2007-03-02

VOL. 5 ISSUE 9

—

ST. JOHN’S, NEWFOUNDLAND AND LABRADOR — FRIDAY THROUGH THURSDAY, MARCH 2-8, 2007

—

WWW.THEINDEPENDENT.CA —

$1.50 HOME DELIVERY (HST included); $2.00 RETAIL (HST included)

IN CAMERA 8-9

LIFE 17

Week one of the 2007 Canada Winter Games

CBS mother’s happy return from Afghanistan

Top heavy?

Former premier says number of MHAs could be cut to as low as 36 from 48; Roger Grimes accuses Premier Danny Williams of being pressured to maintain status quo to help rookie politicians qualify for pensions

Grimes says the situation is similar today. He says Premier Danny Williams, who spoke of smaller government while in Opposition, has had to accommodate a large number of new members looking to make a career in politics.

“My understanding, from people like Ed Byrne, was that they had a dozen or more brand new MHAs,” says Grimes. “If you cut back the number of seats, some of these people would have to run against each other for nominations and not have a chance to serve their second term.

“Here we are a decade later and the government, with its leader who has always said we should have fewer members has, for some reason I guess, acquiesced to the facts that they have all these brand new members.”

When contacted by The Independent, the premier declined comment for this story.

Grimes says Williams is under pressure to give his rookie MHAs a chance to get their second term and pension eligibility.

“So maybe after the next election you might hear the premier

IVAN MORGAN

F

ormer Liberal premier Roger Grimes doesn’t think the province needs 48 MHAs. Grimes says with new transportation links and improved technology, the province no longer needs so many provincial politicians.

He says 40 MHAs — eight less than the current number — would be more realistic, although that would still leave the province with one of the highest ratios of politicians to populace in Canada. To be in line with ratios across Canada, he says the number of MHAs would have to be cut closer to 36.

In the early 1990s there was a feeling that there were too many MHAs, Grimes says, but when a report written by Judge John Mahoney recommended cutting MHAs to 44 from 52, there was a strong reaction.

“My recollection was that it was too much of a shock for too many new MHAs,” says Grimes.

A new commissioner, Judge Nathaniel Noel, recommended cutting the number of seats to the current 48.

See “Democracy,” page 2 MHAs identified page 2

QUOTE OF THE WEEK “The people of my province had been lied to so often by those in politics that it really does not matter who we elect.”

Our Lady From the image on a passing iceberg to a gifted statue from Portuguese fishermen, Our Lady of Fatima has deep Newfoundland roots

By Marjorie Doyle

I

don’t know how old I was the day Our Lady of Fatima steamed into St. John’s harbour. The caption on the photo says 1901, but that can’t be — I can see her so clearly.

Skeptics say it was an iceberg loosely suggesting a woman; others say the picture is doctored. That muddle of fact and fiction I can’t explain. I only know I saw her. She was ice-white and cool, and had the bearing of a mediatrix. That

she sailed on icebergs had not been made clear to me, but I knew who she was.

I knew her from a childhood pilgrimage. My mother had taken me many holy places, and the Portuguese village of Fatima was one. I became ill there — ill at the thought of those three little kids being boiled in oil. I’d known this story for years, but now it took on a certain immediacy. There we were standing in the very town where the mayor had interrogated and tortured the child mar-

tyrs. They’d reported that while minding sheep in the meadows around Fatima, the Blessed Virgin Mary had appeared and given them a secret message: “Pray the rosary for the overthrow of communism.” The mayor, presumably of communist leanings, tried to scare them into retracting by hanging them over a cauldron of boiling oil, dipping them in, inch by inch. Or so went the story in our reader. They were preSee “Tempted,” page 10

—— Father Aidan Devine, parish priest of Immaculate Conception Parish in Deer Lake. See page 6.

BUSINESS 13

Behind the scenes at Jumping Bean Coffee LIFE 17

Adriana Maggs making waves in television in TO

Voice from away .

Paper Trail . . . . . .

Style . . . . . . . . . . .

Crossword . . . . . .

12 12 21 28

2 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

MARCH 2, 2007

A dying breed

Randy Simms wonders what’s up in our bedrooms

N

ewfoundlanders are just not having enough sex. I know we are noted for being great lovers, very romantic, charming and all that, but it’s simply not true any more.

A few years ago a national magazine declared Newfoundlanders and Labradorians the most sexually active people in Canada. Like it or not, things appear to have changed.

I know lots of you will disagree with me, but I have evidence to prove the point. When it comes to love making, we seem to have ignored our more basic desires and decided to watch television instead. As a result, we are having fewer children. If the trend continues much longer all of the other problems we face in this province will pale in comparison. There was a time when we were having lots and lots of sex (ah, children). We could proudly say we rocked the old rock, but we are a dying breed.

There are a number of reasons for it.

First of all, there’s the reality of 21st century life. Most women today have

RANDY SIMMS

Page 2 talk to work outside the home to help make ends meet. The decision whether to have children has been made much easier by the cost of having children.

Modern birth control has also played its part. Did you know that in the 1970s we were having up to 12,000 children a year? Can you imagine? In 2006 we had 4,400.

Here’s another sad fact: we went to more funerals in 2006 then we did baby showers. More Newfoundlanders and Labradorians died in 2006 than were born — 4,500 deaths as opposed to 4,400 births. It is the first time in our recorded history that we crossed such a dubious line. In fact, we are the only Canadian province to ever cross that line. It looks like we’ll enjoy the distinction for years to come. We are

slowly but surely going the way of the dodo bird and the cod. If things don’t change Newfoundlanders and Labradorians may be declared an endangered species.

OK, the have-more-sex idea is a little silly, but I hope it got your attention because we are in some serious trouble here and it’s impacting every aspect of life. According to the Newfoundland Statistical Agency, our population decline is going to continue for decades to come. Our population is getting smaller and smaller. Add to that the reality of out-migration, and things look bleak.

From 1991 to 2006, 69,841 people left our province. Better than 12 per cent of our people moved away. Most were young people looking to get ahead and start families. In other words, Newfoundlanders are still having lots of babies but they are being born in Alberta and Ontario — not here.

With so many young people leaving — possibly never to return — another

unique statistic comes into play. The median age in Newfoundland and Labrador today is 41 years. Put another way, half of our population is over the age of 41 and half is under that age.

Just two decades ago we were the youngest people in Canada. Today, we are the oldest. By 2021, the median age will be 49. Granted we are living longer these days, but we are also going to be lonelier.

As you can imagine, none of this indicates anything good. In coming years we will see more and more outports close up. With less people to pay taxes, many of our towns will fall victim to migration to urban centres. Ever shrinking school systems with fewer children will simply mean more consolidation of schools. We’ve seen lots of this already and there’s more to come. With our smaller but much older population, increasing health-care costs will become the new reality, while we’ll have fewer people of working age to pay for it all.

The province faces numerous public

Roger Grimes

policy issues: a shortage of skilled labour; a shrinking fishery; increasing health costs; educational costs; infrastructure maintenance and growth; and the slow death of rural Newfoundland and Labrador. All of these challenges can be traced to one over-riding reality — a shrinking population.

How do we solve the problem and turn the corner? We have to change our immigration policy for sure and we have to get big development projects like lower Churchill moving sooner rather than later.

Encouraging people to work longer will also have to be a part of the changing face of our province. In the end, only population growth will really turn things around.

When I mentioned sex at the beginning of the column I was only joking.

Maybe it’s not so funny after all.

Randy Simms is host of VOCM’s Open Line radio program. rsimms@nf.sympatico.ca

Paul Daly/The Independent

‘Democracy is a fluid word’ From page 1 do an about face again and go back to where he always was and say its time to have fewer than 48 members.”

Grimes says while he was premier he struck an electoral boundaries commission and gave them leeway to look at the number of MHAs in the House.

The commission did not finish its work before the 2003 election.

When the new Tory government took over, Grimes says they threw out the work of the previous commission. The new commission, headed by Judge John O’Neill (on which Grimes served) was mandated to redefine electoral boundaries, keeping the existing 48 seats based on population figures from the 2001 census. Critics say it should have been based on the 2006 census.

A political scientist says the province has one of the highest ratios of elected MHAs to the general population for political reasons.

“The simple answer is politics,” says Memorial University professor Christopher Dunn. “I think it is as easy as that. There would be resistance if the number went down markedly.”

Dunn says he is against adjusting the number of MHAs, saying the current number represents an “institutional protection” for rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

Even if the number was to be

reduced, Grimes says rural Newfoundland would have to be protected. Meaning there has to be accommodation to the “one person one vote” premise to take into account the realities of a rural district.

“Otherwise all the seats would be on the Avalon, and there would only be 10 or 12 seats in the rest of the province.”

Dunn says Supreme Court decisions have allowed some “wiggle room” to adjust the size of boundaries of constituencies based on the particular needs and the dictates of rural districts.

“Democracy is a fluid word in this regard,” says Dunn.

Cle Newhook, who served with Roger Grimes on the most recent Electoral Boundaries Commission, says he would like to see a complete overhaul of the whole electoral system.

He also says the reason for the province’s high number of politicians is political.

Newhook says problems with the province’s electoral systems go beyond reducing the number of MHAs. “In my view — and this is just a personal view — its not good enough just to tinker with it in this way, because the sorts of population movements that are going on within the province requires far more comprehensive look at the whole system.” ivan.morgan@theindependent.ca

MHAs pictured on page 1: Top row from left: Tory Keith Hutchings, Liberal Anna Thistle, Tory Bob Ridgley, Tory Charlene Johnson, Tory Clyde Jackman, Tory Dave Denine, Tory Dianne Whalen, Liberal Ed Joyce, Tory Elizabeth Marshall, Tory Felix Collins, Tory Clayton Forsey, Liberal George Sweeney.

Second row, from left: Liberal Gerry Reid, Tory Harry Harding, Tory Harvey Hodder, Tory Jack Byrne, Tory Joan Burke, Tory John Dinn, Tory John Hickey, Tory John Ottenheimer, Liberal Judy Foote, Tory Kathy Dunderdale, Liberal Kelvin Parsons, Tory Kevin O’Brien.

Third row: Liberal Dwight Ball, NDP Lorraine Michael, Liberal Oliver Langdon, Tory Paul Oram, Tory Paul Shelley, Liberal Percey Barrett, Tory Ray Hunter, Tory Roger Fitzgerald, Liberal Roland Butler, Tory Ross Wiseman, Tory Shawn Skinner, Tory Sheila Osborne.

Fourth row: Tory Terry French, Tory Tom Hedderson, Tory Tom Marshall, Tory Tom Osborne, Tory Tom Rideout, Tory Tony Cornect, Tory Trevor Taylor, Tory Wallace Young, Liberal Wally Andersen, Tory Danny Williams, Liberal Yvonne Jones.

The seat for Labrador West is currently vacant.

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 3

SCRUNCHINS A weekly collection of Newfoundlandia

DOLLARS AND SENSE We’re not that bad off here anymore.

The Conference Board of Canada reported this week that the Newfoundland and Labrador economy will lead all provinces this year with a growth rate of five per cent. That’s thanks to Voisey’s Bay, the Terra Nova oil field, and increased output from White Rose. As for 2008, dwindling oil production is expected to slow down growth.

Question is, can we trust oil companies to tell us the truth about production? The New York Times reported recently that an investigation found pervasive problems in the U.S. government’s program for ensuring companies pay royalties they owe on billions of dollars of oil and gas pumped on federal land and in coastal waters.

According to the report, government officials rely too heavily on statements by oil companies, rather than actual records. On second thought, that could never happen here given the competency of our politicians when it comes to dollars and sense …

I

n case you missed it, a historic rugby game was played late last month between Ireland and England in Dublin’s Croke Park, a field with huge Irish cultural and historical significance and a little-known connection to Newfoundland. The 82,000-seat park is precious to the Irish as a shrine to their struggle. A foreign team — English especially — would never be allowed in, only Ireland’s usual rugby pitch is under construction.

First a bit of history … after the failed Easter Rebellion of 1916 Michael Collins emerged as leader of the Irish resistance to British rule in Ireland. On Nov. 21, 1920 Collins masterminded the assassination of 11 British undercover agents.

Later that afternoon (Bloody Sunday, as it became known) the British forces did a tit-for-tat revenge attack and drove tanks into Croke Park football field and opened fire on the crowd during an all-Ireland Gaelic football game.

The Black and Tans (British forces), under the leadership of General Hugh Tudor killed 14 people. Tudor was later made a knight and hid away/emigrated to Newfoundland in 1924, where he remained for the rest of his life.

In the 1950s, Sir Tudor’s presence in our neck of the woods became known to the Irish Republican Army, which sent over two assassins to St. John’s.

The planned assassination was apparently called off after consultations with a local Catholic priest, Joseph McDermott, who informed the hit men their escape plan was bound to fail.

As for the Feb. 24 game — the first time an English team has set foot on the grass of Croke Park since Bloody Sunday — Ireland demolished England 43-13 …

BLOOD RUNS COLD Speaking of blood, Canadian Blood Services issued a call for blood recently after severe blizzards in Ontario and

BOTWOOD BERG The most recent edition of Our Canada magazine includes a photograph by Mac Owens of Gander, a shot up for photo of the year. Owens’ picture is of a wondrous iceberg drifting off Botwood, although I don’t know if he’ll win over the shot of two polar bears rubbing noses in Churchill, Man. Maybe if Owen got two moose snuggling on the Botwood berg …

A member of the Republican Sinn Fein demonstration organized at the Drumcondra street against the rugby match in Croke Park on Feb. 24.

Albert Gonzalez/Photocall Ireland

Newfoundland reduced the country’s blood supply. Michael Hyduk, a Winnipeg spokesman, said they want to see blood donors come out to help others. Town is getting as bad as Toronto

Killer snow

By Mandy Cook The Independent

A

t 1:07 a.m. on Feb. 17, 1959, five residents of the Outer Battery in St. John’s were killed in an avalanche that saw the top story of one house ripped off and a second house completely demolished.

Fifteen-year-old Shirley Noseworthy was buried in Clarence Wells’ home for 10 hours under a mountain of snow that had rushed down the Battery embankment — an avalanche triggered by a weak layer in the snow. Ironically, Noseworthy was taking shelter at her friend’s house from the raging winter storm outside. She was one of the lucky ones to survive the ordeal, and knows it.

“I think it was a miracle,” she says, reflecting on the 48th anniversary of the event. “It used to haunt me a lot. I couldn’t sleep in the fetal position for years. I had my legs up towards my stomach, cuddled up on the couch. I never slept like that for years and years … it was too frightening.”

Noseworthy (Eales is her married name) was asleep on her side on a daybed in the kitchen when the lights blinked twice. Then came a cracking sound, louder than thunder. The next thing she knew, she was flying down a “chutey-chute.”

After that there was nothing but silence for what “seemed like a long time after.”

for overreacting to a bit of snow. Next thing you know Ottawa will send in the army to clear the streets of St. John’s.

Oh right, there’s no army here to speak of. Bloody hell …

CALVING SEASON Icebergs are getting a fair amount of publicity in this edition, especially ones shaped like the Virgin Mother (see page 2). Which brings me to Icebergs of Newfoundland and Labrador, a 2004 book by Stephen Bruneau. An estimated 40,000 medium to large-sized icebergs calve (break off) annually in Greenland, and about one to two per

New book raises awareness about avalanches in Newfoundland and Labrador There are no statistics recording the number of avalanches in the province, but there have been over 60 deaths in the past 250 years, according to David Liverman’s new book, Killer Snow: Avalanches in Newfoundland and Labrador. In February 1959, the book says, there had been an accumulation of 70 centimetres of snow on the ground in the Battery, and another 55 centimetres fell that night. Temperatures had fallen very low, dipping as low as –15 C, creating ideal conditions for an avalanche.

Liverman, an environmental geologist, says a build-up of snow on a “steep-ish” slope and cold temperatures — which can create a weak layer of snow — are the perfect circumstances for an avalanche. When that first layer is buried in more snow, it is likely to break. Everything on top can then slide downwards very quickly.

Dry, powdery snow or crystal layers formed from particularly cold temperatures can also result

in a flat, slippery layer that can trigger avalanches — and there are several other conditions which can contribute to their occurrence.

Liverman says he had no idea avalanches occurred in Newfoundland and Labrador until he stumbled upon the 1912 gravestone of Francis Williams and his son James in Tilt Cove on the Baie Verte Peninsula. Their deaths were attributed to a “snowslide.”

“Before that, I certainly had no idea avalanches even occurred here so that sort of started off the line of inquiry and we were constantly surprised by what we found,” says Liverman, who has lived Number of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians killed by avalanches: 60 Number of injuries: 30 Source: Killer Snow: Avalanches of Newfoundland and Labrador

cent (400-800) of those make it as far south as Town. (The Townies can’t get outside to see them because of the snow blocking their front doors.) Did you know that the Hibernia platform is designed to withstand the impact of an iceberg in excess of five million tonnes? Let’s hope Big Oil got that figure right …

TRIVIAL PURSUIT One last piece of useless trivia (also from Icebergs of Newfoundland and Labrador) … if the assumed weight of a snowflake is 1/500 grams and the assumed weight of an iceberg is 200,000 tonnes, then the number of snowflakes to make an iceberg is one hundred trillion. Personally, I’d want to see a hand count …

COWB’YS Rumours of rich CFAs (Come-fromaways) buying up outport Newfoundland continue to abound.

Canadian Geographic carried an article a couple of years ago that said nonresident land ownership is a burning issue in Nova Scotia, “where the stunning scenery, frozen-in-aspic fishing villages and bargain-basement prices have made it a real-estate haven for well-heeled Americans, Upper Canadians and Europeans, mostly German.” (Maybe we could send them over a few sealskin key chains as gifts to mark this year’s hunt).

Part of the problem is no one is exactly sure how much land has been gobbled up by CFAs. The Nova Scotia government estimates six per cent of all properties are owned by folks who live somewhere else most of the time.

Property prices are apparently through the roof (multi-million-dollar properties aren’t unheard of). In other words, hold on tight to your grandparents’ saltbox around the bay — it could be a worth a fortune. Especially when icebergs calve and our cowb’ys head out to round ’em up … ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca

and worked in the province for the past 19 years.

Upon discovery of the grave, Liverman and his colleagues at the Geological Survey of Newfoundland and Labrador set out to determine how much of a risk avalanches pose in the province. They examined the public record, mostly in the form of archived newspapers, and made some surprising discoveries.

There have been more people killed in their homes in this province because of avalanches than all of British Columbia and Alberta (the “avalanche centres”) combined, Liverman says.

“From that point of view Newfoundland is quite different than anywhere else in Canada … because of the fishing industry, most people would live close to a good harbour and the good harbours are often below steep cliffs.

“These were people going out to sea every day in small boats and to be honest that was far more dangerous and they would balance off the dangers they had in their every day life and the fairly remote chance of something happening in their houses.”

Keith Nicol, an avalanche awareness instructor in Corner Brook, has been “knocked off his feet” by avalanches a couple of times during his excursions in the back country on the West coast.

See “A big unknown,” page 4

Nothing... gets you all Rev’d up like a new Accord!

Down Payment

Security Deposit

Due on Delivery

0368 0 30 9

$

$

2007 Accord Sedan DX-G 5-speed

$

*

$

@

.

%

Special 48 Month Lease

Accord Sedan DX-G ¥

†1

Special Purchase Finance

Best Family Sedan 21st Win in 25 years

ACCORD Sedan Race-inspired performance, excellent fuel efficiency, head-turning styling, more of the refinements and added features you’ve been looking for… it’s time to get all revved up over nothing – nothing down, nothing due on delivery!

†

%

2.9

up to 60 months

www.honda.ca ‡

All lease and finance offers are from Honda Canada Finance Inc., O.A.C. *Lease based on new 2007 Accord DX-G 5-speed (CM5517J) for 48 month term, OAC. Monthly payment is $368 plus applicable taxes per month with $0 down payment, $0 security deposit and $0 due on delivery. Payments include $1,360 freight and PDI. Lease rate is 3.9%. 96,000 kilometre allowance; charge of $0.12/km for excess kilometres. Total lease obligation is $20,137.

Option to purchase at lease end for $11,160 plus taxes. †: Accord Finance: 2.9% purchase financing for up to 60 months available on new 2007 Accords, O.A.C. Finance example based on a 60 month finance term, OAC: $20,000 at 2.9% per annum equals $358.49 per month for 60 months. Cost of borrowing is $1,509.14, for a total obligation of $21,509.14. †1: Double 5-star safety rating based on crash tests by NHTSA on Accord DX Sedan for driver and front passenger in front-impact crash tests, www.nhtsa.com ¥: 10Best Car Awards as reported by Car and Driver Magazine in January 2007 issue, www.caranddriver.com. Limited time offers. See your Honda dealer for full details. .

All Honda vehicles are delivered with a full tank.

4 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

MARCH 2, 2007

Municipalities face $3 billion ‘infrastructure deficit’

By Ivan Morgan The Independent

T

he province would have to spend $3 billion to bring municipal infrastructure such as roads and water and sewer up to standard, says Wayne Ruth, president of the Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Municipalities.

Ruth says a lot of the infrastructure in the province’s municipalities is now “rusting and rotting,” and municipalities need more money just to maintain and repair the basics.

“We’re not looking at the ‘lap-of-luxury’ type thing,” says Ruth.

Municipal Affairs Minister Jack Byrne says the $3 billion figure seems

a little high to him. “You can make the figure whatever you want it to be, I suppose.”

Byrne says the province is looking at the big picture when it comes to assisting municipalities. After coming to power in 2003, he says the Tories were faced with a financial crisis and had to find savings. He says the thinking was a “straight across the board cut” for municipalities.

Municipal operating grants from the province have been cut from $50 million in the mid-1990s down to less than $20 million today.

