project with a very challenging site,” Halitzki says he now has vandalism and security alarms to contend with.

“We don’t have a night watchman on the sight,” he says, “(so) they put in an alarm, and I’m getting calls over the weekend of actual sub-consultants and people that have access to the site, and they’re in a panic because they set off the alarm and so on. It’s been going off quite regularly. We’ve got signage there, that it’s private, but there are a lot of people that just ignore that information.”

Halitzki says that curious locals have been wandering inside the grounds to take a look around.

Indeed, Robert Roche, the mayor of Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove, says every time he drives past the Castle

there’s a line of traffic.

Not that Roche himself minds the attention. When asked if interest in buying land and property in his municipality has increased within the last decade, he emphatically concedes.

“Oh very much so,” he says. “We’re five minutes from the city, we’re a rural town, we’ve kept our rural town, you still need at least an acre of land to build, which gives you a fair bit of privacy…

It’s a nice, quiet, quaint town.”

Roche mentions Doran’s Lane, overlooking Outer Cove, where a number of large, impressive homes can be found, and says that Middle Cove Estates are putting 20 high-end homes in the local area. He also says that compared to the city, residential property tax is low. A $100,000 home in St. John’s would be taxed at $1,220 a year, whereas the tax on a property of the same value in Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove, would only be $700.

Not that there are many $100,000 homes going up now. Roche says people are far exceeding that kind of budget, and although Halitzki wouldn’t say exactly how much the finished castle be worth, it’s sure to top the lot in terms of millions of dollars in value.

As well as rumour mongering.

“The rumour’s been that William Hurt bought a piece of property and that someone else bought a piece of property and even the last going off. Someone said that Jennifer Lopez bought a piece of property,” Roche laughs.

“I have no idea… I can’t really comment if William Hurt bought (any). He may have, but if he does, that’s great as long as he follows the rules and regulation down here, we’ll let him build.”

Page 24

LIFE & TIMES

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

‘Look for a landing’

Extreme action video producer Andrew McCarthy offers some advice

By Clare-Marie Gosse The Sunday Independent

A

ndrew McCarthy’s look matches his job description: Outdoorsy, rugged, and with a deeper tan than any Newfoundlander has a right to.

But as the owner of Boondockers, a company that produces extreme sports action videos, it stands to reason McCarthy spends some extreme time outdoors, and in some extreme weather to boot.

“I keep using the word extreme,” he says. “But it’s a word that I try to not use in any of our sales literature or really in our conversations.

“We’re trying to focus more on riding and the parameters that you can stretch to without actually endangering our riders or pushing our riders beyond what we consider to be normal limits.”

McCarthy and his riders work predominantly with snowmobiles and motocross bikes, depending on the season. “Normal limits” for Boondockers can mean anything from racing around bike tracks to jumping off 30-metre cliffs.

McCarthy makes the videos, and an international distribution company sells them over the Internet and through magazines. His most recent mad-cap production is entitled 2 Tangly.

The Newfoundlander says he likes to incorporate as much local scenery, music and humour as he can into his work, to make it stand out from the usual “rah, rah, harder hitting beat” that his competitors tend to favour.

McCarthy began his career in the tourism industry as an original partner in the popular Strawberry Hill Resort on the west coast. He stumbled into snowmobiling — quite literally — after a skiing accident in 1998 forced him off the sticks and onto a motor.

“I started snowmobiling and I met this kid — his name is Brian Seaward — and he had a completely different, unique style of riding and an element of action and extreme that I had never seen in snowmobiling before and I thought at the time, wow brilliant,

Andrew McCarthy with pro motorcycle rider Brian Churchill on Bell Island.

what a great opportunity to build snowmobile videos.”

When asked if any Boondockers have suffered serious accidents, McCarthy looks sheepish.

“Just me,” he says. “I’m the only one that’s really been hurt.”

McCarthy says he’s had six surgeries. Ironically, he adds, the mishaps have played a positive role in his career development.

“I broke my leg up last winter,” he says. “That was a compound fracture and threw all of the bones out the side.” He calls the incident a silver lining in a grey cloud. It forced him behind the camera and helped him realize his own artistic potential.

Generally, McCarthy’s riders range in age from 14 to 40,

although he says both his son and daughter (aged six and seven) enjoy riding. He says he often assumes a paternal role with all his riders, spending time with them for his own peace of mind.

McCarthy has an interest in writing, stressing the importance of education as well as sports. The website www.boondockers.ca is currently running an essay writing competition to win a ride with Dan Gardiner, known as one of the best snowmobilers in the world.

Gardiner will also host a training camp for Boondockers next January.

McCarthy says the company has been getting a lot of positive feedback, with over 75,000 hits on the website last month.

“We’ve had some really, really ridiculous links,” he says. “We were acknowledged by SnoWest magazine, which is the largest snowmobile publication in the world, who made us their news story of the week and who carried a direct link to our site for the preview of the video.”

Despite McCarthy’s earnest intentions towards promoting education and local culture within his glamourously, reckless lifestyle, there’s still something decidedly playboyish about this self-confessed “very single” bachelor.

There are some “risqué, just for fun” (non-naked) girly-photos on the website, and McCarthy laments that the sport doesn’t really attract female admirers. He says

Photo by Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

they do have one female rider, however, and she’s extremely dedicated.

McCarthy jokes that he wouldn’t mind having a few groupies though, and in one of his website articles (Sex Sells) he writes, “So bring on the girls. They always said mother knows best. Who knows, this might be just the shot of adrenaline our industry needs.”

But McCarthy’s ultimate advice when it comes to extreme sports action is of a more practical nature.

“If I can stress one thing, it’s look for a landing,” he says. “Look for a landing, look for a landing, look for a landing. It’s one thing to find a jump, it’s another thing to find a landing once you get off it.”

August 8, 2004

Page 25

The Sunday Independent

SPORTS

Photo by Paul Smith/For The Sunday Independent

Salmon fishing on the Eagle River, Labrador.

‘Big fish feel altogether different’ Labrador’s Eagle River, about 25 kilometres as the crow flies from Cartwright, is one of North America’s best salmon rivers Editor’s note: This is the last in a two-part series on sports fishing in the Big Land.

On the Eagle River, Labrador

By Paul Smith For The Sunday Independent

A

boat is anchored below and off to the side of Governor’s Rock on the Eagle River. The huge boulder, likely dropped off by an ancient retreating glacier or, more recently, dragged downstream by rafting spring ice, disrupts the Eagle’s massive flow into rolling hydraulics.

The extent of the disruption is about four metres wide and 30 metres long. Anglers call it a rip. Salmon rest in the disrupted water away from the heavy and continuous push of the Eagle.

The boat is positioned just far enough off to the side so that two dry-fly enthusiasts can drift Bombers along the edge of the rip without scaring the resting fish. The anglers are mending line (readjusting after casting) in concerted attempts to get that perfect, drag-free drift.

There’s art in fly fishing — from the flytying bench to tailing (lifting a fish from the water).

The fly must ride the hydraulics like a free-floating cigarette butt. The art is not without purpose — the salmon like it that way.

Back-eddies and cross currents compli-

cate the anglers’ efforts but they cast and mend, waiting for that special moment when tempered British steel meets fish flesh.

Both fishermen concentrate on their Bomber’s downstream voyage, covering the extent of the rip in 20 or so casts and repeating the process. Line flows to and fro in tight, narrow aerodynamic loops that make casting look smooth and effortless.

The angler in the bow sees a distinct silvery flash under his fly about seven metres below the rock where the rip meets the river’s smooth surface.

He repeats the cast — nothing.

He repeats it again, years of practice allowing him to duplicate the drift almost exactly. This time the salmon goes all the way. A huge head breaks the surface and its mouth engulfs the fly. The salmon attempts to return to its resting place, but something isn’t right, there’s a strong pull on its upper jaw.

The angler reacts instinctively to the rise, jerking the rod violently upward, in contrast to his smooth casting stroke. The price of a drag-free drift is slack line and if a solid connection isn’t made very quickly the salmon will surely spit out the offending steel. It’s not pretty, but it works.