Byrne says his department identified 14 towns that had potential for growth and could better handle operating grant cuts, and government decided on a $5-

‘A big unknown’ From page 3 “It’s pretty unnerving when all of a sudden the whole slope is moving on you and any control you had before is gone,” he says. “It’s certainly something to get the heart rate going.”

He says there are tests people can learn to check the stability of the snow. He suggests outdoor enthusiasts avoid all slopes over 30 degrees, and plan their hiking, skiing or snowmobiling route with a topographic map can help to avoid risky valleys.

Nicol asks people who witness an avalanche to register the event on his website. “(The numbers are) a big unknown. That’s one of the reasons when people are involved with avalanches to report them back to my webpage which I’ve been trying to use as a way of getting avalanche information (out).”

Shirley Noseworthy still thinks about how her mother instructed her to stay at her aunt’s house on Forest Road if she were unable to make it home. She instead decided to accept her friend’s invitation to spend the night in the Battery. It was a decision that would affect her for the rest of her life — an experience she still recounts with apprehension.

“I don’t know how to explain it, my dear,” she says. “There’s no words to tell you how I felt, oh my. They opened up a hole and the sunlight hurt my eyes. They were digging with their hands and the snow was coming down and hitting me on my face. I asked them to put (a blanket) over me and they did.”

For more information about avalanche awareness, visit www.swgc.mun.ca/~knicol. mandy.cook@theindependent.ca

million cut over three years, leaving the smaller municipalities alone.

This year was to see a third round of cuts to their operating grants. Earlier this year the government announced they would not make a cut — slated to be $1.4 million — in 2007. That means the 14 towns only bore a $3.6-million cut.

Clarenville is one of the targeted towns, and Mayor Fred Best doesn’t agree with the premise that towns like his, with a growing tax base, can better absorb a cut in operating grants.

He says while every new business brings new taxes, they also bring liabilities — the town has to provide services to them such as streetlights, pavement, sidewalks, water and sewer and

snow-clearing.

Best says a lot of the infrastructure in his town is 40 to 50 years old.

He says with a new water treatment plant coming on stream, the town’s water and sewer situation is good, but some of the town’s streets need to be replaced or improved. Clarenville, with a little less than 100 kilometres of roadways, still has a number of unpaved streets and small gravel roads.

“Our streets are beginning to take a beating,” says Best. “If we are fortunate enough to pave two to four kilometres a year, that’s about it. At that rate it will take 25 years to repair all the existing streets.”

Ruth says the provincial government has got to invest more money in munic-

ipalities, as their ability to raise revenues is limited mostly to property tax.

Ruth says for every dollar that’s collected in taxes, 50 cents goes to the federal government, 42 cents to the provincial government and eight cents goes to municipalities. He says there is a need to address this “fiscal imbalance.”

“We have to go back to the trough all the time and the trough is the taxpayer.

If we can’t make it on your 10 mils then we have to increase to 12 mils,” says Ruth.

“That’s regressive and we have to have a new mechanism whereby municipalities can get a bigger share to the tax regime.” ivan.morgan@theindependent.ca

Gun with a three-year trigger Petroleum board looking at complex, time-consuming fallow-field type sections of Atlantic Accord

By Ivan Morgan The Independent

S

ections of the Atlantic Accord may be implemented by the petroleum board to attempt to get production started on Newfoundland and Labrador’s undeveloped offshore oil reserves.

Max Ruelokke, chair and CEO of the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board, is not comfortable referring to these sections as fallow field.

He says the sections from the Accord’s implementation act relate to the board’s ability to declare a resource a commercial discovery.

Fallow field legislation is timesensitive — an operator has a set amount of time to begin developing a resource. Failure to do so can cause the resource to revert back to government.

“This doesn’t have that. The board, in order to move on this, would have to prove that it is a commercial discovery,” Ruelokke tells The Independent. “So it is not nearly as broad in application as fallow field legislation.”

Ruelokke says he’s currently making himself familiar with these sections.

Max Reulokke of the C-NLOPB

“It is a pretty complex procedure — there’s no doubt about that.”

Ruelokke says the legislation has existed since 1985 and to his knowledge has never been used.

The procedure, which has to be initiated by the board, is a long, complex process he says could take six years. It involves hearings and consultations, numerous opportunities for appeal on all sides, and at the end,

tion can be used to do something that isn’t being done, he says, then the board needs to make sure that they understand those provisions.

“And that’s a process that I’m in the midst of now,” says Ruelokke.

“The fact that we have a potential development in our area that is stalled, for the lack of a better word, as somebody in this position I would want to look and see if there was anything in the legislation that we operate under that would allow us to have an impact on that. So it is within that context.

“We would prefer if the development was to proceed with three willing parties — two governments and an operator, with ourselves as the regulator.”

In an e-mailed statement, Natural Paul Daly/The Independent Resources Minister Kathy Dunderdale says the department is if successful, the board can only considering the board’s request for shorten the operator’s lease to no less direction as to whether it than three years, which Ruelokke should pursue these legislative provirefers to as a “gun with a three year sions “as it is ultimately (the governtrigger.” ment’s) decision.

Ruelokke acknowledges the “The board, by its own admission, board’s current investigations are acknowledges that the development related to the impasse between the order process is time consuming, province and oil companies over the cumbersome and has never been testdevelopment of the Hebron oil field. ed.”

If provisions in the board’s legislaivan.morgan@theindependent.ca

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 5

Paul Daly/The Independent

Newfoundland: heaven on earth for the political crook

T

hey’ve had to haul away poor old Mrs. McCarthy for closer observation. Poor soul, this winter overtopped her as it has done for many. For a month and a half the snow has been up to the very eaves of her little bungalow in the east end. On one occasion she put her aged fist through the kitchen window at her neighbour and his snowblower and on another she took off after a council plow with her broom handle.

What was there for her to do but sit there in that white hell and watch her television set?

Government crawling with nothing but scumbags, whoresons and avaricious swine. Mount Pearl baynoddies saying, “Snow? What snow?”

But what finally tipped the balance of her reason was the report that they’d found Jesus in a box.

As she said to Father Jim when he came to comfort her: “Himself, his mother, his wife, their youngster and some bits of his blessed grandmother ... all in a thing the size of a breadbox. It’s been on the television numerous times.”

Father Jim did his best but his best was none too good for Mrs. McCarthy. “Pay no attention, it is all the devil’s work,” he said to her. “The Holy Father is warning against the whole concern.”

“Would you believe it if they said they found Karl Wells or Randy Simms in a box?” he put it to her in the best Jesuitical fashion. But Mrs. McCarthy said that them two was always in a box for what else was the television but a box.

Whereas Jesus and His Blessed Mother were supposed to be floating free and clear since long before commission of government.

And if there was nothing at all to it whatsoever, she said, why would the Holy Father — up to the two blessed eyes with the troubles of this world — want to go to work and pass any comment whatsoever on it?

She would not be pacified. Father Jim laid heavy blame on himself for his failure to communicate the finer points. Poor old Mrs. McCarthy was hauled away.

Who among us during this winter from the dark side has not stood in jeopardy of physical and pharmaceutical restraints?

Not only the clergy but our secular leaders have seen fit to try and head off a threatened breakdown in law and order and general civility as we know it. The police advised against striking one another over the head with shovels or making rude inciting gestures. Even a heavy winter mitt may conceal an upraised middle finger.

With the plowed snow up to 15 feet high along the twisted streets of the city and a single track to carry vehicles and pedestrians alike, the muffled silence and strange disorientation in those tunnels does odd things to people’s heads. Something verging on panic and dread. Experiments with rats have shown as much.

Six weeks of one howling belt of a blizzard after another. Three hours hard labour every morning to get the car unstogged. Andy Wells pitifully reduced to a civil word in his cheek.

And for those who, like poor old Mrs. McCarthy, had been confined to house arrest for a month and a half, something was bound to snap … with or without Jesus in a box.

For what is there then to do but listen to the radio or watch television? And what has been pouring off these media like molasses over a bread pudding but a sticky stream of abominations big and little. Everything from TB rumours to Big Daddy Danno and the lads and their little extras.

Of course, some of us never cease to be surprised whenever the public “discovers” … yet again ... that a Newfoundland politician is a nasty piece of work — that the last honest politician in Newfoundland was John Cabot. And he didn’t hang around.

RAY GUY

A Poke In The Eye The current blizzard of skullduggery should, by now, be no more amazing than that snow falls in winter. Yet the depths of astonishment among the populace is such that you can only suppose that our spring fogs erase the mass memory completely. What a heaven on earth Newfoundland must be for the political crook.

This trip to the well, it seems to have driven the electorate ever more firmly to the bosom of Daniel W. He’s safe because he’s already rich may, I suppose, be the thinking of the “common person.” No, say I, it’s because he thinks and acts like he’s a bloody captain on a quarterdeck.

When the going gets rough, there’s something in the Newfoundland psyche that craves the big boss. Any window-dressing of democracy, any flimsy notion of ballot-box power, is swept away.

At sea, in a storm or a battle, there is no god but the captain.

Dan is not a politician, never was, never will be. He’s a captain of commerce, a chairman of the board. Laying down the law to a cabinet of bunny rabbits; barking rebukes at an Opposition of sheep.

For relief we turn from the political sewagepond left to us by Joey Smallwood (or, more probably, Richard Squires) to nature. Whenever there’s a strong whiff of mass hysteria in the air, the collective mind seems to turn to a sense of malevolent nature. Are you old enough to remember the shrews?

Back in the day, your government and mine introduced the shrew to the island. It would attack the spruce budworm thus saving our pulpwood for Bowaters and the AND Company.

With the aid of the radio open-line shows, panic soon set in among the likes of poor old Mrs. McCarthy.

An early caller reported that she had heard tell from her daughter living in Nova Scotia that a woman there had set her little baby out on the grass to take the healthful airs and one of them vicious little shrews had crawled right up that little child’s back passage and eaten the precious little creature right out from the inside. And when that poor mother came out to check on that baby there was nothing left only like one of them pink rubber kitchen gloves. Now what do you think of that?

Newfoundland mothers blocked the airwaves, that’s what they did. Several cabinet ministers spoke but to no avail. Then some other alarmed parent said she had seen with her own eyes a helicopter come over and drop three wooden boxes “chock full of snakes for to eat them shrews!” It was a long hard summer.

Today, of course, we’ve got ravenous coyotes gathered in savage packs amid the midnight trees, their cruel eyes gleaming. And bigger, more handy to the size of a man-eating wolf.

Arrrrggg! I have to stop before I go nuts along with poor old Mrs. McCarthy. For her (and for me) I must hold up one glowing candle against this winter’s discontent.

A 12-year old girl also made the news recently. She’s a champion in one of those martial arts.

From what I gathered, she swept the field in North America, kicking and punching the spit out of a thousand or more set against her to take a silver and a gold medal.

I disremember her name but she had a perfectly round and cheerful face and she used the word “awesome” three times in every sentence, childfashion.

Winter? What winter? Lead us, my child!

Lead us on!

A rant contest?

What, do I look like Rick Mercer to you?

If you were asking me – and

I know you’re not, but if you were – I’d say someone just wants to take my ideas and recycle them. Little old

me: a high school student. Fine!

If you want my opinion, right from the source, unprocessed,digitally delivered, with crazy camera angles, then let’s do itit.

Yah, of course I can outrant Rick...

Memorial University of Newfoundland wants you to rant like Rick Mercer. Shoot your own rant, submit it, and you could win one of three one-year tuition prizes.

OPEN TO ANY GRADE 12 STUDENT IN CANADA CONTEST DEADLINE: MARCH 16TH, 2007 SEARCH FOR ‘RANT LIKE RICK’ ON YOUTUBE EMAIL US AT

™

rant@mun.ca

FOR RULES AND FULL DETAILS, VISIT OUR WEBSITE

www.mun.ca/rant

6 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

MARCH 2, 2007

Grimes of the times W

hat the hell has gotten into Roger Grimes? Former premiers are supposed to ride their pensions into the sunset, not go guns blazing after the administration that brought them down.

Grimes hasn’t been in the news this much since he bragged to a New York audience about how we’re such good fishers and, ah, love makers. Which I have no doubt we still are, although the only thing scarcer than fish these days is baby Rogers and Rogerettes.

Grimes may be out to pasture, but that doesn’t mean he’s quieted down.

At least he’s standing up, which is more than can be said for the Liberals he left behind, a party that is most definitely pooped. Her Majesty’s Official Opposition is supposed to be a royal pain in Danny’s butt, but there’s more life in a deflated whoopie cushion.

There’s an unwritten rule in Newfoundland politics that retired/defeated MHAs are to go quietly into the night. There’s usually a carrot (on top of the political pension) to steer them along — Beaton Tulk with a $100,000-plus gig with the federal Transportation Agency, Clyde Wells with an appointment to the bench. Even Chuck Furey, who had a tendency to go

RYAN CLEARY

Fighting Newfoundlander off at the mouth, got a post as chief electoral officer, a bureaucratic position that most definitely doesn’t suit his car salesman ways.

Then there’s the late Frank Moores, the first to pack it up and beat it to the mainland, followed by the two Brians — Peckford and Tobin. You don’t hear much from them these days, although, to be fair, Tobin, chief executive of Consolidated Thompson, did say last month he was no longer pursuing plans to purchase Wabush Mines, in favour of a Quebec development. There’s a loyal Newfoundlander.

Grimes, who draws two provincial pensions, one from his days as a teacher and another from his days in the House, landed a part-time job at the electoral boundaries commission helping to decide where to draw the political lines.

Even that couldn’t keep him quiet. He goes off his head on the front page this week about how the number of MHAs should be slashed to a more reasonable

number, as low as 36 from the current belly. A former senior hockey player, he 48. was known as a scrapper. Keep in mind He’s mental, of course. Politicians that as a sitting politician Grimes recwill never agree to slash 12 of their ommended the formation of a Bloc own throats. Hari Kari isn’t in their Newfoundland and Labrador party. As makeup. Grimes does have a point, and a people, we generally hate those who more power to him for making it, but try to crawl outside the box. We’d our politicians are like caplin in terms much rather pull them back into the pot of weighty guts. we’re boiling in. So So what’s Grimes much for the Bloc after? He must want idea … something. Once a it be — and Could it be — and I’m I’mCould politician always a taking a leap politician. Another shot taking a leap here — here — that Grimes at the premier’s office is simply speaking that Grimes is simply his mind? How outperhaps? The 20 months he had on the speaking his mind? landish is that in our eighth floor didn’t realparticular political ly count because it closet where every wasn’t his mandate. sleeve has something (Tobin left him that one, remember?) stuck up it?

It’s not like a political comeback would When Grimes took on MHA John kill Gerry Reid’s political ambitions, Hickey for his double billings, maybe which amount to holding the Liberal he truly felt that the fault was Hickey’s. fort.

How many other people have stood up Maybe Grimes is considering a fed- and given it to a sitting politician since eral run? Norm Doyle is thinking about the spending scandal began? Not many. giving it up. With two pensions to keep Newfoundlanders and Labradorians Doyle comfortable, why the heck elect their politicians to speak for them; wouldn’t he? we have forgotten how to speak for Maybe Grimes retired too soon. ourselves. When was the last time you Maybe there’s still fire in his political saw a Newfoundlander or Labradorian

pumping placards in the streets that the demonstration wasn’t bought and paid for, down to the yellow bus and box lunch? What life we have left is orchestrated.

Grimes came out recently to say that any deal Danny will eventually do on the lower Churchill will be pretty much like the one he almost did, the same one the Tories helped scuttle. He accused the Conservatives of playing political games to get elected — strong accusations.

Again, former premiers aren’t supposed to have any fight left in them. We chew them up and spit them out. The very next week, Dean MacDonald, chair of Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro, came out swinging, accusing Grimes of failing to read his own deal.

MacDonald called it a piece of crap, a “shit deal.”

Grimes seems to love a pounding.

There’s Grimes again this week just a few inches below this column defending himself in a letter to the editor. He also came out late this week to threaten Danny with legal action if the premier keeps at him. Where will it end?

In the absence of an effective opposition, let’s hope it doesn’t. ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca

YOUR VOICE Vultures circle over FPI bones Dear editor, I am an observer of political concerns in our province and look forward to a give-and-take debate over the issues.

Every now and then an issue comes along that forces me to put pen to paper, and causes my blood to boil far beyond the regular chat with friends in a coffee shop. A few come to mind … the fibre-optic deal with Danny and friends, out-migration that our present government doesn’t seem to notice or even care about, and the latest cause of my extreme rise in blood pressure — the FPI fiasco. Is it just me or does this so-called discussion about who should get the assets of our company stick in your throat like bad medicine. I become very angry

when I hear government and the unions taking about this — like Brutus and his cronies dividing up Caesar’s spoils. There is something fundamentally wrong with this picture! As far as I know FPI turned a huge profit as of late … this is a successful company, this is a competitive company, and it’s a Newfoundland company. I am not at all surprised as I watch the vultures circle. It’s just another step toward the dismantling of Newfoundland ever since the present regime took power. We have to give FPI with an oil name. Maybe then Williams will take note and fight to keep it all together.

Ed Dowden, Bay Bulls

Grimes defends his lower Churchill deal Dear editor, I write to offer clarification regarding comments made by Dean MacDonald in The Independent’s Feb. 23 edition (‘Worse than upper Churchill’, by Ivan Morgan).

I recall a meeting with Mr. MacDonald after the chief negotiator for the lower Churchill project reported to me that the Hydro board had raised some concerns.

At that meeting, Mr. MacDonald conducted himself in a professional and dignified manner. He did not resort to the crass language that he used in your article. However, Mr. MacDonald’s present-day recollections do not reflect what occurred at the meeting.

For the record, the proposed arrangement for the development of the lower Churchill that government was trying to finalize was to see the project 100 per cent owned by Newfoundland and Labrador. All project work and hirings would be controlled by the province. There would be a guaranteed floor price based on all of Hydro Quebec’s sales (not just domestic, as claimed by Mr. MacDonald). There would also be full inflationary protection and recall capability for our own use, if and when required.

I am at a loss as to why Mr.

‘A beaten people’ MacDonald’s description of the major components of the proposed development is factually incorrect. The details as I have described them are contained in publicly available documents.

By the way, this is the same Dean MacDonald who, along with Danny Williams, was an avid supporter of the Brian Tobin-Lucien Bouchard proposed lower Churchill development that was only going to be two-thirds owned by Newfoundland and Labrador and one-third owned by Quebec. How times change!

I invite any and all to read the publicly available documents as I have done. Maybe Mr. MacDonald should also take the time to read these documents. Surely the people of the province expect nothing less from the chairman of the Hydro board before making public comments on such an important issue.

Roger Grimes, St. John’s

AN INDEPENDENT VOICE FOR NEWFOUNDLAND & LABRADOR

P.O. Box 5891, Stn.C, St. John’s, Newfoundland & Labrador, A1C 5X4 Ph: 709-726-4639 • Fax: 709-726-8499 www.theindependent.ca • editorial@theindependent.ca

The Independent is published

by Independent News Ltd. 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 EDITOR IN CHIEF Ryan Cleary MANAGING EDITOR Stephanie Porter PICTURE EDITOR Paul Daly PRODUCTION MANAGER John Andrews ADVERTISING DIRECTOR Sandra Charters SALES MANAGER Gillian Fisher CIRCULATION MANAGER Karl DeHart

sales@theindependent.ca • production@theindependent.ca • circulation@theindependent.ca All material in The Independent is copyrighted and the property of The 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. • © 2007 The Independent • Canada Post Agreement # 40871083

The 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 Independent, P.O. Box 5891, Station C, St. John’s, NL, A1C 5X4 or e-mail us at editorial@theindependent.ca

The following letter was written by Father Aidan Devine of Deer Lake to federal Transportation Minister Lawrence Cannon, with a copy forwarded to The Independent.

Dear Minister Cannon: I have lived my life here in Newfoundland and Labrador and I have to write today to express my disappointment and to express how very disillusioned I have become as I witness yet another slight from our nation’s capital! I am a Catholic priest and what I am seeing is the slow death of a beautiful province.

Today, I learned with sadness that Marine Atlantic had decided to increase the fares for the ferries traveling between Port aux Basques and North Sydney. It’s a small matter in and of itself, but the constant pressures being put onto the shoulders of the residents of this province just keep coming and coming! Is Ottawa trying to rid itself of this province? When you look at the overall history it sure does look that way! I don’t really know what to say to you as there seems to be nothing that will change the mindset of Ottawa when it comes to the way we are treated!

As I write this letter the sound of silence from our own elected politicians is absolutely deafening. Not a peep out of them. The promises of a brighter future for our province have long since been so compromised that it is no longer part of our heritage. It is bad enough living on the island with the highest cost of living east of Toronto that I guess it is almost impossible for you, living in Ottawa, ever to grasp the high cost of food, fuel and living in general in my province. I often wonder what the reaction of the people and politicians of the province of Quebec would be if there was any movement on the part of Ottawa to downgrade their standard of living to any degree. You know what would happen? In a short time you would see a province in an uproar with threats of separation once again being raised.

If ever there was a province that has every right to separate, it is Newfoundland and Labrador. Just recently we saw our present premier, Danny Williams, have to fight Ottawa for a share of the money that was being made available with respect to our offshore oil resources. To make himself heard he had to go so far as to actually have all Canadian flags lowered on all provincial buildings! What an embarrassment that he would have to go to such extremes to try and get noticed! It was only after a long battle he was finally able to secure a sum of $2 billion and Ottawa made a big issue of it.

Personally this amount of money is mere pittance compared to what we truly deserve. It was yet another embarrassing moment for Ottawa with respect to how this province is treated.

Our province came into existence due to the great fishing grounds of the Grand Banks, however, due to greed on the part of many, especially the foreign countries, the fishery came to a screeching halt in 1992. Since then the fishery has been closed to most Newfoundlanders and a way of life that was in existence for hundreds of years has come to a screeching halt.

Our 200-mile limit is a joke. What benefit has my province seen as a result of change in jurisdiction? Some foreign fishing boats have been caught for illegally fishing on the Grand Banks; these boats have been brought to shore and released for one reason or another while the poor Newfoundlander is now reduced to standing on the wharf watching as everybody else catches all kinds of fish.

The list of items that have negatively affected our province continues to grow. What has happened to the promises made for the people of Goose Bay regarding the Armed Forces’ pullout!

As well, the airport in Gander is now reduced almost to nothing.

Stephenville is fast going the way of many extinct animals, never to resurrect again. There are more items; these are but a few that are negatively affect-

ing the Newfoundland economy. Over 20 years ago Brian Peckford signed a deal with Ottawa where our province received the grand total of $800 million for roads in exchange for the closure of the rail system. The promise of a Trans-Labrador highway remains that and the major highway across the province is constantly in need of repair, costing us more than the $800 million. That really is not the fault of Ottawa so much as poor foresight on the part of the government of Newfoundland at that time.

The famous upper Churchill Falls hydro deal made by Joey Smallwood with the province of Quebec is the greatest example of a forced sellout of our recourses in exchange for the employment of several thousand people to construct the project. The profit that Quebec is making on this deal is a windfall for that province at our expense.

The people of my province had been lied to so often by those in politics that it really does not matter who we elect.

Nothing is going to really benefit the province. We have been reduced to the status of a Third-World country.

Perhaps many of our problems today are the results of bad advice/decisions of earlier premiers. However, I nonetheless sense from history that Ottawa sees Newfoundland/Labrador as a province that has become an economic drain on the financial status of the federal government.

The latest increase from Marine Atlantic will become another nine-day wonder. For awhile there will be an outcry but we all know that it will go away and many Newfoundlanders and Labradorians will be forced to pay the extra fares to travel on Marine Atlantic and we will complain and makes jokes about it. We will still continue to grow poorer, and the cost of living will continue to increase, but who really cares?

I doubt if many people will lose any sleep over this new increase even though at present there is an outcry.

See “Marine Atlantic,” page 7

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 7

Impending doom might not be all bad

G

et ready for a heresy, and I don’t mean slagging the church — that’s a mug’s game, and has become almost fashionable. A good heresy has to really fly in the face of a dearly held religion, not the old-fashioned stuff. I think I have one.

I am sceptical about all the panic over global warming.

Concern over global warming has caught on so strongly that even Stephen Harper and his Conservatives have started pretending they care about it. Make no mistake, their commitment is only vote deep, but it is impressive enough that public concern has forced them to care.

There used to be a joke that went “Everyone complains about the weather but no one does anything about it.” That joke isn’t funny any more, as politicians jockey and posture to be seen as just that — doing something about the weather, which is, if you stop and think about it, ridiculous.

No doubt human activity is affecting climate change. No doubt this

IVAN MORGAN

Rant & Reason change is going to mean … well … change. But so what?

Weather is unpredictable. If you don’t like it, we say, wait five minutes.

Climate — weather patterns measured over time — is also unpredictable.

Don’t think so? Check for yourself.

There has been a lot of alarm recently over melting ice sheets in Antarctica. The articles say these sheets are over 5,000 years old.

What I am reading from this is that they have melted before. What caused the melting, or the freezing for that matter, the last time? Here’s a hint: it wasn’t me. It wasn’t you. It wasn’t us.

The history of weather is climatology, and a look at climatology shows that this planet’s climate is pretty unpredictable. From about three million years ago this planet has seen ice sheets form and melt on 40,000- to

100,000-year cycles, the last one ending about 12,000 years ago. That means the province has been covered in ice five kilometres thick dozens of times. That means that dozens of times it has started snowing one year — and not stopped for tens of thousands of years.

So, you may ask?

So that brings up some questions.

Were we to have never burned a quart of oil, would we still be in climatological trouble? All the evidence points to climate changing; is the message we will always have to adapt? Looks that way to me.

The problem with the pious lecturing of some environmentalists is the implication that, were it not for our wicked ways, we would be living in an ecological paradise of unchanging perfect weather. How do we know that to be true?

What if, centuries from now, historians write about how a group of wrong-headed people with imperfect scientific knowledge almost stopped the burning of fossil fuels, which would have stopped global warming,

Marine Atlantic not only problem From page 6 though at present there is an outcry. Why? Because I fear we are a beaten people who have become completely lethargic and apathetic. I’m convinced you will be able to count on the fingers of one hand the number of letters you will receive on this latest move on the part of Marine Atlantic.

Politicians will promise us the stars and many will believe and hope they are going to deliver what they promise. The problem is not Marine Atlantic alone, but the federal government’s constant refusal to truly help my province. We are not looking for money. We want our fair share of what Canada has to offer. We want to feel some sense of respect and acceptance. Unfortunately, we are not getting this. Communities are being emptied, families are being torn apart and the moral fabric of our province is being torn apart. We want to feel part of this great country. But it seems that as soon as we see a glimmer of hope or light somehow Ottawa turns the screws on us and we are once again left in the dark. Mr. Cannon, the peo-

ple of Newfoundland are a tired, angry, frustrated people. People bitter over the way we have been treated and I fear most of all we are a people who see no hope of a future.

When all is said and done nothing will change except that once again this province and its people will be like the poor of the world burdened with another “small tax” and Marine Atlantic will get its $270 million. The service will not change and the boats will continue to plow the seas of the Gulf and all will be happy in Ottawa. People like me will be thought of as fools trying to get you to see what effect all this is having on the people of Newfoundland. Mr. Cannon, you live in Ottawa, you have no idea what life is like for people living in communities like Flower’s Cove, Brent’s Cove, Bay Bulls, English Harbour, Burin, South Branch or any one of the hundreds of communities that exist outside the City of St. John’s.

I fear you could care less!

Father Aidan Devine is parish priest of the Immaculate Conception Parish in Deer Lake.

YOUR VOICE Fear of flying car parts Dear editor, I’ve lived my whole life in Newfoundland, except for 10 months last year when I moved to Nova Scotia. The first thing that struck me as being different there was that in order to get my car registered I had to get it inspected. It only makes sense that you should be required to drive a structurally sound vehicle. It doesn’t make sense, however, why you are able to register a car in Newfoundland without first making sure it is safe to put it on the road. I take good care of my car, so I’m not worried about it breaking down in the middle of a storm on the side of the highway or losing control and going off the road at high speed. What I do worry about sometimes is that the car coming at me will lose control and swerve in front of me, or

part of the tail pipe will rust off and fly in front of me — causing me to lose control.

I know what it’s like driving in a car that breaks down every time she runs more than 15 minutes.

Think of all the accidents on our province’s roadways each year. Too often we blame the state of the road, the driver or the weather. We never ask how many of them were a result of a faulty or deteriorated car part?

Chances are many of them can be attributed to the sheer number of aging, un-inspected, rust buckets on the roads. I know what it’s like driving in the fog with one headlight and a moose runs across the road in front of me. I know what it’s like being unable to put more than $10 worth of gas in the tank or else it will leak out. I know what it’s like driving in a car that breaks down every time she runs more than 15 minutes. I know what it’s like not having brakes good enough to stop me quickly if I have to. Looking back at those cars, I think I must have been crazy to drive them, but I was young, poor and had places to go. I’m just glad I never hurt anyone — including myself — on the roads.

Jason Croft, Gander

Kudos for Kennedy

Jerome Kennedy

Dear editor, I usually don’t make it my business to get involved in the campaigns of other political districts in this province other than to wish the PC candidates well in their election, and I certainly don’t wish to tell people in other districts how to vote.

Still, every once in awhile a great candidate comes along, someone you can be proud of, someone your party is lucky to have. Right now we (especially the good people of Carbonear/Harbour Grace) have that person in Jerome Kennedy.

Kennedy is someone who is well known in legal circles as a champion of the underdog, someone who will really be there for people when they need help the most. In politics you strive to find two things — name candidates and people who will look out for the little guy. Jerome Kennedy will do those things 110 per cent.

Come the Oct. 9 election, voters will face this decision: do I vote for a member who’s going to be part of a shrinking opposition or do I vote for a member who’s going to be part of a strong government?

Tony Ducey, Garnish

which saved humanity from an impending ice age?

During a recent environmental disaster, in the year 1816, known afterwards as “eighteen hundred and froze to death,” severe frosts destroyed crops in Canada, the northern U.S. and Europe. It was the year with no summer. Some people saw it as the wrath of a vengeful God — some people always do. My question is: have some people in our modern times just swapped one piousness for another? Are we to be washed away in a great storm, not because of our ignoring of the scriptures but for the driving of sinful, wasteful SUVs? If weather were political it would have wiped out Washington D.C. It didn’t, it picked on New Orleans. But the issue of weather is so polarized politically that to question it puts one, in some people’s minds, in the same camp as Stephen Harper and George Bush. Not in my case. God forbid. I know why they question global warming — it isn’t why I am.

I am not saying we shouldn’t cut greenhouse gases, reduce dependency

on oil or become a less wasteful society. These actions are good in and of themselves, but their effect on our future is next to impossible to predict.

What if global warming turns out to be the greatest godsend in human history? What if the warming spreads rain across arid regions, allowing millions who now starve to feed themselves? What if it opens the north to agriculture and human population expansion?

What if here in Newfoundland it leads to a whole new ocean environment where new species take advantage of changing sea conditions to flourish, and we can all grow grapes and make wine?

Who the hell knows? And that is my heresy — I don’t, and I don’t think a lot of environmentalists do either.

Impending doom makes for good columns and movies, but who says it has to be all bad?

And for those poised to write nasty letters, don’t forget wasting paper helps wipe out the world’s forests. ivan.morgan@theindependent.ca

‘One of the best and inspiring pieces’ Dear editor, A copy of Rick Mercer’s magnificent Fighting Words (The Independent’s Jan. 26 edition) piece was just forwarded to me by an acquaintance. I have forwarded it on to many more acquaintances, because it is simply one of the

best and inspiring pieces of journalism it has been my pleasure to read in many a long day.

I congratulate your fine paper for printing it.

James J. Yaworsky, University of London, U.K.

MARCH 2, 2007

8 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 9

IN CAMERA

Cold hands, warm hearts

Take a look out your front window … what do you see?

T

Adam Howse in single men's badminton on Feb. 24, 2007. Canada Winter Games.

Team member #1 competes in the men's 3000 meter relay event on Wednesday.

Fiona Humber completes the 10 km. Biathlon in brutally cold temperatures. Fiona finished 25th in a large field.

Although athletes representing Newfoundland and Labrador had, as of press time, yet to win a medal at the 2007 Canada Winter Games, organizers from this province say the team has been welcomed with open arms in Whitehorse. Photographer Lee Carruthers took in some of this week’s competition, while writer Don Power recaps the participants’ ups and downs so far.

A coach looks out during the men's short track speedskating relay event. Wednesday, February 28, 2007. Canadian Winter Games.

Canada Winter Games Nfld/Labrador vs New Brunswick hockey game. Monday, February 26, 2007. Score 5-8 for NB.

Tara O'Brien, Cheryl Norman and Jennifer Cunningham at Wednesday's game against New Brunswick. Nfld/Labrador lost 9-4.

Team Newfoundland/Labrador's Men's Badminton team takes a minute out from cheering Jessica Murphy during her game Tuesday night. L-R: Mitchell Webb, Adam Howse, Chris Howse, Matthew Parsons and Matthew Alexander.

Tara O'Brien, Cheryl Norman and Jennifer Cunningham at Wednesday's game against New Brunswick. Nfld/Labrador lost 9-4.

he Newfoundland and Labrador contingent at the 2007 Canada Winter Games may be 5,400 miles from home, but team leader Clayton Welsh says you’d never know it from the hospitality they’re receiving.

Newfoundland and Labrador’s team of athletes, coaches and managers are in Whitehorse, Yukon, for the games. Welsh says, despite the brutally cold temperatures, the team has been received very warmly. In fact, says Welsh — Newfoundland and Labrador’s chef de mission — every province or territory at the games has talked about the hospitality of the locals in the first week of the multi-sport event.

“Every morning during our chef meetings, somebody from one province or another brings a story of how somebody locally helped them the day before,” Welsh tells The Independent from the mission staff headquarters in Whitehorse.

He says the Canada Games are known to have three logistical problems: transportation, meals and accommodations. This year, teams travelled to Whitehorse via commercial aircraft instead of chartered flights because of the smaller airport. Attempting to feed and house 1,800 people per week at the athletes’ village is another difficult chore for most host societies.

Not Whitehorse.

“There hasn’t been a problem with either of the three,” Welsh says, sounding half surprised. “We go around the table every morning at the meeting, and everybody, every province, not just ours, is pleased with the way things are going.”

While the logistical aspect of the Games continue to hum along smoothly, the actual competition has left Newfoundland and Labrador wanting. The team has been unable to win a medal thus far at the event (as of the morning of March 1), and has seen its share of disappointments.

Glenn Littlejohn, one of the mission staff members and a former chef, says the devastating injury to badminton player Samantha Ralph of Glovertown on Feb. 25 left the entire team a bit down.

Ralph was the top ranked singles player and Newfoundland and Labrador’s best hope for a medal in the first week. However, a twisted knee forced her to the sidelines after her second match. When she couldn’t start the quarterfinal match, she was relegated to fifth place in ladies singles.

“When Sam when down it hurt us a bit,” said Littlejohn, a veteran of Canada Games as an athlete, coach and mission staffer. “She was our best medal hopeful.”

Then two days later, on Tuesday, Welsh says, the judo athletes — who had previously been the toast of the team, winning matches throughout Monday — lost the two bouts they had that would have put them into bronze medal matches.

“As a mission staff, we’ve got no control over what the athletes do, or how they do,” Welsh says. “Although I think some of our athletes are getting a little uptight because we still haven’t won a medal.”

Newfoundland and Labrador is competing in badminton, biathlon, female curling, male hockey, judo, shooting, short track speed skating and synchronized swimming during the first week. Next week, athletes will arrive to compete in alpine skiing, boxing, male curling, fencing, figure skating, gymnastics, female hockey, cross-country skiing, squash, table tennis and wheelchair basketball.

Newfoundland and Labrador will not participate in two sports, archery and ringette.

The lack of medals in week one also means that several of the athletes arriving in Whitehorse Friday and Saturday won’t have momentum on their sides.

Of bigger concern to the mission staff than a lack of medals is the lack of warmth. The temperature was expected to be cold, but many of Newfoundland and Labrador’s athletes are not used to the extreme temperatures, and there have been several minor cases of frostbite, according to Welsh.

In fact, some of the outdoor activities, including biathlon and skiing, were postponed early in the week.

One biathlete, Kyla Fisher, suffered minor frostbite during a race, as did a Corner Brook speedskater, who was just outside waiting for a shuttle bus.

“You know the way our teenage kids wear coats these days,” Welsh says. “When they’re home, they rarely wear gloves or hats. Up here, you need hats, gloves and a warm coat.

“Fortunately most of the venues are close together, so they don’t need to be outside for long, but our coaches and managers have been warned to tell their athletes about the cold.”

“It was –35C with the wind chill here the other day,” Littlejohn says. “None of our athletes are used to that, so we’ve got to be very careful.”

Lance Aux Meadows, St. Anthony

Photo by Paul Daly

Kids with rosy cheeks and ice crusted, homemade mitts? A group of snowmobilers stoppedÊ for a boil-up? An abandoned saltbox house fringed with icicles?

The Independent announces a photography contest Ñ Your Town pen to amateur photographers across ewfoundland and abrador, Your Town is an opportunity to show us your community through the lens of a camera An entry must include at least three photographs, preferably digital (minimum size 5X7@170 dpi) Prints will also be accepted Photographs can be in colour or black and white Dig down deep and reveal, through your photographs, the character and uniqueness of Your Town . O

N

L

.

.

.

.

.

1st PRIZE Nikon D40 W/18-55mm Lens $750 value

2nd PRIZE Nikon Coolpix L6 $200 value

3rd PRIZE LowePro SlongShot 100 AW $80 value

1 The Contest will run from February 16 to March 16, 2007 The winner will be announced in the March 23rd issue of The Independent Entries may be mailed to Paul Daly at The Independent, P Box 5891, Stn C, St JohnÕs, , A1C 5X4, or by emailing paul daly@theindependent ca o purchase necessary to qualify 2 Submissions must be a minimum size of 5"x7" @ 170 dpi 3 The prizes cannot be redeemed for cash and are non-transferable 4 The winner will be selected by a panel of independent judges including photography editor Paul Daly, Ray Fennely and ed Pratt All entries must be received by The Independent by 5 p m ednesday March 21, 2007 and published in the March 23 issue of The Independent 5 The contest is open to all residents of ewfoun land and abrador, with the exception of The Independent, prize sponsors, employees, agents, contractors or immediate family members 6 n accepting the prize, the winner agrees to allow publication of their entry, name and photograph in The Independent for promotional purposes All submissions may be published and edited for length 8 By entering the contest, the contestants agree to accept the rules as stated .

.

.

.O.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

W

N

.

N

NL

.

.

.

.

. N

.

.

L

.

. I

.

.

.

.

rizes Sponsored By:

P

foto source™

E-MAIL DIGITAL ENTRIES TO PAUL.DALY@THEINDEPENDENT.CA BEFORE MARCH 21

MARCH 2, 2007

10 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

YOUR VOICE ‘Protesting is a democratic right’ Dear editor, While some media are obsessed with the untimely passing of Anna Nicole Smith, I am happy to see The Independent has its feet on the ground and is more concerned with matters concerning everyday people of this province.

Right now I find myself upset because of the closing of the Status of Women here in St. John’s. I believe the Status of Women in this city has done a great job of educating the public on the problems women face in their everyday life with employment and childcare, not to mention sexual assault and spousal abuse.

It seemed like the right thing to do

when they protested the cuts by staging a sit-in at the Status of Women’s office.

However, I was surprised when I heard the police were told to arrest these peaceful protesters if they did not vacate the office. I have always believed that protesting is a democratic right. I know I signed petitions to protest the cuts to the St. John’s Status of Women. I also sent e-mails to Stephen Harper but when all else failed a sit-in seemed like the only thing left.

I am hoping the women of this province will have a long memory and not mark their X for the present government.

June Wilcox, St. John’s

‘Consume, shut up and die’

Noreen Golfman

Dear editor, Noreen Golfman expresses surprise (Irony is the cruellest kind, Feb. 9 edition) that Rick Mercer should attack her so viciously for her opinions.

When I read Golfman’s initial statement, I was immediately struck by her courage in criticizing the media fetish over the war in Afghanistan. I circulated her article widely among acquaintances who, like me, do not endorse the Conservative government’s move to enlist the military in combat, as opposed to peace-keeping. Let us examine, not the writers, but rather three areas of cloudy thinking in this ongoing debate. The first is the not-soinnocent conflation of individual story with ideological position. With Rick Mercer, Golfman, and Ray Guy, we all

‘A way to describe my friend’

deplore the loss of a soldier’s life or limb during combat. And that goes for Afghans as well as Canadians. Many of us, as well, see this war as a Canadian social tragedy, serving some interests highly (e.g., those of politicians and manufacturers of armaments), some Afghans possibly, and military personnel and their families not at all.

The second logical slip concerns a misplaced emphasis on duty to country. While military people believe, and must believe in order to kill, that they are saving people from something (the target enemy changes with each war), I see this as a militaristic fallacy whereby people blindly do what they are told. As a student of mine wrote recently, we too often perpetrate the Western cultural imperative to “consume, shut up, and die.”

The third faulty argument is that, through our military intervention, we are somehow helping Afghan women.

In their schools we may be; however, as we kill and mutilate men, women and children — and we do — this hardly advances the agenda of women.

Kudos to your paper for airing differences of opinion, belief and moral stance. Keep arguments about policy alive; but please avoid those that castigate individual people who dare to differ.

Carol E. Harris, Woody Point

Dermot O’Reilly

Dear editor, I looked in the dictionary for the word gentle and I found this: chivalrous, honourable, distinguished, gentleman, kind, amiable. What I’d really been looking for

was a way to describe my friend, Dermot O’Reilly. I’d found it.

John Murphy, St. John’s

‘Anti-Newfoundland bigotry’ Dear editor, The country of Germany, always a bastion of civility and humanity, has decided to ban the import of seal products for reasons of political cowardice and profound ignorance. With its love of eating wild boars and hunting deer, this move just highlights the hypocrisy of the Germans. To hear accusations of cruelty leveled at us from a country

that tried to subjugate the world twice in the last century is laughable.

Maybe the German people could actually contribute to the ecological movement by closing any number of their industrial or nuclear plants or reducing the amount of cars they drive.

I call on all people of Newfoundland and Labrador to boycott all

German products and most especially, any Volkswagen product. Call your local VW dealer and let them know that as long as the German government pursues a course of antiNewfoundland bigotry, that you or any of your friends will not buy a VW vehicle.

Wallace Ryan, St. John’s

Andy Wells’ ‘arrogant, abrasive and sarcastic self’

Andy Wells

Dear editor, Albert Einstein said, “Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character.”

On Feb. 21, St. John’s Mayor Andy Wells was interviewed by Chris O’Neill-Yates on CBC’s Here and Now. He tried to present the persona of a thoughtful leader methodically tackling the city’s toughest problem — mountains of snow.

Instead Wells was his usual arrogant, abrasive and sarcastic self. It’s not snow that needs to be cleaned up

— it’s a piggish-like manner unbecoming of a man occupying such a prestigious office as mayor. Abraham Lincoln said, “Character is like a tree and reputation its shadow. The shadow is what we think it is; the tree is the real thing.