The fish is solidly hooked and the graphite rod bends like a willow. This is a big fish, about 15 pounds, and the angler knows it.

This is why the anglers drove to Labrador.

Big fish feel all together different. In place of the thumping of a grilse, there’s a deep, heavy, fish-in-control pull. The angler keeps the rod’s tip high, sets the fighting butt to his stomach, and adjusts the reel’s drag. The size of the fish calls for two hands on the rod.

The fight goes on for about 20 minutes, control of the battle alternating between angler and fish. Early in the fight the fish dominated the battle with aerobatic displays and powerful long runs while the angler held a steady strain, hoping to tame the explosion of energy.

Over time, the fish weakens and desperately fights to stay in its element, a comfortable distance below the surface. The angler pulls up hard, with both hands on the cork, trying to lift the beast out of its comfort zone. The rod strains against the fish’s weight and power and the flow of the Eagle all at once.

Rods often snap on this river.

This time the rod performs flawlessly and the weakened fish breaks the surface just behind the boat. The fisherman pulls the fish to the side of the boat with its head thrashing side-to-side, desperate to regain control.

A swift gloved hand firmly grips the fish’s tail and another plucks out the offending hook. The combatants part ways with a reassuring flick of the salmon’s broad tail.

The fisherman is reassured that he played the fish swift and hard, inflicting no perma-

nent damage. He sits back and lights up a well deserved cigar.

There are salmon rivers all over Newfoundland, including several less than an hour’s drive from St. John’s. Salmon fishing is a great sport wherever it’s pursued.

Salmon fight hard and are often difficult to hook, which is why they’re called the “king of game fish.”

But some rivers are extra special; some rivers are world class. There’s the Ponoi in Russia, the Restigouche in New Brunswick, the Alta in Norway, the Spey in Scotland, and the Eagle in Labrador. Many Salmon fishing aficionados say the Eagle is the best in North America.

What makes a river extra special? It’s not just numbers of fish, although that’s important. It’s quantity and quality. The Eagle has a high percentage of big salmon. As opposed to grilse that stay at sea only one winter, salmon stay at sea two or three winters, and grow much larger.

While grilse range from three to six pounds, salmon typically weigh in from 10 to 20 pounds. Salmon fight orders of magnitude harder. The Eagle’s flow is big, cold and well oxygenated. Even the grilse can take you to your backing. When you hook a big salmon, all hell breaks lose. Then there’s the fact that the Eagle is remote, beautiful and untamed. Hopefully, it stays that way for many future generations to enjoy. This province has lost too much already.

Page 26

SPORTS

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

This Sporting Life

by Shaun Drover

Rock crushes Crimson Tide, an Independent prediction

I

tem: The Newfoundland Rock will compete for the Rugby Canada Super League Championship next weekend in St. John’s.

Comment: After a fantastic regular season, the Newfoundland Rock will have a chance to bring home the McTier Cup on home soil. The Rock finished the regular season with a perfect 6-0 record in the Eastern Division, but don’t expect them to have an easy final when they’ll face Vancouver Island’s Crimson Tide, a team that also has a perfect record after going undefeated in the Western Division.

The Crimson Tide has an illustrious history, with three championships in the league’s seven-year run. One of those three championships was in 2002 when they defeated our own Newfoundland Rock 6–3 in an extremely tight match. This year’s final should once again be a close one, hopefully with the Rock bringing home the McTier Cup for the first time.

The venue was originally scheduled to take place in Hamilton, Ontario as part of the Rugby Canada National Championship Festival, but a decision to move the venue to Newfoundland was made after the final weekend of regular season play.

The national championship festival will still see the Canadian under-21 team host the U.S.A. Collegiate All-Americans for the first time on Canadian soil, which means Rugby Canada will have two huge rugby venues on the same day in different parts of Canada.

Regardless of how or why we’re hosting this match, the bottom line is our boys will be fighting for a national championship at the Swiler’s Club, which gives us a great opportunity to catch high quality rugby and cheer on the

Photo b y Paul Daly/The Sunday Independent

The Rock, under-18, training at Crosbie Park in St. John’s under the watychful eye of coach Pat Parfrey. Parfrey was recently awarded the Order of Canada.

home team to victory. So come out on Aug. 14 (the kickoff’s scheduled for 3 p.m.) to see the Rock win their first national championship.

A win would be a great accomplishment and a storybook ending for coach Pat Parfrey’s season, just two weeks after being appointed to the Order of Canada.

Item: Mike Tyson was the victim of a surprising upset when he was knocked out by Danny Williams in the fourth round.

Comment: I don’t know whether to be happy or upset knowing the defeat will likely put an end

to Tyson’s legacy. At least it used to be a legacy before the guy went absolutely crazy.

After a great opening first round, Tyson became the victim of punch after punch until finally hitting the mat for good, 2:51 into the fourth round. British bookies pegged Williams as a 10–1 underdog, but he prevailed and took home a relatively small (by boxing standards) $350,000 purse. It was a great win for Williams.

Tyson, on the other hand, is on the tail end of an up and down ride.

He has been in the boxing spotlight,

for various reasons, for over 20 years. This latest bout was Tyson’s last chance of reviving a career that’s now all but a fading memory.

It’s too bad the guy has no clue about managing his career, or his life for that matter.

Tyson evolved from a sporting hero to a circus act. When his boxing career spiraled downward his true personality surfaced, leaving us all witnessing a foolish man destroy any positive perceptions of his name or career. This last fight was also an attempt by Tyson to remedy his desperate financial sit-

uation, which finds him over $38 million in debt. Keep in mind this is a man who earned an estimated $400 million over his career.

Similar to the Jerry Springer effect, everyone loves to see what Tyson will do next. For his sake, I wish he had hung up his gloves years ago so we would remember Tyson as the great boxer he was.

That said, I can honestly say I’ve been thoroughly entertained watching him ruin his life.

Item: The Royal St. John’s Regatta was again a success with NTV taking home top honours.

Comment: Despite a short rain delay in the morning, the Royal St. John’s Regatta saw great weather and an equally impressive atmosphere for both championship races.

There was no surprise on the men’s side, with the NTV crew defeating Newfoundland Power for the men’s championship. The crew, comprised mostly of members from the legendary Barrington family, finished with a time of 9:12.73 — a good four seconds ahead of the second place crew.

On the female side, Jungle Jim’s captured the female championship with a time of 5:06.46 — just over two seconds ahead of second place, Compusult. Congratulations to all crews for making it a great day on the pond. shaundrover@hotmail.com

Events

AUGUST 9 • Dale Jarvis will sign copies of Haunted Shores: True Ghost Stories of Newfoundland and Labrador, 1-4 p.m. at the Downhomer store, Water Street, St. John’s, 739-4477.

• Youth Justice Rocks Camp, presented by the Public Legal Information Association of Newfoundland, ages 12-15, North bank Lodge, Pippy Park, 722-2805.

Until Aug. 12.

AUGUST 10 • Live! On the Lawn Theatre, Hawthorne Cottage, Brigus. Plays are performed Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 3 p.m.

• Canadian Bible Society’s Gospel Music Festival, Cabot 500 Theatre, Bowring Park, St. John’s, until Aug. 12, 722-7929.

AUGUST 11 • Folk night at the Ship Pub, St. John’s.

• Cool Jazz for hot nights, with the Louis McDonald Quartet, Corner Brook Arts and Culture Centre, 637-2580.

• Anthony Barton, author of Horsy-Hops will give a presentation at the A. C. Hunter Children’s Library, St. John’s, 10 a.m., 7226680.

AUGUST 12 • Salvage: Story of a House, written by Michael Crummey, presented by Artistic Fraud of Newfoundland, 8 p.m., Commissariat House, St. John’s, (709) 7395091.

• Town of Brigus’ 17th annual Brigus Blueberry festival, until Aug. 15, 528-3201.