Wells continually degrades his own character and his reputation will be in the shadows for a long long time — unless he changes his ways.

Bill Westcott Clarke’s Beach

‘Honourable indeed’ Dear editor, On April 5, 1932 I was a young boy but I can still remember standing on Bannerman Road in St. John’s watching as a mob of 10,000-plus angry Newfoundlanders stormed the Colonial Building.

I watched as every window was broken and the building ransacked. What caused this riot? “The misappropriation of funds.” Nothing has changed except the fighting Newfoundlander has lost his will to fight. Surrendered, gave up. Traded our

birth right for three welfare cheques; old-age pension the baby bonuses and unemployment insurance. But the honourable gentlemen elected to serve us, serve themselves instead. Generous salaries, pensions and slush funds all done while

they ignore the plight of others. Legislating government workers back to work, while they increase their salaries. Honourable indeed.

Leo F. Knox, St. John’s

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 11

‘Tempted to hammer up a sign’ From page 1 pared to die for their faith, we were told, not like us — selfish Newfoundlanders trying to sneak chocolate during Lent.

Our Lady of Fatima had returned to St. John’s in the spring of 1955, this time sailing through The Narrows aboard the Gil Eannes, the hospital ship of the Portuguese fishing fleet.

Was I present on that cool May day, raised up on my father’s shoulders to watch the grand spectacle, or is this, too, constructed memory?

She disembarked at the naval dock into a waiting crowd of 4,000 Portuguese fishermen and most of St. John’s. She was petite now, and had a delicate face with fine features. She’d traveled the rough Atlantic seas in the ship’s chapel, and looked none the worse for wear.

This smaller, sweeter plaster Lady was eased onto a portable altar hoisted onto the shoulders of Portuguese men, some wearing suit jackets, some dressed in their fishing uniform of plaid shirts and rubber boots. They left the wharf and crushed into the crowded streets of St. John’s.

More fishermen, carrying tall staffs with lighted lanterns, clustered around the altar like an informal honour guard. This Mediterranean procession in an Irish Catholic town wound its way up steep hills to the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. Inside the church, ringing richly now with robust Marian hymns, the proud gift of thanks was delivered to the Catholic community of St. John’s. For hundreds of years, Portuguese vessels had sailed into port for refuge from storms, to stock up on supplies, or to offer leave to their men during the long voyages fishing cod on the Grand Banks.

A symbol of this quiet cultural mingling had been sought, and found.

The statue became the centerpiece of a grotto that includes two young kerchiefed girls and a shepherd boy, the startled children from the Fatima meadow. They kneel in front of an immaculate woman who’s draped in flowing robes that fall to the top of her toes, exposing bare feet. If you had visited the shrine in later years, you would have observed, kneeling behind the Portuguese children, a bank of kids in navy pleated uniforms and colourful bandanas. That would be us, lured there by a fascination with child martyrs, the rare sight of sheep in a holy shrine, and by the gentle Lady.

The church was the far border of my pre-

scribed childhood world. I was free to roam the back alleys, streets and lanes of a defined quadrant between our convent, attached to the church, and home. Walking to and from school, we tried to scare each other — threatening sightings of the neighborhood’s perilous characters: Bucky King, Nina, Orvil, Silly Willy.

The names sent shivers through us. And we would dart up side streets and hide if someone yelled a warning of gang invasion: The Ivanies!

The Wheelers! The Portuguese!

We pretended to be terrified although, unlike most kids in town, we were well used to these foreign seamen, mixing up with them in Mom Collins’ shop. The shop was en route from the harbour to my street, Carpasian Road. Soon after their boats arrived in port, the fishermen — stir crazy from shipboard confinement — would face the steep climb up Prescott Street, stroll out Monkstown Road, and descend Johnny’s Hill to St. Pat’s Ball field, across the road from my house. There they played endless hours of soccer, in bare feet. We would sit in the meadow above the field and watch. We’d take off our shoes and socks to see if we could stand the cold. We’d dare and double dare each other to run around in naked feet, but no one could. This was not a playground in the American mid-west on a summer’s day; this was St. John’s — soggy, slushy, damp St. John’s in May or June. We knew they were hardy; often when they played soccer on the wharf, one of them ended up diving into the harbour to retrieve a stray ball from unappealing, frigid waters. When the men had exhausted themselves on the soccer field, they’d hike back to port, calling in again at Mom Collins’ shop.

The shop filled the corner at Monkstown Road and Maxse Street in the east end of town, and was the centre of brisk juvenile commerce.

My entire disposable income, maybe 25 cents a week, was spent there, though for all the bull’seyes, licorice and jawbreakers procured over the years, I never forked out more than a nickel at a time. It was a small clapboard structure painted that prevailing downtown St. John’s colour, a rich homey green. The store was so cramped it might have been built around Mom Collins, as if someone had grabbed a cluster of children, a few shelves of candy, and hammered up walls. To the right of the door was a window that took up most of the storefront. If

she wasn’t busy serving, Mom Collins kept watch on the passing world. We wriggled through the narrow doorway, shifting and twisting to accommodate our lumpy bookbags. Mom Collins’ entire custom was convent schoolgirls buying candies and jacks, and idle schoolboys buying marbles and yo-yos. Was it a groc and conf selling milk and other things neighbours might need? I never saw a grownup in there. Except the Portuguese.

They were swarthy, stocky, curly haired, dressed in rough sweaters and faded plaid shirts. They reeked of the exotica of European cigarettes, and were always in an uproar — or so it sounded to our untutored ears. What did they buy? I don’t remember them buying much.

We kids were tedious and predictable clientele; even our shopping hours, lunch time and immediately after school, were unvarying.

Mom Collins was suitably indifferent to us. But the ambience changed instantly when the Portuguese squeezed in. They’d loll about, carrying on a running discourse as we conducted business around them. We’d dodge under them, plunk our coins on the counter and mumble our demands. We knew the prices of our purchases and added up our own sums. Mom Collins handled our requests without a word, a silent ballet of trade carrying on inside a larger communication. Had she learned a smattering of Portuguese? Or was she just charmed by the company of these lively, funny men — the only adults she ever saw? She had a warm smile, saved for their arrival. They lit her up, spread mischief all over her, these homeless boys who traveled thousands of miles from family for half the year, to fish.

Like childhood, the Portuguese have vanished, at least from my life. Little trace of them remains in this town and, where the shop used to be, a lone bench sits on a patch of grass.

There should be a plaque to those men from Oporto, Lisbon, perhaps even Fatima. I’m tempted to hammer up a sign myself: In memory of a tender link between Portugal and Newfoundland. Or erect a secular shrine to the ancient.

Who knows? Perhaps on a quiet street corner in Oporto, or in a meadow near Fatima, such a plaque, or plaster lady, exists.

Majorie Doyle is a St. John’s writer. This article first appeared in the Newfoundland Quarterly. Reprinted with permission.

Divine symbol or doctored hoax?

By Mandy Cook The Independent

T

he picture is a stark outline of what’s purported to be a grainy, black and white likeness of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the form of an iceberg, floating serenely past The Narrows of St. John’s harbour over 100 years ago.

The photograph is thought to have been taken on June 24, 1905, the very same day Newfoundland’s own son, the newly-appointed Most Rev. M. F. Howley, was to celebrate high mass wearing the investiture of the sacred pallium at the Basilica Cathedral for the first time. The date also happened to coincide with the 408th anniversary of the discovery of Newfoundland by John Cabot.

The highest quality version of the image on hand is a slightly tattered postcard, said to have been widely circulated some time ago.

The severe border of the iceberg against the ocean horizon might suggest a forgery, as the picture could easily be a cardboard cut-out at a time when such fakeries were easily crafted.

Local photographers muse over the photo’s legitimacy.

“It’s hard to say. If I were able to look at a decent copy of the photograph, an actual silver print, then you could tell if there were any doctoring, re-touching, it would be obvious … if they say there’s a Virgin in the iceberg, the artist or engraver or re-toucher might take

Image of an iceberg spotted outside the Narrows in 1905.

license with it — clarify an arm here, or a face there or a fold of a cloth,” says Mannie Buchheit, a well-known local photographer and archivist.

Frank Kennedy, a Daily News photographer from 1944 to 1964 who specialized in April Fool’s photos of doctored photographs, believes the “Crystal Virgin” picture to be a hoax.

“As a professional photographer, in my opinion is that it was re-touched,” he says.

“Some of the tones in there, particularly the sky, looks like it was artificial. I would have questioned its authenticity. It seems to me they did some re-touching around the so-called statue as well.”

Although it cannot be verified, the photographer of the picture is thought to be a man by the name of T. B. Hayward, a painter of marine scenes. mandy.cook@theindependent.ca

MARCH 2, 2007

12 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

VOICE FROM AWAY

By GEOFF DALE For The Independent AROUND THE BAY Television has, at last, come to Port aux Basques. Following the election of Mr. Don Jamieson as the MP for Burin-Burgeo, a group of private citizens got together and decided to “go after” Mr. Jamieson for TV. Following a barrage of telegrams containing the names of hundreds of residents and sent them to the CBC, the BBG (Board of Broadcast Governors), Mr. Jamieson, Hon. Judy LaMarsh, the secretary of State, Hon. J.W. Pickersgill, Minister of Transport and Newfoundland’s representative in the federal Cabinet and last, but not least, to the Prime Minister of Canada, the wheels began to turn.

Mr. Jamieson “just managed to locate” an unused obsolete TV transmitter, had it trucked to Port aux Basques from Montreal and subsequently installed on Red Rocks Hill.

— The Echo, Channel-Port aux Basques, Feb. 21, 1967 AROUND THE WORLD The Allan Steamer Newfoundland which has just made her first voyage here, in the winter mail service, is a wooden boat of about 900 tons. She is extra strongly built and apparently well-fitted in all ways for the tough work she will occasionally have to get through between St. John’s and Halifax. Her cabin and steerage accommodations and fittings are of a very superior order – the former affording comfortable provision for about thirty passengers.

— The Telegraph and Political Review, St. John’s, March 4, 1874 YEARS PAST One day last week two men killed four deer at Colinet, Placentia Bay. They report the deer very plentiful, the cause being attributed to noise made by the men working on the railway track, near Spread Eagle Peak.

— Our Country, St. John’s, Feb. 7, 1884

T Our Country, Feb. 1884

EDITORIAL STAND One of the first things an editor learns is that he can’t please everybody. The ones who haven’t learned this are too dumb to run a newspaper. Human nature is so constituted that some of our readers would like to have us tell the unvarnished truth about them, while others would try and jail us if we did. It is a comforting thought to the editor to know that the saviour Himself did not please everybody while he was on earth.

There is one thing that we are never going to forget: that is that an editor can’t please everybody and isn’t going to try. If he could, he would be wearing wings on his shoulders in another world, instead of patches on his pants in this one.

— The Twillingate Sun, Feb. 28, 1925 LETTER TO THE EDITOR Dear Sir: This is really the first time I have ever written a letter to anyone, except my mother that is, but some how after reading all the letters that people write (some of them twice) I just felt that I had to write one too. I think you have really stirred up a hornet’s nest in the Valley, and I sincerely hope you keep up the good work. My girl friends and I get a kick out of some of the stuff people write, and it seems to me that one thing leads to another, first there was the dog house, then the cat house, and now it’s the rat house, but I think you’ll need a big piece of cheese or pork to get rid of the rat. Anyway, there are different kinds of bait you can use and I think if you persevered you will get the mayor out in the end.

Best of luck anyway. Yours Truly, A PAPER FAN — The Labrador News, Feb. 15, 1965

he slogan gracing the home page of Ottawa-based Grace Glastonbury’s real estate website speaks volumes about her life-long connection to Newfoundland: Real estate with a touch of Newfoundland warmth.

“In searching for a tag line for marketing myself as a realtor, I reflected on my Newfoundland upbringing,” she says. “I felt that the natural way for me to conduct my business would be with a touch of Newfoundland warmth.

“This remains my motto and my philosophy.”

The only child of Harrison and Susie Noseworthy (from Pouch Cove and Salmon Cove, Carbonear, respectively), the St. John’s native has enjoyed a wildly successful and varied career.

Educated at Prince of Wales Collegiate, she earned a public relations diploma from Memorial University during three years of parttime studies.

“At the age of 19 I started a great 35year career with the federal government,” Glastonbury says. “It began at Fisheries and Oceans in Pleasantville back in 1966.

“I left Newfoundland in 1979 to accept a position with Fisheries and Oceans in Memramcook, New Brunswick. Leaving home was difficult for me … I remember it well. I was leaving my friends and relatives in St. John’s.”

Yet while it was a difficult break, she realized Newfoundlanders never completely close doors. The people important to her in her early years are still very much a part of her life today, though she lives thousands of kilometres away in the nation’s capital.

In her first position in Memramcook she worked for a team headed by the late Len Cowley, a fellow Newfoundlander and director general with Fisheries and Oceans. The task at hand was to set up a new east coast divisional office for the federal department.

That challenge led to several business opportunities for her, including the chance to become bilingual. She studied French in Moncton, achieving the required level of competency for her job. That was followed by further French studies in Jonquiere, Quebec

Grace Glastonbury

Members of the Canadian Greandier Guards march down a city street after a changing of the guard ceremony in Ottawa,.

Jim Young/Reuters

and Tour, France.

“In 1986, yet another door opened for me with the federal government in the communications field,” she says. “I moved to Ottawa where I continued to work for some time before accepting a position with Canada Post.

“My last project, before retiring from Canada Post and the federal government, was to oversee the communications and public relations activities for Canada Post when New Brunswick implemented province-wide civic addressing and the NB 911 program.”

After 35 years with the federal government, it was time to put her passion for working with people and her communications experience together for a stab at real estate. For the past fourand-a-half years, real estate has provided her with an equally challenging and fulfilling career.

Becoming a licensed realtor in 2002, she began with Royal LePage. By the end of 2003, the company recognized her sales excellence with the President’s Gold designation.

“For the last three consecutive years I have received the Directors Platinum Award, ranking me in the top five per cent of Royal LePage agents in Canada,” she says. “My growing team now consists of two more licensed realtors and an administrative assis-

tant.”

A strong believer in networking as a business tool, she is an active member of several organizations including the Ottawa Chamber of Commerce, the Ottawa Business Network, and the Newfoundland Society of Ottawa — her personal favourite.

“I attribute my success to my Newfoundland heritage,” she says.

“Newfoundlanders know instinctively how to interact with people in a caring way. This is my strength — striving to build a rapport with my clients by effective communication, developing an open, honest relationship.

“This isn’t about buying and selling houses, it’s buying and selling people’s homes. Houses contain people’s stuff but homes embrace their dreams and their memories. That’s where I come in.”

She and her partner Seymour Kell enjoy a full and busy personal lifestyle just outside Ottawa with their golden retriever Chelsea and cat named Cody.

They feed the deer and birds, walking daily along the creek backing their property and welcoming visitors from Newfoundland.

“I enjoy frequent visits to St. John’s, seeing my mom and dad, cousins and friends,” she says. “Continuing to tighten the ties with my loved ones.”

INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

FRIDAY THROUGH THURSDAY, MARCH 2-8, 2007 — PAGE 13

Jumping Bean Coffee manager Shane Milmore (left) and owner Jeff LeDrew with some freshly roasted coffee beans.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Full of beans

Jeff LeDrew’s coffee roastery and Italian specialty store is a bit tucked out of the way — but may become a destination for kindred coffee lovers

By Stephanie Porter The Independent

W

hen you’re working out of your home, with no water cooler to gossip around and no colleagues to lunch with, you find your own reasons to step away from the grind for a few minutes.

For Jeff LeDrew, it was creating the perfect cup of coffee.

LeDrew currently owns Jumping Bean Coffee, a high-end coffee roaster and distributor, and importer of fine Italian specialty food.

Trained as an electrical engineer, LeDrew worked “in the telecom world” for years — but his passion for java led him off in a different direction.

“You really need that break in the

day,” he says. “Coffee was something I developed a passion for. I procured some green (coffee beans) online and through networks, and just roasted some coffee at home, fooled around a lot.

“I made it a habit and a lifestyle.

When you’re working out of your house, for me anyway, you really want that great cup of coffee, that great cappuccino.”

The home coffee roaster is an investment few make — it roasts just enough coffee for one pot at a time, making the process of getting that first cup of joe a longer and more detailed process than most are interested in. But for those who love it …

“It all started as a hobby, a time in the day to get my head straight again. But then I got into the cul-

ture, started reading more about it, I became totally interested in coffee.”

A member of the Rotary Club, LeDrew remembers a key brainstorming session with others in the organization about possible fundraising projects. He suggested roasting, bagging, and selling coffee — and offered to get the project off the ground.

He found and bought a much larger roaster and sourced some coffee beans. After a few months of looking around, he found a location to start up operations. The building on St. Thomas Line — just on the Paradise side of the Paradise/St. Philip’s border — was ideal at the time, he says, because its multiple sources of income minimized his risk.

There’s a residential space on one

side, a storefront on the other (it was a tanning salon when LeDrew took ownership). There was enough room in the basement to set up the coffee roaster, packaging equipment, and to store the beans.

When the tanning salon closed up shop, LeDrew decided to renovate the space into a coffee bar and showroom — a place to meet clients and, on the weekends, invite the public by to browse, shop, and drink coffee. The coffee bar is front and centre; the shelves on the walls on either side are stacked with Jumping Bean coffee, a large selection of loose tea, imported pasta, rice, sauces, olive oils and vinegars.

LeDrew is the distributor for Atlantic Canada for many of the goods, and does brisk international business online.

“When I got this showroom, I figured I couldn’t just have coffee and my other passion is cooking,” he says. “I knew there was a market, a growing market for these products.

“The (location) is a bit tucked out of the way, but the logic was, I’m a wholesaler so I’m not trying to compete with my clients. I’m trying to sell to specialty delis and grocers … and hopefully we’ll become a bit of a destination for people interested in this kind of food.”

But fundamentally, LeDrew says, “what we do is provide great coffee.”

LeDrew and manager Shane Milmore spend a good part of their Jumping Bean work time in the See “Once,” page 15

Ain’t love grand? (or maybe several)

W

henever we look critically at our finances, with particular emphasis on our spending habits, it’s interesting to see how much larger the ton of bricks becomes once we start evaluating what we believe to be the “frivolities” of our lives.

We can become quite critical about how much is spent on birthday gifts, vacations, pets and so on. Most see these expenses as frivolous. And I’ll be the first person to jump on that bandwagon — remember the column on moneygrabbers you read here last fall?

However, anyone who simply says “cut it,” me included, is simply not being realistic. Human beings were made to socialize, mix and enjoy relationships.

And all these things cost money.

The management of our personal financial resources is entirely about balance and trying, to the best of our abilities, not to overspend. No category of

AL ANTLE

Your Finances expenditure is entirely unreasonable if it’s balanced against and reflects our income. And no financial plan to rein in costs should ever use the elimination of an expense entirely as a practical means of achieving a goal.

A balanced spending plan sees a maximum of 15 per cent of a household’s net income devoted to what we call “the three Rs” of the family budget: relationships, recreation and reading.

This is where you identify the costs of things like vacations, memberships in service and other clubs, sports, athletics, political and social causes. It’s also

where you pay for tuition, lessons, newspapers, books, magazines and other subscriptions.

It covers the cost of taking your honey to a movie or a weekend hotel or B&B getaway. This is also the category of household expenditure where you cover off the cost of caring for your pets, having your photos developed, supporting your church and making sure your children have an allowance. It covers Christmas and occasional gifts, gatherings and celebrations, postage stamps and other mailing costs. And last, but by no means least, it includes expenses associated with seeing and socializing with family, extended family, colleagues and friends.

Of course, not all households or individuals will have such an extensive list.

Whether you do or not depends on your own priorities and value system.

However, most of us certainly have

Stop a heart attack before it starts.

Your support is vital.

Research into the root causes of heart disease and stroke will help millions live longer, healthier lives. As a leading funder of heart and stroke research in Canada, we need your help.

Call 1-888-HSF-INFO or visit www.heartandstroke.ca

experienced all these expenses at one point or another — or we will.

They’re primarily about relationships.

Who do you vacation with? Your family.

Who do you golf or play hockey with?

Your chums. Who do you take photos of? People important in your life.

And what social or charitable causes to you support? Chances are, things important to you or someone you love.

Who do you support politically? I’ll bet it’s someone you know, may have known in the past, or you have an affinity for.

And why do you invest in your children, socially, spiritually, academically and athletically? I think you know by now.

It’s all about relationships and the things that meet our needs as human beings to be close, to cajole, to care and to be cared about. While we’re making all these investments in other people,

hopefully, we’re getting something back from them. The best relationships to invest in are mutual.

The key ingredient is knowing how much to spend and when to stop. If you’re spending more than 15 per cent of your net pay, it’s time to start trimming.

Cutting these expenses is not easy. We see people every day who are willing to sacrifice the second car in a household.

But when it comes to spending less time at the rink or deciding which of a daughter’s three dance options will have to go, the same people struggle incredibly.

These are gut-wrenching and highly emotional choices.

Sometimes I call this category of expenditure “love money.” Ah, love.

Ain’t it grand … well, maybe several grand.

Al Antle is the executive director of Credit and Debt Solutions.

14 • INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

MARCH 8, 2007

Editor’s note: the following paper was presented recently to a federal agriculture policy review hearing in St. John’s.

M

y name is Wayne Williams.

I have been involved in the agricultural industry in Newfoundland since 1977. I am a poultry farmer and am the proprietor of Birchy Brook Farms Ltd., located in Goulds, Newfoundland.

When I began poultry farming in 1977 there were over 70 registered egg producers in Newfoundland.

Today, there are only 11 and four of these are operated by the same family/conglomerate, so that leaves really only seven producers because one of them is essentially a corporate/conglomerate farm, which I might add, has significant historical ties to government, and which seemingly reaps the lion’s share of markets and taxpayer dollars available to the poultry industry in this province.

My father was a swine specialist with the Newfoundland government.

The swine program was started in this province back in the 1960s with a number of producers across the province and two processing plants — one in Corner Brook and the other in St. John’s. A swine program was set up to minimize disease and to maximize wean pigs from farrow to finish market hogs. In the 1990s the provincial swine station closed down, producers and processing plants were closed and today there is no hog industry in Newfoundland.

The broiler industry was started up in conjunction with the hog industry to assist in maximizing the utilization of the processing plants that were built. There were approximately 25 to 30 broiler producers across the island.

Back in the 1990s the broiler industry decided to go to government to secure a $50-million investment in buildings and equipment at Cochrane Pond. After about five years in operation it was decided that there were too many issues to make the facility viable, it went into receivership and was sold to a Nova Scotia company for the fine sum of $3. Newfoundland invested approximately $1.5 billion in its broiler industry since its conception in the 1960s and we have nothing to show for it? Newfoundland has no broiler industry to speak of — it was given away.

The dairy industry in this province today does not belong to Newfoundland. It belongs to two Nova Scotia companies — Scotsburn and Farmer’s. Basically, what’s happening is that we have two Nova Scotia companies piggy-backing on the backs of Newfoundland taxpayers to subsidize milk quotas for the

Goulds farmer Wayne Williams

Paul Daly/The Independent

‘Agriculture isn’t working in Newfoundland’ province of Nova Scotia — another give-away.

I have just listed four blatant examples of how agriculture works in Newfoundland. The truth is that agriculture isn’t working in Newfoundland. History has proven that our governments have been throwing taxpayer dollars at this industry hoping that an influx of money will fix the problems and then when the money doesn’t fix it they give our industries away. If our government is so eager to give money away then shouldn’t there be, at the very least, criteria that have to be met regarding an individual’s or corporation’s financial viability over a specified

time line? There should also be a ceiling on the amount and definite time limits within which financial emancipation from government assistance must be achieved.

Existing farms and new entrants into the agricultural industry are met with many challenges. These are the farms that government should be supporting and assisting. Finding capital through banks and various other lending institutions for farm ventures is extremely difficult due to the high costs associated with startup and the risks associated with trying to break into markets that are already monopolized by corporate/conglomerate farms.

Once farms are established and have proven their ability to operate efficiently there should be a limit on the amount of government financial assistance provided. Perhaps assistance in other practical areas would bear better results. Limits on farm size should be set so that the industry and markets are not monopolized and are open to allow new entrants so that our agricultural industries can grow.

Existing smaller farms should have priority over corporate farms for government trials, government financial assistance and government programs that can assist in the acquisition of new technologies, lands and equipment. I don’t think it is unreasonable

to assume that a truly viable corporate/conglomerate farm should be able to supply its own funding without having to continually rely on government monies. Government has no business assisting multi-million-dollar conglomerates whose yearly incomes rival the sum of incomes of an entire industry in Newfoundland, and they should also not be giving away industries that have been subsidized by the tax dollars of Newfoundlanders, to other provinces.

Government hand-outs to already established conglomerate farms, in my opinion, amount to nothing more than corporate welfare and is responsible for creating a climate that is completely unfair to others in the industry. Large corporations and conglomerate farms should not need, or qualify, for government funding, and in my opinion, are probably just salting away our tax dollars in their own personal Swiss bank accounts.

Just using the few examples I have provided, it has been proven time and time again that government initiatives and policies are not working for agricultural industries in Newfoundland.

These industries are now effectively closed to new entrants because our government deems that select individuals/conglomerates are more entitled than the rest of us to benefit from policies designed to assist us all. They continually return to feed from the government trough while the rest of us in these industries try our best to eke out our livings.

People will argue against my points stating that “free enterprise” should be allowed to work its forces.

My question to that is — where does free enterprise fit into it when taxpayer dollars are continually funding favouritism and corporate welfare and the only ones who benefit from government’s assistance are a select few individuals or corporations?

How can it even be referred to as “free enterprise” when individuals or conglomerates are given unfair advantage by being permitted to use their historical ties to government to influence the creation of policy and gain access to an unlimited supply of government money that others in the same industry cannot access?

These are just some of my opinions on the agricultural industry based on 30 years of my own personal experiences. I could also go on at length regarding marketing board schemes and the involvement of these same individuals and corporations in making and changing policies to suit their own interests. However, without elaborating on that topic, in the interest of sticking to the topic of agricultural policies, and not wanting to even utter the words Sprung fiasco, that will have to be saved for another time. In addition, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to voice my opinions. It is sincerely appreciated in a climate that doesn’t always want to hear what people have to say.

Wayne Williams is an egg farmer in the Goulds.

MARCH 2, 2007

By Dana Flavelle Torstar wire service

I

n the global “war for talent,” Canada’s largest employers are in danger of losing some of their most gifted visible minority employees unless they place a higher value on their foreign education and training, a study warns.

The research, which compared the attitudes and experience of thousands of professional managers and executives, found visible minority professionals feel employers don’t value their foreign credentials as highly as Canadian diplomas, degrees and certificates.

The visible minority professionals who feel undervalued said they had fewer advancement opportunities at work, were less happy with their income and felt they were offered fewer opportunities for training and development, the research found.

The study, by Catalyst Canada and Ryerson University, should serve as a “wake-up call” to Canadian employers as they face increased competition from emerging economies for the world’s most talented workers, the authors cautioned.

While the problems faced by new immigrants who can’t find work in their field are well documented, this is the first study based on a broad survey of established, experienced professionals, the authors said.

“Just as Catalyst has seen over the years with women, the challenges don’t end with getting in the door but continue as they work their way up the ladder,” said Deborah Gillis, executive director of the non-profit research firm that examines barriers to women’s career advancement.

A fuller report, called Career Advancement in Corporate Canada: A Focus on Visible Minorities, is due in June. That report will answer why the respondents felt their foreign qualifications are undervalued — is it because of stereotyping in the workplace or perceived racial biases?

“If our final research confirms that this group is most likely to seek opportunities outside of Canada, the implications for competitiveness, economic growth and productivity could prove to be significant,” Gillis said.

The results released yesterday are based on a survey of 6,000 professionals, managers or executives at Canada’s 500 largest firms, including visible minority and white/Caucasian employees, both male and female. Participants had on average 20 years’ work experience.

The survey found: • Only 14 per cent had been educated outside of Canada.

• Of those, 79 per cent were from visible-minority groups.

• Half of visible minority participants educated outside Canada felt employers didn’t value their foreign credentials as highly as Canadian diplomas, degrees and certificates.

• They were twice as likely to feel this way as their white/Caucasian counterparts who had studied abroad.

• They were also least satisfied in their careers and more likely to pursue opportunities outside Canada.

The findings raise serious issues for Canada’s global competitiveness, Gillis said at a news conference at Ryerson’s business school, particularly in light of the country’s growing dependence on immigrants for future economic growth and prosperity.

Within a decade, visible minorities will account for one in five members of the available workforce, and in large cities like Toronto they’ll represent half, the authors said. Within four years, visible minorities will account for 100 per cent of the net growth of the labour force.

“The City of Toronto is already there,” said Zabeen Hirji, chief human resources officer for RBC Financial Group, a lead sponsor of the research.

“The labour growth depends almost entirely on immigrants.

“As an immigrant myself, I was in my kitchen on Sunday where my mother and daughter were having a conversation. I was 14 when we immigrated.

My mother was talking about how the lack of Canadian experience hurt her career,” Hirji recalled.

But times have changed, said Wendy Cukier, associate dean of Ryerson’s business school, one of the most ethnically diverse business schools in the country.

“Visible minorities now have opportunities to exit the Canadian workplace and go elsewhere. It’s a very, very serious issue we haven’t had to face before.

And it’s only going to get worse,” Cukier warned.

Ryerson student Khurram Raja, who imigrated from Pakistan at age 14, says “people have the wrong idea. They think Canada is a land of opportunity.

Then when they come here employers want you to have Canadian experience.”

‘Once you grind it …’

From page 13 basement, roasting and packaging coffee. After significant research, the green beans are imported from countries around the world.

LeDrew compares the process to that of winemaking — the beans must be picked at a certain time, just like grapes; different regions offer different tastes and qualities; and, just as there are estate wines, there are estate coffee beans. Buying better quality raw product may cost a little more, but there will be less uncertainty and fewer imperfections among the beans.

One bad bean, says LeDrew, could ruin a pot of coffee.

Time is of the essence — a green bean is good for quite a while, but “once it’s roasted, the time clock is on,” says LeDrew. “You’ve got two and a half, three weeks before it’s off the shelf.

“Once you grind it, you’ve got a day before it’s flat. It’s just like flat Coke or a bottle of wine …”

And like wine, there are coffee connoisseurs who score different blends

and roasts on a scale to 100.

LeDrew realizes it’s unrealistic for most people to adhere to those strict timelines. He’s aware too, that his coffee has got to stay within a certain price range if he expects it to move.

Just over a year in business, he’s made some key business partnerships.

Jumping Bean is the only coffee served in The Rooms café (The Rooms Blend is sold in the gift store) and a number of tourist shops, and he’s trying an office delivery program in conjunction with Discovery Water.

His fair trade coffees — about 50 per cent of his product — are especially popular at places like Food for Thought (on Water Street in St. John’s) and Belbin’s Grocery.

“It is where it is right now,” says LeDrew. He’s not yet pulling a salary from Jumping Bean, and is still involved in the telecom sector and engineering work.

“We’re not doing any national chains at the moment or anything, but that would be the long-term vision.” www.jumpingbean.ca

Hey Newfoundland & Labrador miser.ca is now province wide! ...So log on to miser.ca and check out sponsor websites, view menus, download flyers and coupons, enter to win great prizes, and much more!

Shop Wiser. Go to Miser.

miser.ca

www.

Credentials undervalued, minorities say

INDEPENDENTBUSINESS • 15

Shop Wiser. Go to Miser.

*OAC. Minimum purchase $300. See in-store for details. Offer expires March 10, 2007.

Graphicdesigner

16 • INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

MARCH 8, 2007

E C E I 7-P

MAJOR SHIPMENT OF LIVINGROOM FURNITURE TO DISPERSE TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC AT FACTORY DIRECT PRICES! All 7-Piece Packages Will Be Sold on a First Come, First Served Basis... Hurry In For Best Selection!

M O O R G N LIVI S E G A K PAC OME, FIRST C RVED! E S FIRST

#3300

$

GET ALL 7-Pieces ND LOOKS AEATHER! L KE FEELS LI

948

SOFA/LOVESEAT, COFFEE TABLE, 2 END TABLES, & 2 DESIGNER LAMPS.

EE 100% FRAY! W A L AY

#0200

$

GET ALL 7-Pieces IBRE MICROFVESEAT! LO S O FA &

#4600

GET ALL 7-Pieces $

7-PIECE PACKAGES INCLUDE:

#0221

76

Sleep Aid

154

GET ALL 7-Pieces $ IBRE MICROFVESEAT! O L S O FA &

TWIN ....$109 ea. pc.

FULL .....$139 ea. pc.

Queen QUEEN .$154 ea. pc.

5YR PRO-RATED WARRANTY

ea. pc.

Any Value Plus Twin or Full Set

#2369

GETT ALL 7-Pieces $1098 1068 GE #4700

IBRE MICROFVESEAT! O L S O FA &

#7300

$

214

TWIN ... $149 ea. pc.

FULL .... $194 ea. pc. $ 214 ea. pc.

QUEEN Queen ea. pc. KING .... $223 ea. pc.

Eurotop Mattress

TWIN .... 199 ea. pc.

FULL ... $249 ea. pc. 7YR NON PRO-RATED $ Queen QUEEN 269 ea. pc. WARRANTY $ ea. pc. KING ... 263 ea. pc. $

15YR PRO-RATED WARRANTY

Memory Foam

Eurotop Mattress

334

wtop ow llo Pill Mattress

Majestic

TWIN ... 264 ea. pc.

FULL ... $339 ea. pc. 10YR NON PRO-RATED $ Queen QUEEN . 374 ea. pc. WARRANTY $ ea. pc. KING ... 323 ea. pc. $

$

$

8” Queen Size Visco Memory Foam Mattress

$

Also Comes With 2 Memory Foam Pillows a $99 Value!

Supreme Comfort TWIN ... 249 ea. pc.

FULL ... $309 ea. pc. 7YR NON PRO-RATED $ Queen QUEEN 334 ea. pc. WARRANTY $ ea. pc. KING ... 299 ea. pc.

Our Inventory Of Memory Foam

MATTRESSES HAVE ARRIVED!

Chiro Firm

Sunrise

269

ICES OUR P R BE AT! E B CAN’T

Don't Worry About Renting A Truck, or Having It Delivered!

Take It Home Today! It's Vacuum Packed, In A Box!

Mattress Pricing No Competitor Can Beat!

$

#1160

1098 GET ALL 7-Pieces $1128 GET ALL 7-Pieces $1168 GET ALL 7-Pieces $1198

Qualit y Mattresses $ Star ting At Only $

948

WITH C O M E S I L LO W S !

P ACCENT

$

374

$

494

668

Platinum Comfort

TWIN ... $349 ea. pc.

FULL ... $449 ea. pc. 10YR NON PRO-RATED $ Queen QUEEN 494 ea. pc. WARRANTY $ ea. pc. KING ... 399 ea. pc.

Mattress Fabrics Vary By Store Location. Advertised mattresses sold in sets only. See store for individual mattresses at factory direct prices. King sets consist of 3 pieces.

4-PIECE #8200

Chest Also Available!!

BEDROOM 4PC BEDROOMS INCLUDE PACKAGES DRESSER, MIRROR, HEADBOARD & NIGHTSTAND

$

568

GET ALL 4-Pieces

5-PIECE /WOOD PEWTERINETTE! 5PC D

#1113

GET ALL 5-Pieces

$

248

$

WOOD METAL/NETTE! I D 5PC

#1223

GET ALL 5-Pieces

dyy Pine nd an Brra B Finish

GET ALL 4-Pieces $

48 #2398

Open To The Public

Floor Spider Full or Queen Lamp Canopy Bed

$

99 #4888

1028 Complete Queen Bed $368

$

298

FINISH CHERRYINETTE! 5PC D

$

#1000

GET ALL 5-Pieces

Converts To A s!

Bed In Second

$

398

B CINO PU CAPP UCPC DI NETTE! 5 HEIGHT

GET ALL 5-Pieces GET

#4480

$

Available In Four Colours!

Three Colours Available!

$

Modern ccino Bed pu ap C

518

Door Crashers At Amazing Factory Direct Prices! Limited Quantities!

All Door Crashers Will Be Sold First Come, First Served! Hurry In Today!

y and Matching Vanitilla ble! ai ab Avva Mirror Also A

ble Matching Bar Ta ! le ab il va Also A

728

#0137

Dresser,, Mirror, Nightstand Dresser & Chest Also Available!!

DINETTE 5PC DINETTES INCLUDE PACKAGES TABLE & 4 CHAIRS • 7PC DINETTES ALSO AVAILABLE!

DOOR CRASHERS

Swivel Bar Stool

#0900

Chest Also Available!!

pe Chateau Philli Cherr y Finish

Marble Look

GET ALL 4-Pieces

#4700

Chest Also Available!!

108 #4115

Klick Klack Studio Futon

$

298

Can Sit Two People!

t Chair Leather Bi-Cas ttoman With Storage O

#9001

$

498 #0796

OVERSIZED Reclining Chair A Great Selection Of Recliners $ Starting ting At 228 Star

$

648 #0705

Opportunity Is Knocking...

Call Toll Free

Visit Us At:

Visit our Web Site or Come to a Location Near you for an Immediate Interview

1 (866) 929-9949 For a Location Near You!

www.surplusfreight.ca For Incredible Savings Everyday!

Mon-Thurs: 12-8 • Friday: 10-8 Saturday: 10-6 • Sunday: 12-5

StJohn_Tele_11.5x21.5_0307.indd 1

ST. JOHN'S 22 O'Leary Ave. (709) 726-6466

Locations Also In: Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Newfoundland We Accept: Cash, Interac, Visa, Master Card, American Express, Cheques, FREE Layaway

Tables, Fabrics, and Colours May Vary by Store Location. 7-Piece Packages Include Your Choice Of Sofa & Loveseat Or 2Pc Sectional, A 3-Piece Table Set (#2221, #2213, #3612, #3623 or #4710) and two #6117 Lamps any colour.

No Interest, No Payments, OAC. Additional Terms Apply. See Store For Details. Same Day Delivery Valid On In Stock Items Only.

Across from Avalon Mall next to Avalon Software 2/21/07 10:40:55 AM

INDEPENDENTLIFE

FRIDAY THROUGH THURSDAY, MARCH 2-8, 2007 — PAGE 17

Cpl. Jeanne Crane plays with her daughters Matilda, 4, and Laura, 13, while grandmother Suzanne Morgan watches.

Paul Daly/The Independent

‘Hard to see how much has changed’ After six months in Afghanistan, Jeanne Daniels has returned to her home and two children

By Pam Pardy Ghent For The Independent

J

eanne Daniels woke her children up one morning last week with their special song, and it has never sounded sweeter.

“I’ve had visions for months now of how I would wake them up that first morning,” she says, “thinking how it would be to finally see them, and I wind up doing the same thing I did every morning before I left.”

Daniels, 32, has just returned home from Afghanistan, where she was one of about 2,500 members of the Canadian Forces serving as part of Joint Task Force Afghanistan.

Daniels served as a medic, sometimes on the front lines, for more than six months.

While she was away, her two children — four-year-old Matilda and 13-year-old Laura — stayed with their maternal grandmother, Suzanne Morgan, in Upper Gullies.

There wasn’t time to prepare for this homecoming.

“I only found out enough in advance to make sure I was there to pick her up at the airport,” Morgan says with a laugh.

While Daniels says the hugs and kisses she received from her girls are amazing, the remainder of her first day home has been a blur.

“It’s hard to see how much has changed, with the baby especially,” she says. “I have someone else telling me what she likes and doesn’t like and even the way she likes her cereal is different.”

Admitting she struggles with guilt at times, Daniels reminds herself how grateful she is to be home — she’ll take the challenges of being home over being away any day.

“First we have to relax and enjoy each other. I can’t expect to bounce back into their lives and have them fall into our old routine.”

MOTHER ‘SAVED HER’ For Daniels, the hardest part of being overseas was pretending everything was fine. Conversations with her eldest were the most challenging.

“I would tell her that I was nowhere near danger, when many times I was over there praying for my life — I just didn’t need my daughter to be worried, so I con-

vinced her that things were fine when maybe they didn’t feel that fine.”

Daniels says it was her mom that “saved her” from the stress and worry many experience when they are away from their families.

“I would call Mom and she would make me laugh, or tell me to ‘get over it’ in her way. She would tell me not to live in fear, and I tried to follow that every day.”

When Daniels called home, crying and “in shock” after finding out she would be assigned as a medic on the front line, her mother reminded her how hard she had worked to be where she was.

Morgan admits she kept things from her daughter.

“I knew she had things to focus

on, and I took on this role with my whole heart, so if there were problems, I handled them.” It was the least she could do.

Daniels is back to cooking meals, and the house is happy and hectic — they’re working hard at “normal.”

“A little while ago I was worried about my safety and worried that there were people I loved at home who were worried about me and now that I’m home with all my fingers and toes I just have to worry about everyday life.”

While Morgan was glad to be able to act as a surrogate, she’s relieved her own tour of duty is done. “More than just knowing your child is fine and finally back where she belongs, I also need to hand over the mothering reins and just be grandma again.”

Something to write home about Corner Brook’s Adriana Maggs busy writing for more than one television network in Toronto

By Stephanie Porter The Independent

A

lready an award-winning writer for film and stage, Corner Brook native Adriana Maggs seems to be finding her stride working in virtually any format television throws her way — from documentary to sitcom to reality TV. This week, Maggs is promoting the second season of The Wilkinsons, a quasi-reality television show scheduled to begin airing on CMT on March 7.

The show, set in Belleville, Ont., is about the home and professional life of a real family country band. Maggs, 32, was the writer for the series, which she calls “a really special project.”

She’s also in the final stretch as writer for Shaye: This is it, a four-hour documentary about the trio of musicians — Newfoundland’s Dahmnait Doyle and Kim Stockwood, and Nova Scotia’s Tara McLean — set to air on CBC in June.

Then there’s Tumble and Spin, a comedy series she’s developing for CBC with frequent collaborator Sherry White, and the two feature film scripts she has in development.

Her two kids also occupy plenty of her time in Toronto, where she moved last June, originally for The Wilkinsons.

Maggs wasn’t involved with the first season of the show — which focused on the real-life country band’s move from Nashville back home to Ontario — but she tuned in, and “thought it was one of the best shows I’d seen in Canada.” She successfully chased the job as writer for the second outing.

She says The Wilkinsons is “really innovative and unusual.” Similar to the situational improvisation of Curb Your Enthusiasm, the show takes real situations, people and personalities and tailors them into 30-minute segments that are funny, honest and engaging.

Maggs’ first job was to sit down with the Wilkinson clan and listen.

“They’re so great and open and trusting and they just told all these stories about what was going on right now in their lives, what was going on recently, and funny stories that were totally unrelated to anything,” she says.

“I just took their stories and there were themes that came up a lot … and you can fool around with the themes.

Then I’d give the director the map and outline and she gets them to reenact or act for the first time and we’d pair that with stuff that’s happening in the moment.”

She says that part — listening to and See “Not reality,” page 20

Writer Adriana Maggs behind-the-scenes for The Wilkinsons.