AUGUST 13 • Salvage: Story of a House, written by Michael Crummey, presented by Artistic Fraud of Newfoundland, 8 p.m., Commissariat House, St. John’s, (709) 7395091.

• Wine and Words featuring readings by Robert Parsons and Dale Jarvis, Newman Wine Vaults, St. John’s, 7:30 p.m., 739-7870.

• Burgoyne’s Cove Fun Days, 5:30 p.m., 663-1136. Continues Aug. 15.

AUGUST 14 • Flanker Press will launch Easton by Paul Butler and Tsunami: The Newfoundland tidal wave disaster by Maura Hanrahan, 4 p.m., Beaches Heritage Centre, Eastport, 739-4477.

• The Vampire; or, The Bride of the Isles — a staged reading to sink your teeth into, directed by Danielle Irvine and produced by Dale Jarvis, based on James Robinson Planché’s 1820 play.

Doors open 7:30 p.m.; show 8 p.m., Newman Wine Vaults, St. John’s, 739-7870. Continues Aug. 15, • Craft Council Clay Studio’s annual Day at the Beach: Pottery is fired using driftwood, seaweed and other materials found on the beach, finished work available for sale, noon-4 p.m., Middle Cove Beach, 753-2534.

• Sir Thomas Roddick Hospital Foundation’s annual garden tour and fundraiser, 1:30-3:30 p.m., 643-7478.

AUGUST 15 • Kelligrews Railway Festival, presented by the Kelligrews Ecological Enhancement Program, 25 p.m., at the end of Station Road and the T’Railway, Kelligrews.

OTHER: • St. John’s Haunted Hike, 9:30 p.m., Sundays to Thursdays, stone steps of Anglican Cathedral, Church Hill, www.hauntedhike. com or 685-3444.

• Where once they stood, O’Boyle’s historic walking tours, daily 10 a.m. at the Fairmont Newfoundland Hotel, St. John’s. Reservations required, (709) 364-6845.

• Basilica Cathedral museum open, Roman Catholic Basilica, corner of Bonaventure Avenue and Military Road, St. John’s, 10 a.m.4 p.m., 726-3660.

IN THE GALLERIES: • The Wonder of it All by Bernice Blake at MUN Botanical Garden, 10 a.m.-5 p.m., 737-8590.

• Artist Statement by Stephan Kurr

and Bad Ideas for Paradise by Emily Vey Duke and Cooper Battersby, Eastern Edge Gallery, St. John’s.

• Annual Members Exhibit, Craft Council Gallery, Devon House, St. John’s, until Sept. 3.

• Summer Songs featuring the work of 15 artists at the Leyton Gallery of Fine Art, St. John’s.

• Grand Falls-Windsor Arts and Culture Centre art gallery, solo exhibition by Audrey Feltham.

• Burin Peninsula Arts Council presents Youth Athletes of Newfoundland and Labrador at the Peninsula Mall, Marystown. Until Aug. 29.

• Express 2004: A Festival of Art in 24 Hours, Eastern Edge Gallery, St. John’s, Aug. 21-22. Volunteers needed, 739-1882.

See puzzle on page 22

AUGUST 8 • 28th annual Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival concludes. Workshops begin 10 a.m., performances on the main and youth stages start at 1 p.m., Bannerman Park, St. John’s, 5768508. For schedule visit www.sjfac.nf.net.

• Family day at Memorial’s Botanical Gardens, St. John’s, 10 a.m.-5 p.m., 737-8590.

• Weekly healthy garden workshop series, facilitated by Dr. Wilf Nicholls, 737-8590.

• St. George’s Blueberry festival, with food, children’s entertainment, music, Blueberry Hill, St. George’s, Bay St. George, 6473739. Concludes today.

• South Coast Arts Festival: Newfoundland music and fun for the whole family, St. Jacques, Fortune Bay, Newfoundland, 2 p.m.2 a.m., 888-5101. Concludes today.

• Port Saunders Summerfest starts today with sports, dances, family events, bingo, more. Runs until Aug. 11, 861-3105.

The Sunday Independent, August 8, 2004

Page 27