Photo by Rohan Laylor

MARCH 2, 2007

18 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

GALLERYPROFILE ANNETTE MANNING Visual Artist

A

nnette Manning, Torbay native and visual artist, sees patterns everywhere she looks — in the curled hair and printed polyester pants of elderly women, in the grass as it encroaches the body of a beloved family pet, in the swaninspired hair of her sophisticated (but unpredictable) husband.

The artist says her work with patterns is connected to her interest in the physical confines and borders of the body, to the point where she is compelled to “interrupt” the shapes and forms of an object or individual and extend them beyond where they’re supposed to be. “(It’s about) taking the patterns out into space … and moving them around a bit. It’s something about your presence in the here and now and your concrete presence and how it doesn’t end with your skin or your body — it goes beyond. It’s not like a spiritual thing. I’m playing with the limitations of the body.”

Manning’s interest in the human body is rooted in a close study of its elemental parts — the biochemical components awash in our brain and blood flow — that she researches through Memorial University’s collection of scientific and medical journals.

She is fascinated by the kinetic aspect of atomic theories. She is also intrigued by how human interference with the body can create new possibilities in health and science — or, as she puts it, where “man meets machine.

“The standard stick and ball models we studied in chemistry and biology, they represent something of how things look like, but really it isn’t, because everything is constantly moving,” she says.

“I’m researching neurotransmitters and looking into the lock and key theory of how molecules attach to the outer layer of cells, how drugs actually attach to our molecules, so it has to do with the actual physical shapes that fit into other physical shapes. I’m focusing on that in terms of mobiles.”

The artistic breakdown of the physical body to the cellular level is prominent in Manning’s ink and lead pencil seniors’ series. The slightly hunched figure of an elderly lady clutching a handkerchief immediately intrigues the eye. The geometric pattern of squares and circles filling in the woman’s short, manageable hairdo reminds one of epithelial cheek tissue — a cell sample magnified on a slide under a microscope.

The reddish flecks of her blouse float up and away from the boundary of the cloth, suggesting some kind of energy exchange, or release, from the aging body it covers.

Manning’s portrayal of her husband is part of another series featuring pattern work, but The Swan is more an exercise in fairy tale and whimsy, and less so the organic exploration of a woman in the winter of her life. Stamped with inked, carved pencil erasers, the sketched face is framed by a sequence of rust and silver swans for locks of hair.

On the shoulder, a feather epaulet in pink, purple and blue reflects the cool, silvery-white of the picture’s theme.

“I was thinking of the aspect of his personality which is kind of swanlike to me, because he’s civilized and refined in a lot of ways, he’s a professor of philosophy and very articulate, and he’s also very stubborn and willful. Swans are quite beautiful but are very vicious when they’re approached,” laughs Manning.

From microchips and molecules to feathers and flowers, Manning draws inspiration from the numerous life forces surrounding her. Yet she is keen to push herself to the creative edge — perhaps formulating her own personal patterns. “(Art is) the most challenging thing I’ve ever done and … I don’t know where it’s going, and it’s very much like life in a way, when you take chances at doing something you’ve always wanted to do. (You break) whatever pattern that you’ve been stuck in and you’ve been wanting to break from for a while, like a rut. I find that every time I do a drawing it’s like that.

“That experience where I’m challenging myself and trying to break out of the patterns I’ve put myself in and I get that exhilaration of breaking some aspect of myself I’m trying to change.” mandy.cook@theindependent.ca The Gallery is a regular feature in The Independent. For information, or to submit proposals, please call (709) 726-4639, or e-mail editorial@theindependent.ca

MARCH 2, 2007

SEAN PANTING

State of the art

L

ast month St. John’s musician Barry Hillier ended up in the news after an incident at Club One on the infamous George Street strip. The story goes, 10 minutes after finishing his gig, he was ejected by a pair of bouncers who punched him in the face half a dozen times or more and broke his arm in the process.

I wasn’t there, so I can’t tell you what was said or by whom, and frankly I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. The simple fact is that when bouncers start throwing punches and making deliberate attempts to injure people — even people they deem to be troublemakers — they’re no longer doing their job.

Bouncers are hired by club owners to keep a lid on the problems that so often go hand in hand with serving people booze. They are there to keep the peace by preventing and breaking up fights, not by starting and winning them.

You don’t hear a lot about entertainers getting assaulted at their own gigs, but it does happen. And when it does, it has to be something pretty severe — a broken arm, for instance — before anyone pays much attention.

The general perception seems to be that bars are dangerous places and anyone choosing to work there tacitly accepts the risk that sooner or later they’re getting a fist or a foot or a beer bottle upside the head. I’d love to see the reactions around the negotiating table if you suggested that teachers or nurses or engineers or anyone should be prepared to take a punch as a regular part of their job.

This whole ugly, stupid, pointless incident has had at least one worthwhile outcome. It’s spurred a discussion about the casual violence that takes place on a weekly basis in the bars on George Street and a great many other places all over the

INDEPENDENTLIFE • 19

Fight club It seems to be accepted that anyone working in a bar accepts the risk that, sooner or later, they’re getting a fist or a foot or a beer bottle upside the head

province.

A certain amount of violence is expected and accepted in the bar culture, and by any reasonable standard, that’s wrong. We can’t allow serious assaults go by on the grounds that one or both parties were drunk, and we certainly can’t allow standards to slip to the point where bar staff hired to keep the peace become little more than prizefighters for hire in the weekly slugfest.

It’s true that bars can occasionally be very dangerous. There’s something about a full moon and a double

dark and dirty special that seems to bring out the worst in humanity.

Over the nearly 20 years I’ve been working in clubs I’ve seen plenty of ugly incidents. Normally I’m playing, but I’ve also done my share of bartending shifts, so I know what these confrontations look like from both sides of the bar. Thankfully I’ve never been a doorman. It’s a rotten, thankless job.

Drunk people are aggravating. No question. And there is a certain kind of guy, and it’s just about always a guy, for whom the sight of a big beefy bouncer is a challenge. It’s a

chance to step into the ring and prove something. Guys like that will do whatever they can to provoke a fight with anyone they can find in order to impress bystanders and themselves with their physical prowess.

When you’re a doorman at a club, you run into these yahoos all the time, and I can imagine the temptation to slug some of them is huge.

But you can’t. Like it or not, being a bouncer — like being a telemarketer, or working retail, or being on city council — entails taking a certain amount of crap you probably don’t deserve. It sucks, but that’s reality.

Removing a bass player you outweigh by 50 or more pounds and outnumber to boot is not a situation that calls for the full-on Fists of Fury smackdown. Ditto the removal of obnoxious drunks and aggressive jerks.

A decent bar staff will have a strategy for dealing with rowdy customers if and when that need arises.

Properly managed, one drunk idiot, no matter how violent, is no match for a couple of large, sober, experienced security staff as long as the staff in question stay cool and concentrate on their task: getting the drunk guy outside where their responsibility ends. Not punching him. Not “teaching him a lesson.”

Not exacting revenge for the insults he’s hurled at you and others.

If that’s something you’re not capable of doing, then working as security in a bar is probably not the job for you.

Sean Panting is a writer, musician and actor living in St. John’s. His column returns March 16.

POET’S CORNER

Old Harry

By E. J. Pratt

Along the coast the sailors tell The superstition of its fame — Of how the sea had faceted The Rock into a human head And given it the devil’s name.

And much there was that would compel A wife or mother of a seaman To find a root in the belief The rock that jutted from the reef Was built to incarnate a demon.

But there’s a story that might well Receive a share of crediting, And make the title fit the look Of vacancy the boulder took Under the ocean’s battering.

Within the perforated shell Of basalt worn by wave and keel The demon ruler of the foam One night upon returning home Was changed into an imbecile.

Ordered to stay within his cell, Clutch at the specters in the air, Listen to shrieks of drowning men, And stare at phantom ribs and then Listen again and clutch and stare.

So like a sea-crazed sentinel, Weary of sailors and their ships, Old Harry stands with salt weed spreads In matted locks around his head, And foam forever on his lips.

MARCH 2, 2007

20 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

Palliative care

Latest collection from Newfoundland Writers’ Guild wildly uneven

A

nthologies are, by nature, prescriptive ventures. They commend their contents to the reading public as exemplars of a given genre or genres; occasionally they offer correctives to perceived flaws in the official canon and redirect the waters of critical attention to irrigate dry earth.

Sometimes they are simply advertisements for the larger body of work of their contributors. A Charm Against the Pain, the fourth such anthology of the Newfoundland Writers’ Guild, is a bit of each of these.

Since 1968, the Newfoundland Writers’ Guild has served as a sounding board for local writers, providing them with a forum for peer critique. “The workshop process is strictly democratic,” the editors’ preface explains. “Each member reads their work, and receives constructive feedback from all.

Experienced writers mentor and encourage new ones.”

And while the guild may constitute an astute yet sympathetic audience — every writer’s dream — there is more of a polemical edge to this anthology than one might think. Joan Clark’s note of introduction and endorsement tips us off: “Although The Burning Rock has attracted more attention through the success of its starred writers,” she writes, “the Newfoundland Writers’ Guild has been more inclusive and enduring.”

MARK CALLANAN On the shelf A Charm Against the Pain: An Anthology of All New Writing from Newfoundland Edited by Georgina Olivere Queller, Roberta Buchanan and Geraldine Chafe Rubia Pennywell Books, 2006

Clark goes on to characterize the writing within as “energetic,” “toughminded,” “brave,” and “fine.” It is “direct, honest, courageous” work from “a remarkable group of writers.”

Towards the end of her introduction, caught up in the high of hyperbolic praise, perhaps, she goes too far: “When casting around for answers to explain what on the surface may appear to be a recent flourishing of our literature, we need look no further than the Newfoundland Writers’ Guild.”

Take the “need” out of that last sentence and its sense becomes truer. But any anthology of literature will stand on its own merits or not at all. It is always nice to see how the text is framed, to learn something of the editors’ guiding principles, their criteria for selection, but in the end we are left with a collection of writing to judge.

Structured loosely around the literal and metaphorical implications of the four seasons (and divided into corresponding sections), A Charm Against the Pain offers short stories, memoirs, essays, novel excerpts, journal entries, and poems dealing with everything from the heavyweight — incest, murder, pedophilia and rape — to the less sensational subject matter of friendship, family, religion and the aging process.

There are 29 writers featured here, writing in various modes from the celebratory to the elegiac, from the grave to the playful; they also range in the strength of their reputations, from household names in Newfoundland writing like Bernice Morgan and M.T. Dohaney, to the lesser known.

In the latter category, there are some pleasant surprises. Esther SlaneyBrown’s memoir of her father, Baked Beans and Gingerbread, is beautifully understated. She understands that her description of him, ailing on the daybed and shooting his wife in the bum with a toy bow, does more to conjure his spirit than would a host of well-meaning adjectives (the only wolf notes here come in a sentimental outburst at the very end of the piece).

Likewise, Anne Ferncase’s poem Boxing Arena impresses. The language is at once taut and bubbly, bursting with a surfeit of energy appropriate to child-

hood. “My baby sister and me, / fatpacked & pugnacious, / shared the last bed, / parked in the hall.” The relationship is adversarial, as the title implies, the diction concussive: “Each night we’d fight over / Gramma’s blue square of wool / which never quite covered / our two bulbous bums / until sleep, like a good right hook, / knocked us out.”

More well-known writers also contribute some accomplished work.

Roberta Buchanan’s childhood memoir, The Killing Jar, is highly evocative in its imagery; Libby Creelman, Paul

O’Neill and Helen Fogwill Porter tantalize with excerpts from novels in progress; Fran Baird Innes (better known for a superb children’s book, Mae’s Night Flight) contributes Only One Regret, a short story about a charmingly eccentric aunt.

The pieces that fail (and they outnumber the successes) highlight a problem specific to this sort of endeavour.

Can a writing group that espouses an ideology of inclusiveness be sufficiently rigorous in its selections to create a strong anthology? Based on the evidence at hand, the answer is no. A Charm Against the Pain is wildly uneven. For every successful fiction there are at least three bad poems to tank the collective effort.

This congenital weakness begs a more stringent editorial aesthetic, tougher critique, ruthless self-editing. A supportive group of peers, constructive criticism — these are good things. But the rules change quite suddenly when writing is bound and offered for public consumption, professionalized. Then we have a product, a thing that must sing its own merits or else retain a damn good publicist. Buyer beware: A Charm Against the Pain requires sifting.

Mark Callanan writes from St. John’s.

His column returns March 16.

‘Not reality trash TV’ From page 17 assembling the stories — was fairly easy. The real challenge came from the spontaneity of the process. “You’d always get something unexpected out of a scene,” she says. “So you’d have to stay up to 3 a.m. to try and rewrite, trying to make it fit the way things were going.”

Because the one thing she and the director could never do was ask the members of the Wilkinson family not to be themselves.

Although the series is set in small-town Ontario, and features activities like fishing, hunting groundhogs and singing, Maggs says it’s got wide appeal. “This is just a family like any other family, but they happen to be country music singers,” she says. “It’s a bunch of down-to-earth people … it’s not reality trash TV.” She hopes for a strong response to this season’s episodes — and for a green light on a third outing.

It’s all a matter of funding, audience, and the whims and wants of any number of those in the business — a reality of television she’s all too aware of.

Rabbittown, a half-hour CBC comedy pilot about two best, but highly competitive friends, aired just about a year ago. Maggs and White cowrote and co-starred in the show but, although it garnered significant buzz, at least locally, Rabbittown wasn’t picked up for an extended run.

“I loved Rabbittown so much,” sighs Maggs.

“There are lots of ups and downs in the business, and I think it’s going to be lots of ups and downs … I think disappointment about Rabbittown might be the really big disappointment for me and maybe I’ll feel more thick-skinned in the future.”

She and White did get some complimentary feedback from CBC brass (“we like you guys, but can you clean it up?”), which resulted in the script for the pilot of Tumble and Spin, another half-hour

The Wilkinsons

comedy. This time, they followed a suggestion from their potential producers and set the show around Newfoundlanders in Toronto.

Overall, Maggs sounds content, filled with ideas and endless creativity and pleased with the experience she’s so quickly accumulating.

“The Wilkinsons was a really special project,” she says. “There’s something really special about it and I was really thrilled to be involved in something I wanted to do.

“There has been some other stuff I haven’t enjoyed so much, and I don’t want to do that anymore. I don’t want to be a writer for hire up in Toronto … it’s not fun, story rooms, and someone

Photo by Jordan Eady

taking your script and punching it up and changing things.”

Maggs has no firm plans to return to Newfoundland yet — but it sounds like it’ll happen before too long.

“Maybe everyone has to have a year or two where they, you know, move to Toronto, and see how it’s done there. And maybe then I can just go home going, OK, I was there, and that was that.

I’ve learned what I’ve learned.

“I just want to do things I love. I love doing The Wilkinsons. I love writing with Sherry. I’m really lucky and I hope I can stick to that kind of stuff … and raise a couple of youngsters.”

INDEPENDENTSTYLE

FRIDAY THROUGH THURSDAY, MARCH 2-8, 2007 — PAGE 21

Forget the squat bar! Grab a trapeze bar, hold on (and let go) of the newest local fitness craze

SKY HIGH

By Mandy Cook The Independent

Y

ou won’t need a bedazzled leotard to sample the latest exercise trend offered at Cygnus Gymnastics Club in St. John’s, but you will need a love of heights, swinging bars and safety nets. The facility is offering classes in the truly unique art of trapeze starting March 4.

St. John’s native Josh Munden — Cygnus alumnus, acrobat and now trapeze artist — left his home province at the age of 19. He found work at the athletics-oriented Club Med resorts, eventually travelling throughout the company’s locations in the Bahamas, Mexico, the Caribbean and Africa, using his gymnastics skills to learn and perform on the trapeze.

Returning home 10 years later in order for his new wife (and trapeze partner) Dany to give birth to their first child in Newfoundland, Munden says it is now his “ultimate goal” to teach trapeze full-time.

“We’re trying to plan a future,” he says. “We want an all-year-round school in Newfoundland, that’s our dream.”

Eighteen-year-old Sarah Oakley, a gymnast since she was three, says she’s wanted to learn the trapeze ever since she watched Cirque du Soleil as a child. She says it’s one of the most “awesome” things she’s ever done, on top of the wicked workout she gets flying high in the sky.

“It involves every part of your body, it’s not like soccer where it’s all legs, anything from a catcher’s lock knee hang or the arm and grip strength for the cables. It goes from the tips of your toes to your hand grips,” she says.

Oakley is so devoted to the trapeze she plans on accompanying her instructor to Whistler, B.C. this summer. Munden and his wife will be teaching outdoor flying trapeze at their newly-purchased school of acrobatics, Acro-Adix.

Both Oakley and Munden say anyone can learn trapeze and will get in “rock hard” shape doing so. Munden says approximately 80 per cent of the clients he taught at the Toronto School of Circus Arts were set in their careers — doctors, lawyers and money managers — topping out at age 57. Munden says people are drawn to the artfulness of trapeze while challenging their bodies to the physical limit.

“It’s all isometric stuff, lifting your own body weight all the time. Look at dancers, they have phenomenal bodies. You’re essentially dancing in the air up there on a piece of equipment. People are exploring themselves, not only physically but creatively too.”

Munden says people of all backgrounds are approaching him about trapeze classes, primarily because they’re “sick of counting to 15” at the gym. He says the age-range of some of his students might be surprising to some.

“With the results we’ve seen with people in their 50s and 60s … When people start learning this stuff and realize they actually can do it and see how addictive it is — the oldest we’ve had was 77.” mandy.cook@theindependent.ca

Dany Guinaraes of Acro-Adix.

Paul Daly/The Independent

MARCH 2, 2007

22 • INDEPENDENTSTYLE

That’s Spicy I

don’t have to remind people at the moment how cold it is right now.

Heck, you can look out your window — if it isn’t covered in snow — and see how cold it really is.

On my street, it looks like we have moved into another ice age. The snow banks seem to be drifting ever so slowly towards each other into the middle of the road. I just hope it doesn’t get that far. Perhaps spring or a street-widening snowplow will fix that, whichever comes first. My money is riding on spring.

But there are ways to make ourselves warm and cozy.

While we while away our time indoors, we should concentrate on warming ourselves up, from the inside out. It’s time to think about spicy food.

I really enjoy spicy foods and the way the heat opens up the nasal passages and makes the intake of breath cool.

The mother of all heat comes from the fruit of the plant capsicum, which is a

NICHOLAS GARDNER Off the Eating Path part of the nightshade family.

People who love hot and spicy foods, like me, are always looking for the next heat fix. North Americans can thank Wilbur Scoville, the creator of the scale that bears his name and is the measure of “hotness” in chilies. The Scoville scale is measured when a solution of the pepper extract is diluted in a sugar water solution until the “heat” is no longer detectable to a taster; the unit of measure is a Scoville unit.

You might not know it, but that timid little red, yellow, green, and orange “bell peppers” that you buy for every day use in your food, is a capsicum pepper — not a hot pepper, but it is part of the same family. The average bell pep-

per rates a zero on the Scoville scale.

There are some of us who are addicted to the heat of the mighty pepper, and for good reason. The chemical compound capsicum is the reason why we feel heat. The capsicum stimulates the thermoceptors in your skin and the mucus membranes, which is the reason your nose runs and your cheeks get flushed when you eat spicy foods.

On top of all that, the capsicum activates endorphins — chemicals that make you feel good — in the brain, giving you that good feeling when eating spicy foods and giving you a reason to try it again. There’s a lot of chemistry going on when you feel the heat.

Tabasco sauce, that bottled condiment you can find in the grocery store, injects a good heat, but it rates only about a 600 on the Scoville scale.

The jalapeño pepper, mostly found on top of nachos, rates anywhere between 2,500 and 8,000 scoville units. This depends upon whether it is fresh (hot-

ter) or pickled – the little green discs we see on the nachos. I like this pepper. It has a nice heat, not too acidic and it gives you a blast that wakes you up.

The serrano pepper — the pepper added to make “five-alarm chili” — is about 20,000 Scoville units.

But this year a new king was crowned. The naga jolokia chili, native of Assam, India, was listed by the Guinness Book of Records earlier this month as the world’s hottest chili pep-

per with a heat equal to a whopping 1,001,304 Scoville units. That’s 50 times hotter than an already hot serrano pepper. You wouldn’t be able to eat this without serious personal injury. In my opinion, it only needs to be in the same room to inject some serious heat into the food — more heat than anyone needs to see.

This week, I’ll make some nachos and cover the top with some fresh Jalapeños and crack a beer and let Scoville units warm me from the inside out. It sure beats the heck out of shovelling snow.

CORRECTION In last week’s column, C is for cookie, I forgot to add 2 1/2 cups flour in the cookie recipe. Apologies to any frustrated bakers out there.

Nicholas Gardner is a freelance writer and erstwhile chef living in St. John’s. nicholas.gardner@gmail.com

Paul Daly/The Independent

Youth and debt: success stories Not all young adults get themselves into financial trouble

By David Cruise and Alison Griffiths Torstar wire service

A %DUCATION 7EEK -ARCH

T

he purpose of Education Week is to focus public attention on education, the education system and educational issues. The Newfoundland and Labrador Teachers’ Association has been proud to sponsor and organize Education Week since 1936.

We celebrate Education Week to highlight education and the great Kevin Foley work performed in our schools by NLTA President our teachers and their students. This year’s theme, Live Healthy! Learn Well! • Bien être pour mieux apprendre!, highlights the importance of physical development and the capacity to learn.

s a topic of discussion, debt and youth always elicits intense passion — heartening because that means there’s a deep concern about the impact on our social fabric of a generation of young people who begin their productive working lives burdened by debt.

Fortunately, there are many young people who have managed to avoid debt or, once encumbered, have found their own way out. Here are some of their stories.

“I am 29 years old and I have just graduated with a degree in electrical engineering,” writes Cecelia Bosch. “Most of my friends graduated years before I did. However, unlike them, I have no debt beyond a $5,000 credit line I took out last year to buy a car.”

Bosch worked for a year before going away to university, then she alternated studying with working.

“I found it very hard in the middle of my program as my friends were all further ahead and I had to review all my courses in the months before going back to school. I am sure my marks suffered and I had to negotiate with the faculty in order to get permission to take so many breaks.”

Now 29, Bosch has a degree and a good job and she will start putting money away in her RRSP this year.

“I’m not saying this approach would work for everyone but my parents have no money and I did not want to start my career deeply in debt.

Perhaps other students might consider my experience in order to avoid the burden of student loans.”

Scott Parish suggests that part of the problem

lies, not in the expense of getting an education, but in what kind of education is chosen.

“There seems to be this consensus that without a degree you are destined to a life of squalor. As a young apprentice in a trade you start at 50 per cent of a journeyman’s rate (from $24 to $38 depending on the trade),” he says.

Besides, most construction jobs are Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.; a large share of companies offer at least 50 per cent paid benefits; education for the trade is paid for by the government and usually takes five years to complete, which puts an end to the student loan problem; and every year you progress in the trade you receive a 10 per cent increase in pay.

“This leads me to wonder why the trades are so short of the young people who are so desperate for good pay, benefits and stable hours.”

Claude Mercer, 26, is a dental hygienist. His parents are both health care professionals with good incomes.

However, he and his two brothers have always lived by “the 50 per cent rule.”

“From an early age if we wanted something like a new pair of skis or a bike or a guitar our parents would pay half if we saved the first half.

It took me two years to get the guitar I wanted but I felt so good about it.”

Mercer’s parents insisted on the 50 per cent rule for education also, so all three boys worked summers from an early age and then two of the brothers worked for one year before going to college and university.

“I stick to that rule for myself,” Mercer finishes. “If I want something (even a car), I make sure I have at least 50 per cent saved. Putting the remainder on a credit card or a credit line keeps the debt manageable.”

TASTE

Throughout the week, teachers, students and school communities will take part in activities to celebrate the importance of living healthy and learning well.

Pancakes to treasure

The provincial Opening Ceremonies this year will take place at St. Thomas Aquinas Elementary School in Port-au-Port East.

G

My congratulations and best wishes to all teachers and students as we celebrate Education Week 2007.

By Susan Sampson Torstar wire service ive your pancakes a makeover with the whole-grain treatment. These are made with muesli, a treasure trove of wheat, barley, oats, corn and rice cereals, as well as fruit and nuts. They have a hearty texture yet are still tender.

MULTIGRAIN PANCAKES Adapted from Cook’s Illustrated magazine. I used Sunny Crunch Low-Fat Organic Muesli with raisins and almonds, purchased at a healthfood store. If you don’t have a griddle, use a large, heavy pan on medium or medium-low heat.

Sponsored by the NLTA since 1936.

2 cups 2 per cent milk 4 tsp lemon juice 1 1/4 cups + 3 tbsp muesli 3/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour 1/2 cup whole-wheat flour 1 tbsp brown sugar 2 1/4 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp table salt 2 large eggs

3 tbsp unsalted butter, melted, cooled 3/4 tsp vanilla extract Canola oil to taste Whisk together milk and lemon juice in fourcup measure. Set aside. (Mixture will thicken.)

Finely grind 1 1/4 cups muesli in food processor with metal blade, about two minutes.

Transfer to large bowl. Add remaining three tablespoons muesli, flours, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Whisk to combine.

Whisk eggs, butter and vanilla into milk mixture until blended. Make well in centre of muesli mixture. Pour in milk mixture. Whisk gently until just combined. (Do not overmix; a few lumps are okay.)

Heat griddle to 325F. Brush lightly with oil.

Pour about 1/4 cup batter per pancake onto griddle. Cook until small bubbles begin to appear evenly on surface, two to three minutes.

Flip. Cook until bottoms are golden brown.

Cook in batches, oiling griddle in between.

Place finished pancakes on rack on baking sheet and keep them warm in preheated 200F oven.

Makes 18 (four- to five-inch diameter) pancakes.

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTSTYLE • 23

Something to love

No matter what the season, remember this: it could always be worse

I

Schools, parents divided on expelling cell phones

By Louise Brown Torstar wire service

W

hat the cluster of teens was watching on the classroom computer appalled principal Clara Williams.

It was a student fight, filmed on a cellular phone and shown on YouTube to the world.

“I know cell phones have become almost part of kids’ bodies, but there are just so many opportunities to abuse them at school,” said the principal of Marc Garneau Collegiate in Don Mills, where all 1,800 students are forbidden to use cell phones in class and hallways.

While some parents oppose the rule because it curbs access to their teens, Williams calls the indoor ban a fair trade-off. Students can still use their cells, she says — they just have to step outside the building.

This could soon be the rule at all 560 public schools in Toronto, where officials are mulling a cell ban in classrooms and hallways that could be approved as early as April.

“I don’t want to be draconian, but kids can use cell phones to cheat in 10 seconds using the Internet,” said trustee Josh Matlow of the Toronto District School Board, who has asked staff to examine how a ban might work.

They’re not the only ones.

Plagued by students filming fights — and more amorous endeavours — on their phones, texting each other during sports practice, trying to cheat using the Internet on their phone, playing games in class, summoning spectators to a schoolyard brawl and leaving class to take a call, schools across North America are grappling with how to manage this latest teen toy.

A school in Gatineau, Que., banned cells in November after a student filmed a teacher who had been prodded into a temper tantrum, and then posted the scene on the popular YouTube video-sharing website.

In New York City, parents are suing the school board for banning cell phones from school property — and even searching some students at the door.

The court case continues this month, as parents mull over the board’s latest offer, to set up special outdoor lockers where students can check their cells for $1 a day.

Milwaukee banned cell phones this week after students used them to summon spectators to a fight among female students in which three students and six adults were arrested.

In Greater Toronto, the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board voted this week to ban cell use on school property, including portables, and also during after-school sports and field trips.

Some boards ban all hand-held electronic devices from classrooms and hallways, whereas

others let students keep their iPods and other MP3 players to listen to music if teachers agree.

The Ontario Principals’ Council has urged its members to push school boards for system-wide policies that would prohibit cellphones from exams, where students could use them to cheat, and also from washrooms and locker rooms where camera-equipped phones could potentially invade others’ privacy.

The group also wants school boards to think about what to do about cellphones during lockdowns, where students could text-message inaccurate information to relatives or even tip off someone that police were looking for them, said council spokesperson Peggy Sweeney.

“Of course our biggie is that principals don’t think students should be permitted in class to use cell phones to text message, watch TV, take pictures, go on the Internet or make calls — we’re educators, after all, and school boards need to start cracking down.”

But a ban is bound to draw fire from students and parents alike.

“If they’re worried about kids taking pictures with cell phones, are they going to ban cameras too?” asked Grade 12 student Brittany MacDonald, 17, of Toronto’s Northern Secondary School.

“I don’t use my phone in class, but it would be kind of annoying if they banned them in the halls, because I call my friends a lot of the time to find out where they are at lunch, and I also call my parents to tell them what time my basketball games are.”

Northern parent Helga Teitsson said she would oppose an “outright ban, because as a parent, I rely on being able to have access to my kids to remind them of the dentist or another appointment.”

Earlier this week, her Grade 10 daughter used her cell to remind Teitsson of an after-school volleyball game.

“I think there are rules in place in the classroom, and I’m sure students push those rules,” said the mother of two teens, “but I think parents today rely on cell phones to keep communication open with their kids.”

Grade 12 student Monica Scanlan said she’d be against a ban “for sure. It wouldn’t be the end of the world to not use them in class, but it would be really hard to find my friends at lunch if we couldn’t use them in the halls.”

Yet not all students would mind cutting their parents off the cellular apron string. One Grade 12 student at Northern recently answered his phone during class, only to hear his father on the line.

While the class watched, he listened to his father announce the menu for that night’s supper: Beefaroni.

That night, the 17-year-old imposed his own ban — to his father: no calls during school.

t’s easy to hate winter. I doubt it is many people’s favourite season, or at least not in Newfoundland and Labrador.

I really do love this province. It is, and always will be home. One aspect I love about being here are the seasons. Sometimes I think it’s easy to fantasize about living in a tropical paradise where the lowest annual temperature is a rock splitter of a day in Newfoundland. I’ve visited the Caribbean and it is truly beautiful. But I can’t picture myself melting in the sun 365 days of the year.

There’s something comforting about the seasons, in the natural progression that is as constant and steady as time. I can measure moments in my life by recalling the changing of the leaves as warm days faded into bitterly cold ones and then always back again.

Seasons break away from monotony. Variety keeps life interesting and if there’s anything that can be said about Newfoundland, it’s that even if the seasons are predictable, the weather definitely is not.

Spring is wet, that’s almost a guarantee. The rains fall, the fog rolls in and occasionally the sun peeks out. This is generally a time of celebration in Newfoundland. Even under the blanket of aged snow that make the ground resemble more of an ashtray than someone’s lawn, the signs of beauty and life poke through. Spring tulips and crocuses remind me, though the winter may feel long, the thaw will still eventually come.

Summer is almost impossible not to love.

Whether it’s the freedom of no school, the longer days and carefree nights, summer is absolutely addictive — but unfortunately short-lived, leaving you pining for more.

When the grass is green and the flowers are overflowing under an azure sky, it is hard think of the world of ice and snow that looms ahead.

Summer is a mental break from the stresses of winter and in Newfoundland we need all the sanity we can get.

My next favourite season is fall. Watching the hills change colour, fading through the shades of fire is nothing short of spectacular. Maples appear stark against the constant evergreens, like a perfect incision seeping crimson blood on unblemished skin. I love shuffling through the fallen foliage searching for the perfect leaf. One of the most amazing parts is that once spring comes, all the leaves that fell have decomposed and been recycled back into the ground while the snow was piled on top. There’s nothing like the smell of fresh moist earth after the snow melts.

Then there’s winter. I’m sure many people have a lot to say about this season right now, especially after the latest major storm. The local services have been flooded with phone calls about residents not being satisfied with the snow clearing efforts. I do have to admit the city has been a mess

LEIA FELTHAM Falling Face First for motorists — not to mention pedestrians.

There is a time to complain and this would be it. Other times, it’s hardly justified. As soon as we get one hot day in summer, there will be hordes of people whining about how the heat is too much. I think they forget all too quickly how uncomfortable 10 feet of snow is too. I swear sometimes people look for things to complain about.

When the weather is good, celebrate. Enjoy it while it lasts. At least we won’t end up like Pompeii, buried under metres of ash. There won’t be any plows to clear away that mess. Newfoundland is almost free of natural disasters. Every time I think about moving away I remind myself of this. We have little to truly complain about when there are people losing their homes and lives.

Variety keeps life interesting ... even if the seasons are predictable, the weather definitely is not.

I’ll admit winter is not always fun. There was a time when you might have run outside in excitement after the first snowfall. It meant snowmen and forts, sliding with your friends, even putting up with sometimes humiliating snow suits just to do all this. (I still cringe when thinking about winter clothing.) At some point it becomes a time that means backbreaking shoveling, high heating bills and risky driving. In the future I want to remember what it was like to love winter through my own kids when they play and help me forget all that I’ve come to worry about.

The good times have a way of outweighing the bad, so when you’re walking in the middle of the road because there are no sidewalks, when the plow clears the road only to fill in your driveway once again, when the bus shelter has lost the battle to the snowdrifts and therefore you have too, when winter generally kicks you in the ass, remember there is always someone, somewhere who has more of a right to curse the weather than you do.

Look on the bright side. Maybe we have it pretty good in Newfoundland after all.

Leia Feltham is a first year student at Memorial University. Her column returns March 16.

24 • INDEPENDENTSTYLE

MARCH 2, 2007

Planes bring books to remote reserves

I

n two remote First Nations reserves, reached only by “winter roads” that have been thwarted this year by milder weather, literacy is landing by parachute this week as children wait below knee-deep in snow.

More than 7,000 children’s books were dropped from a plane last week in tiny Fort Severn; novels and picture books donated by families around the province as part of the second book drive for aboriginal children conducted

by Ontario Lieutenant-Governor James

Bartleman.

Another several thousand will be dropped on the frozen waters of Sandy Lake, another fly-in community where poverty, low literacy levels and underfunding of federally run schools historically left bookshelves empty in both schools and homes.

While most of the 185,000 children’s books are being driven to reserves, Fort Severn and Sandy Lake posed a problem because the winter roads were either too remote or too dangerous

because of global warming, said Bartleman from Fort Severn.

“It was spectacular,” he said. “The sun was shining, it was 10 below and suddenly the big Hercules came swooping into view, tipped its wings from above 800 feet above us and out came eight parachutes with crates of books floating to the ground.

“We all jumped on the back of snowmobiles and pulled sleighs out onto the ice to load up the books.”

— Torstar wire service

EVENTS

Sara Tilley

Real Action = Real Change March 4 - 11 is Education Week

Government of Newfoundland and Labrador is making real investments for our students and our teachers.

FACT: The education budget is almost $1 billion.

FACT: $37 million for school construction and maintenance.

FACT: $12.4 million for 226 additional teaching positions.

FACT: $4 million annually for new textbooks and resources.

FACT: $2.2 million for lab safety equipment.

FACT: $6.3 million for the elimination of school fees.

Government believes in Education

WOMEN’S WORK FESTIVAL New plays by women, tributes to women pioneers, and dessert, in celebration of International Women’s Week.

• RCA Theatre, She Said Yes! and White Rooster Productions join forces to present a four-night festival of work by and about women, with all proceeds going to the Naomi Centre.

• Reading Series, Eastern Edge Gallery, Harbour Drive, admission by donation, 7 p.m.: • MARCH 5: Sex, the war of by Lois Brown, and Connecting Rooms by Florence Button

MARCH 2 • Buddy Wasisname and the Other Fellers’ Dirty Big Tour at the Corner Brook Arts and Culture Centre.

Performances continue until March 7.

• c2c theatre presents Copenhagen by Michael Frayn, directed by Lois Brown and featuring Bryan Hennessey, Mary Lewis and Charlie Tomlinson, Rabbittown Theatre, 8 p.m. Continues until March 4.

• A night of gospel music with Larry Mills, Labrador West Arts and Culture Centre, 8 p.m.

• Viva Lost Elvis, is a dinner and comedic musical tribute to the late great Elvis Presley, Majestic Theatre, Duckworth Street, 7 p.m., 579-3023.

MARCH 3 • An Evening with Berni Stapleton, a fundraiser for Lighthouse Productions, at the Grand Bank Lions Community Centre. Dinner, silent auction and comedy performance by Stapleton, 6 p.m., 832-2284.

MARCH 4 • Silent auction and pizza for pets fundraiser for Heavenly Creatures.

Dine at Boston Pizza, Kelsey Drive, noon-8 p.m., and donate 10 per cent of your bill to Heavenly Creatures.

• Exhibition opening: Michele Stamp

Paul Daly/The Independent

Featuring Kay Anonsen, Robert Chafe, Sandy Gow, Brad Hodder, Ruth Lawrence, and Sara Tilley.

• MARCH 6: Family, or, 63 Steps by Agnes Walsh. Featuring Robert Chafe, Amy House and Ruth Lawrence • MARCH 7: The (In)complete Herstory of Women in Newfoundland and (Labrador!) by Sara Tilley, featuring Mary-Lynn Bernard, Robert Chafe, Sandy Gow, Ruth Lawrence and Sherry White.

THE LADIES OF MISRULE An International Women’s Day celebration of women pioneers in the arts

Portraits, 32 works in graphite on paper, RCA Gallery, LSPU Hall, 753-4531.

MARCH 5 • NLOWE International Women’s Week Luncheon featuring guest speaker Cindy Roma, CEO, Telelink Call Centre, Capital Hotel, Kenmount Road, St. John’s, 754-5555 x225, noon-1:30 p.m.

• Aldrich Interdisciplinary Lecture presents From Fish Oil to Crude Oil: Newfoundland and Labrador’s Dynamic and Innovative Marine Industries, presented by Trevor Taylor, provincial minister of Innovation, Trade and Rural Development, 7 p.m., Inco Innovation Centre, Memorial University.

MARCH 7 • The Mahers Bahers at Folk Night, the Ship Pub, 9 p.m.

• The Learning Disabilities Association of Newfoundland and Labrador parent support group meeting, 7:30 p.m., 66 Kenmount Rd., 7531445.

• Women writing: a creativity workshop for women only, facilitated by author JoAnne Soper-Cook, Memorial University, Science Building, SN4038, 579-1681, jodygirl@3web.net

of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Gerry Rogers hosts a celebration featuring Kay Anonsen, Tessa Crosbie, Sheilagh Guy Murphy, Amy House, Katie Pittman, Joan Sullivan, Simone Savard-Walsh and others saluting the work of Cassie Brown, Biddy O’Toole, Len Margaret, Bride Judge and others.

There will be a special tribute to this year’s living pioneer, and, to add decadence to our celebration, we will be offering a luscious dessert buffet.

The show takes place at the Masonic Temple, Cathedral Street, St. John’s, 8 p.m., March 8.

MARCH 8 • Motus O Dance Theatre, Corner Brook Arts and Culture Centre, 8 p.m.

• MUN Cinema series presents Little Children, Studio 12, Avalon Mall, 7 p.m. More information about this film and the season’s schedule is at www.mun.ca/cinema.

• Find out what really happened to the Great Auks, a presentation by seabird expert Dr. William Montevecchi, The Rooms lecture theatre, 7 p.m.

IN THE GALLERIES • Different Visions, new work by Elena Popova, Frank Lapointe and Terrence Howell, Red Ochre Gallery, until March 21.

• Kinetic Portraits of 12 Canadian Writers by Peter Wilkins, The Rooms.

• Celebrate Craft, a juried group exhibition at the Craft Council Gallery, Devon House, Duckworth St. Call for proposals Sound Symposium invites invite artists from all sound arts fields to propose projects, installations and performances for the 16th Sound Symposium scheduled for July 3-13, 2008. The event’s theme is Inner Space, Outer Space, and the deadline is July 15, 2007. Visit www.soundsymposium.ca for more.

MARCH 2-8, 2007

What’s new in the automotive industry

FEATURED VEHICLE

Good ol’ b’ys I

THE RACE-INSPIRED 2007 ACCORD SEDAN

The perfect balance of performance, VTEC power and efficiency to make driving something you've always wanted it to be – fun. Town, country or anywhere in between, the Accord looks and feels right at home. Sleek, aerodynamic lines and available 17-inch alloy wheels make any drive more exciting and feel much more rewarding. Legendary Accord handling is a product of the race-inspired double-wishbone suspension design with multi-link rear setup. Stabilizer bars reduce body roll, making for quick, confident cornering. Sharply honed power rack-and-pinion steering provides you with an excellent feel for the road and the Anti-lock Braking System (ABS) with Electronic Brake Distribution (EBD) helps ensure smooth, safe stopping. The 2007 Accord is available at City Honda Kenmount Road starting at $26,500.

Paul Daly/The Independent

can appreciate at least some aspect of every form of motorized racing — the sheer power of drag racing, the absurdity of powerboat contests and the glamour of Formula 1. But stockcar racing really gets MARK WOOD my pulse going.

For me, the rough, WOODY’S tightly packed slamming on an oval track WHEELS is the way races ought to be raced. Maybe it’s because of the old movies of Roman chariot races that I watched as a kid. You know, the one where they gallop down the final stretch and some hot shot has blades on his wheels. He pulls up alongside the lead chariot and sideswipes him, slicing his wooden spokes to bits. The chariot disintegrates, the driver gets tangled in the reins and dragged across the finish line in second place while the guy with the blades gets a standing ovation from the Colosseum crowd.

Later that evening he’s fanned by servants and hand-fed grapes while the guy he raced against spends his time trying to build a new set of wheels. That was probably the start of another tradition … when you’re not racing you’re working on your machine, trying to find an advantage over the competition. Now that I think about it, maybe I really love chariot racing best, but after that comes NASCAR. The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing is the top of the heap for every aspiring stockcar racer. It’s also the only motor sport with a checkered past as well as a checkered flag.

It all started out with running moonshine in the southern states, good ol’ boys with fast cars roaring down dirt backroads with a trunk full of white lightning. The sheriff could never catch them, naturally, for a variety of reasons … the boys had their engines souped-up, they had some moonshine in the fuel for increased octane (10 per cent was perfect), they also had incredible skill and local knowledge of the area.

One guy in particular became a legend and my hero — Junior Johnson. The authorities never could catch him running moonshine and it can’t be an easy thing to outrun the law with 132 gallons of hootch weighing down the car. The vehicle tends to fishtail in the corners on dirt roads.

Junior learned to use that handicap to his advantage and power-slide through turns.

He had a couple of moves that became his trademark, the most famous being the “bootleg turn.” If the competition was closing in on his rear bumper or if there were a roadblock up ahead he’d jam the car down in second gear, cut the wheel and stomp on the gas. The car would swing around 180 degrees and he’d tear off in the opposite direction. Junior got a lot of practice in running moonshine in the evenings and stock car racing on Sundays. He had a pretty good race season in 1955 but the following year he was in jail. The law finally caught him in the act of making moonshine. The process was usually done by the elders while the late-night deliveries were left to young’uns like Junior. He was only bringing firewood up to the “still” for his Pappy when he was ambushed by federal agents.

Junior served 11 months of a two-year sentence and returned to racing in 1958.

In the 1960 Daytona 500 he was racing without any sponsorship and most of the other cars were about 10 miles per hour faster than him. While running close behind the lead car Junior made an interesting discovery, tucked right up on the bumper there was less air pressure slowing his car so he could slingshot out of the turns to pass. He’s credited with being the first to use the technique of “drafting” behind cars for racing advantage, a crucial strategy used in most forms of racing ever since.

Junior retired as a race-car driver in 1966, became a team owner and propelled the careers of many of today’s top Nascar drivers. He was inducted in the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 1991 and currently lives on his farm in Wilksboro, North Carolina.

Mark Wood of Portugal Cove-St.Philip’s occasionally joins the pit crew for #61, Predator Racing at Avondale Speedway.

26 • INDEPENDENTSHIFT

MARCH 2, 2007

Farewell to Jim Paulson LONG-TIME MOSPORT AND MOLSON INDY ANNOUNCER DIES AT AGE 67

O

n Jan. 13, about 150 relatives be rich and the anecdotes — not to menand racing people attended a tion the tears — will flow freely. gathering at a Why? Because Jim was a Toronto-area yacht club to celgenuinely nice, gentle man. ebrate the life of the late He had nothing but good Martin Chenhall, a General words for everybody. Every Motors engineer and a car day was sunny, or so it racer/organizer of note. seemed.

Host Chick McGregor invitThere was so much in his ed people to say a few words life that could — and often in tribute. He informed most does — turn a body bitter. of them of his intention. One His first son, Brad, died, as NORRIS he didn’t was long-time did his first wife, Lynn. His MCDONALD Mosport and Molson Indy beloved second wife, Kitty announcer, Jim Paulson. (a.k.a. Diamond Lil) also You could tell Jim was passed away. But Jim carried caught off-guard. But being on, ever smiling, ever optithe consummate professional, mistic, and kept himself busy he gathered himself — and his thoughts making other people, be they his friends — up, went to the microphone and or his listeners, happy. spoke glowingly for two or three minHe was, most of all, superbly talentutes about Martin Chenhall and the ed, whether it was performing on radio, sport of automobile racing. Every word TV or at the track. He was a master at was a gem. his craft. And a really quick thinker, too.

How shocking, then, that a little more Gary Dolson, long-time Goodyear Tire than four weeks later — Feb. 13, to be and Rubber Co. communications manexact — Jim Paulson collapsed and died ager, loves to tell this story: while working at his regular job with “It sounds like a cliché, but Jim was Toronto radio station AM740. He was such a calm, cool and collected guy,” 67.

Dolson said. “Nothing could throw him A memorial service is planned for 2 off. He saved the day so many times. p.m. on Sat., March 3, at St. James For instance: Anglican Cathedral in Toronto. The “At one of the early Molson Indys in tributes will be many, the memories will the late ’80s, Jim was on the podium

TRACK TALK

introducing a bunch of honoured guests and generally getting everybody worked up for the start of the race.

“There were 70,000 people at the CNE and the race was on international TV so who knows how many people were actually watching. Anyway, Jim introduced the girl who was going to sing O Canada and then threw it to her.

“Halfway through, she stumbled and started to forget the words. Without missing a beat, Jim slid in behind her and whispered: ‘True … North …

Strong … and … Free …’

“With his prompting, she got through the national anthem and nobody was ever the wiser.”

Jim’s reaction? “That’s racing,” he said.

His good friend, two-time Canadian driving champion Craig Hill, tells about the time he was in a jam in Montreal and Jim bailed him out.

“I was marketing manager for Castrol and we had a big reception for clients at the Canadian Grand Prix. It was 1993, we (Castrol) sponsored Team Lotus in those days and one of the drivers was Alex Zanardi. My regular Montreal MC was tied up doing things for Molson’s and I was in a fix. I turned around, and there was Jim just standing there.

“He agreed to fill in as host but was worried because he wasn’t bilingual. So

you know what he did? He asked the questions in English and had Zanardi answer them in French. It worked perfectly.”

Said Hill: “Jim was such an easygoing guy. He always had a good word for, and about, everybody. If there were problems, there were no problems — if you know what I mean. Jim’s attitude was, ‘We’ll keep on going and, at the end of the day, everything will turn out all right.”

Bert Coates, long-time automotive marketing executive, laughs when he tells this story.

“Jim was doing the announcing at Mosport and we were sponsoring the BFGoodrich Sundown Grand Prix. In a six-hour endurance race, things can get a little boring, so Jimmy interviewed the company president and then he interviewed me — except he told people that I was the captain of the BFGoodrich Blimp and that I was talking to him from high in the sky.

“We talked for 10 minutes about the ‘view,’ and what I ‘saw’ going on in the race, and he was so convincing that fans across in the stands were staring up in the sky, trying to catch sight of our imaginary blimp.”

Jim’s amazing ability to make those sorts of things up on the fly got him lots of work with Bob McAllister, whose

company arranged, planned and produced receptions and press conferences for many of Toronto’s elite corporations in the 1990s.

Said McAllister: “I’d be able to call him up at 8 a.m. and tell him to meet me at 11:45 a.m. (for a noon start) in the John Molson Room at Molson’s headquarters and he’d arrive not knowing who was there or what was going on.

He did Dave Barr, the golfer, cold, and Whipper Billy Watson, the wrestler, and every auto racer you can think of and he had this unique ability to make everybody feel right at home.”

This skill earned him the Molson Indy job in Toronto in 1986 and in Vancouver in 1990. Said marketing and public relations specialist Sid Priddle: “I knew of Jim’s work at Mosport and recommended him for the Molson Indy jobs because he could explain auto racing in layman’s terms. You didn’t have to be a motorhead to enjoy commentary at those races because Jim was so good.”

The last word goes to three-time Canadian driving champion Bill Brack: “When I wasn’t racing, I liked to listen to Jim’s announcing because he was so clear. You listened to him and you knew what was happening all around the race track, even if you couldn’t see it. Jim’s voice was our eyes.”

Congestion fees on the way?

By Jim Byers Torstar wire service

C

ongestion fees, road tolls or higher taxes may be coming soon to highways or parking lots in major Canadian cen-

tres.

In Toronto, wrapped in daily gridlock and environmental issues pushing their way to the forefront, it appears that road-pricing of one sort or another has become a politically acceptable phrase.

“There is a tremendous willingness to consider what we need to do to raise additional revenues,” Toronto Summit 2007 organizer David Pecaut said after wrapping up two days of talks on the future of Canada’s biggest city.

“And people embrace the idea largely that user fees will have to be part of the equation.”

Pecaut said some think the solution lies

with road tolls, while others favour a congestion tax like the one in London, where drivers are charged some $20 to bring their cars into the city centre. Others prefer higher licensing fees for gas guzzlers or a tax on people who drive into downtown, while some suggest simply hiking the gas tax to raise money for public transit.

“What I heard … is that people know we have to do more ourselves to fund transportation,” Pecaut said. “At the same time, there was a strong call for a national transportation strategy like other governments have.”

Former Toronto planner Paul Bedford said he agrees with Pecaut.

“I think there’s an emerging consensus, certainly here and in the general population as well, that enough’s enough already, that gridlock’s over the top,” he said.

“I think there’s a willingness by people to

put money on the table to build the kind of transit system through the entire region — not the city alone but the entire region — that’s needed to serve 10 million people.”

Bedford said the current year-to-year funding patchwork can’t build the kind of system that gets people out of their cars. The key to any toll or road-pricing program is to put money into a fund for transportation improvement, and not into a general fund where the public can’t see what’s happening.

Toronto Councillor Shelley Carroll said road pricing would take perhaps a couple of years to establish. In the meantime, the Toronto and other Canadian cities need a national transit strategy to provide long-term, dependable transit funding.

The big city mayors’ caucus of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities is expected to call for this strategy soon.

NO ONE IS ALONE IN THE FIGHT AGAINST CANCER. Behind every person who is touched by cancer, there is a growing force fighting all types of cancer in communities eve r y w h e re.

The Canadian Cancer Society is leading the way through research funding, information services, support pro g rams – and we advocate for healthy public policy. Together, we’re growing stronger. To volunteer, donate or for more information, visit cancer.ca or call 1 888 939-3333.

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTSHIFT • 27

Before you sell A FEW SIMPLE THINGS WILL MAXIMIZE THE AMOUNT YOU CAN SELL YOUR CAR FOR

T

he easiest way to get rid of a car is performed, and when you purchased a to give it away. The next easiest is battery or new tires. A buyer will know to turn it into a dealer if you hap- they’re not just getting a car — they’re pen to be buying a new one. But the getting a well cared for car. smartest thing might just be to sell it.

5. Be professional. Have the Used There are some really simple things Vehicle Information Package ready. It’s you can do to maximize how the seller’s obligation to much money you can sell your obtain it and any potential car for. Be prepared to invest a buyer may see it. Whoever little, and do some homework. buys your car gets to keep it.

1. Clean it. Sounds simple, The kit contains a description but most people make an emoof the vehicle, all past owntional break from their car long ers, mileage, registered liens, before they sell it. Like in most values and sales tax implicarelationships, they stop putting tions. It’s a requirement by the energy in when the end is in law, and costs $20. You can LORRAINE sight. order it on-line.

SOMMERFELD Removing the coffee cups 6. Be transparent. Have and hanging a little pine tree your car emissions tested and from the mirror isn’t going to do have the safety inspection it. Take it to the do-it-yourself done. This will be a huge power wash and vacuum place. selling point for a potential If you can’t bring yourself to do it, have buyer, and also greatly reduces the risk it professionally detailed. You will be of someone driving a block from your shocked at how clean they get your car. house and having the thing fall apart. If You’ll make the investment back in a potential buyer wants their mechanic spades. to have a look at it, be accommodating.

2. Don’t smoke in it. If it’s too late, or 7. Set a realistic price (check out book just not an option, be prepared to have values on your car, and also what similar people hop in and hop out instantly. To vehicles are selling for on places like quote the big bald bully doctor on TV, Auto Trader and LiveDeal). Too high it’s probably a deal breaker. Febreeze will turn off serious offers, and could only goes so far — you’re only kidding leave you with a car on your hands long yourself. Smoker’s Nose will tell you it’s after you’d rather it was gone. fine. It’s lying.

8. Don’t enter into the murky land of 3. If the upholstery is a mess, put on bogus bills of sale in an effort to avoid new seat covers. It’s wise to put them on taxes. The Package makes it more diffiwhen you first get a vehicle, along with cult to do this, though some will always installing new car mats. Save the origi- try. nal ones to put in when it comes time to If a seller offers such an incentive, I’d sell — a fabulous first impression is be inclined to wonder what the condition pristine floor mats from the manufactur- of the car truly was. If a buyer requests er. Seat covers go on sale regularly, so it, let them move along to someone willbuy the best you can afford. If you have ing to break the law. kids, they are rubbing their feet up 9. Don’t sell your car to your neighagainst the back of the front seat, so bour. Trust me. Every single time somemake sure that’s covered. thing goes wrong, they will scowl at 4. Remember that file folder I told you you. Your children will no longer be about last year? This is one of the best allowed to play together, you’ll have reasons for keeping a designated car nobody to borrow power tools from, and folder. Keep all receipts for anything to someone will have to move. Be careful do with this vehicle. When you buy a with family members for the same reahouse, you want to know how old the son. furnace is, when the roof was replaced, When you see how great your car can and what the utility costs will be. It’s the look, you may just decide to keep it. same with a car. You can hand over a www.lorraineonline.ca copy of maintenance and warranty work

POWER SHIFT

Paul Daly/The Independent

Oscar for product placement goes to Ford

By Ellen Vanstone Torstar wire service

O

ne very happy “casting agent” at last weekend’s Academy Awards was Myles Romero, director of Ford Global Brand Entertainment.

“My cars are my stars,” says Romero, speaking by phone as he waits for a plane to take him from his Dearborn, Mich., office to his Beverly Hills, Calif., office.

“My staff and I read scripts with a creative eye,” he says, looking for the best roles possible for their “diverse portfolio” of characters — er, make that products — made by Ford.

They didn’t win Ford an actual Oscar nomination, but last week Romero’s team won the company its second consecutive Brandcameo Award for Overall Product Placement.

Of the 41 films that made it to No. 1 at the box office last year, Ford vehicles appeared in 17, or 40 per cent, including The Departed (nominated for five Oscars) and Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (one).

Ford’s award was among 13 “Brandies” announced last week by online branding magazine Brandchannel.

Other Oscar-nominated films that resulted in Brandies for major corporations were The Devil Wears Prada (making Prada winner of the Coca-Cola Kid Award for Achievement in Title) and Blood Diamond (making De Beers winner of the Award for Not Being Placed — a remarkable un-marketing coup).

As for the cost of product placement, it “can range anywhere from a straight integration fee or backend promotions to support the film,” Brandchannel

spokesperson Iris Yee said in an e-mail.

While most companies usually don’t disclose what they pay, Romero says he is happy to: “Zero. Ford does not pay for product placement, although many of our competitors do.” What Ford does pay for is transportation and maintenance of the cars it lends to a production, including fleets of vehicles for hundreds of cast and crew on top of the onscreen vehicles.

As for the return on investment, Romero bases that on awareness. The global impact of Casino Royale, showcasing such Ford products as the Mondeo, Range Rover, Jaguar and Aston Martin, he says, resulted in “over a billion favourable impressions worldwide.”

There have been demonstrable, and legendary, cases when product placement resulted in increased sales: Mini Coopers after The Italian Job, Red

Stripe beer after Tom Cruise quaffed it in The Firm; a 4,000-per-cent increase in sales of Etch-a-Sketch after Toy Story.

Recently, in the first 10 days after the release of Night at the Museum, attendance at the American Museum of Natural History increased 20 per cent.

It’s a tricky business, however. The Ford appearances in The Departed, unlike Casino Royale’s plugs, were quite discreet, and the car we see the most is a maroon Buick Roadmaster belonging to Jack Nicholson.

Despite Ford’s heavy onscreen presence — from Jack Bauer’s Ford Explorer on 24 to the 17 movies in 2006 — America’s former No. 2 car manufacturer fell to No. 4 (after GM, Toyota and DaimlerChrysler AG) in sales last year, when it also posted a $12.7 billion.

Last month, sales were down 19 per

cent from January 2006.

Romero shrugs off the question of whether this means his Brandie-winning product placement is a bust commercially. “Marketing is not always about sales the next day.”

He said the Ford vehicles in 24, for example, “raised intent and consideration among the public 14 to 40 per cent.”

Nor is there any plan to rein it in. The cops drive Ford Mustangs in Reno 911!: Miami and there will be more Fords in the in-production I Am Legend starring Will Smith and Ford Mustangs in the Transformers movie.

It’s true: Pontiac and GM are supplying “the good guy cars,” Romero admits, while police interceptors will drive Mustangs.

“But,” Romero says, “there aren’t really any bad characters in a Transformers movie.”

28 • INDEPENDENTSHIFT

MARCH 2, 2007

WEEKLY DIVERSIONS ACROSS 1 Recedes 5 Not fem.

9 Parched 13 Swept-up hair 17 One in the net 18 Suffix with cigar 19 Taboo 20 Imitation 21 Impolite 22 Plane 23 Miniature abode 25 ___ on (incited) 27 Head 29 Black: comb. form 30 Porcine pen 31 Man. town with giant trapper (2 wds.)

33 Balkans leader, once 35 Plaything 36 Language suffix 37 Turban wearer 39 Pointed end 41 Summer time in Salmon Arm 43 It runs in spring 46 Leader of Upper Canada Rebellion (1837): William ___ Mackenzie 48 Mosque cleric 50 Piece for nine instruments 54 Just gets by: ___ out 56 Merino mother 57 Clay pot 59 Back (of) 60 Brief role for star 62 First black woman mayor in Canada:

CHUCKLE BROS

Daurene ___ (Annapolis Royal, N.S., 1984) 65 Arms and ammunition 67 French bathtub 69 ___ polloi 70 Intellectual faculty 71 Gordon Lightfoot’s hometown 74 Happen next 77 Canada’s first woman doctor 80 Ms. Mouskouri 81 Maligne (in Jasper Park) 83 Workout place 85 African antelope 86 Nasal tone 88 St. John’s site used by Marconi: Signal ___ 90 First black Canadian to win Victoria Cross: William ___ 92 Lawyer’s charge 93 Samovar contents 95 Sask.’s animal emblem: white-tailed ___ 97 Thick slice 99 Owns 102 Summer time in St. John’s 104 Sudden attack 106 Make possible 110 Small island 111 Words of promise 113 Have the courage (to) 115 Sticks

116 Tiger tender 119 Like some lingerie 121 ___ d’or Lake, N.S. 122 French pronoun 123 Roman fiddler 124 Exhaust 125 River of N France 126 Legal attachment 127 Sketched 128 Responsibility 129 Social insects DOWN 1 Big wading bird 2 Tree branch 3 Police identifier 4 Naps 5 Encountered 6 Perched on 7 Ermine 8 The Rankins’ kind of music 9 Plus 10 Hotel unit 11 Small bay 12 Lump or blob 13 One in ten of us has seen one 14 Temporary stop 15 Does housework 16 Daisy 24 “Papa ___’s dead and gone ...”

26 Irish parliament 28 Small case 32 Hebrides island 34 Absorption through a membrane 38 Wolf call 40 Best bud

42 City with CN tower 43 Dry in Dieppe 44 Shortened alias 45 Alberta river and park 47 Originally 49 Provincial rep.

51 Sask. hometown of Henry Taube, Nobel laureate (Chemistry, 1983) 52 Unit of corn 53 Attempt 55 Caulking 58 Upper limb 61 Vinaigrette ingredient 63 Film director Anne (“Bye Bye Blues”) 64 Charged item 66 Wrong: prefix 68 Zero 71 Man. neighbour 72 Uncooked 73 Word of admiration 75 Word of disgust 76 Young falcon 78 English river 79 Devon river 82 Tease 84 Mademoiselle in short 87 Canadian film award 89 “You can ___ a horse ...”

91 Singer K.D. 94 One of the numbers in a column 96 Bridge in Venice 98 Spanish explorer 99 Most severe hurricane in Canadian history (1954)

100 Garlic mayonnaise 101 Scarf for the shoulders 103 Hard drinker

105 Draw off liquid gradually 107 Nfld. peninsula hit by 1929 tsunami

108 Last but not ___ 109 Curves 112 Dried up 114 Beige

117 Understanding 118 Line in a garden 120 Affirmative reply Solutions page 30

Brian and Ron Boychuk

WEEKLY STARS ARIES (MAR. 21 TO APR. 19) You’re correct to want to help someone who seems to need assistance. But be careful that he or she isn’t pulling the wool over those gorgeous Sheep’s eyes. You need more facts.

CANCER (JUNE 21 TO JULY 22) You’re likely to feel somewhat crabby these days, so watch what you say, or you could find yourself making lots of apologies. Your mood starts to brighten by the weekend.

TAURUS (APRIL 20 TO MAY 20) The Bovine’s optimism will soon dispel the gloom cast by those naysayers and pessimists who still hover close by. Also, that good news you recently received is part of a fuller message to come.

LEO (JULY 23 TO AUG. 22) Your pride might still be hurting from those unflattering remarks someone made about you. But cheer up, you’re about to prove once again why you’re the Top Cat in whatever you do.

GEMINI (MAY 21 TO JUNE 20) Feeling jealous over a colleague’s success drains the energy you need to meet your own challenges. Wish him or her well and focus on what you need to do.

Results start to show in midMarch.

VIRGO (AUG. 23 TO SEPT. 22) A misunderstanding with a co-worker could become a real problem unless it’s resolved soon. Allow a third party to come in and assess the situation without pressure or prejudice.

LIBRA (SEPT. 23 TO OCT. 22) Call a family meeting to discuss the care of a loved one at this difficult time. Be careful not to let yourself be pushed into shouldering the full burden on your own.

SCORPIO (OCT. 23 TO NOV. 21) An upcoming decision could open the way to an exciting venture.

However, there are some risks you should know about. Ask more questions before making a commitment.

SAGITTARIUS (NOV. 22 TO DEC. 21) Personal matters need your attention during the earlier part of the week. You can start to shift your focus to your workaday world by midweek. Friday brings news.

CAPRICORN (DEC. 22 TO JAN. 19) You’ve been going at a hectic pace

for quite a while. It’s time now for some much-needed rest and recreation to recharge those hard-working batteries.

AQUARIUS (JAN. 20 TO FEB. 18) This is a good time to upgrade your current skills or consider getting into an entirely different training program so that you can be prepared for new career opportunities.

PISCES (FEB. 19 TO MAR. 20) Keep a low profile in order to avoid being lured away from the job at hand. Focus on what has to be done, and do it. There’ll be time later to enjoy fun with family and friends.

YOU BORN THIS WEEK You can be a dreamer and a realist.

You dream of what you would like to do, and then you face the reality of how to do it. (c) 2007 King Features Syndicate, Inc.

Fill in the grid so that each row of nine squares, each column of nine and each section of nine (three squares by three) contains the numbers 1 through 9 in any order.

There is only one solution to each puzzle. Solutions, tips and computer program available at www.sudoko.com SOLUTION ON PAGE 30

INDEPENDENTSPORTS

FRIDAY THROUGH THURSDAY, MARCH 2-8, 2007 — PAGE 29

Memorial University women’s basketball coach Doug Partridge.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Upholding the tradition Doug Partridge leads Sea-Hawks ‘family’ into national championship

By Don Power For The Independent

J

enine Browne is the poster child for Memorial University women’s basketball. A four-time Atlantic most valuable player, Browne led MUN to three AUS titles during her five years in a Sea-Hawks uniform.

These days, she’s playing professionally for the South Adelaide Panthers in Australia. But despite being on the other side of the world, she’s thinking about her former team as it prepares to host the biggest tournament in the school’s history — the Canadian women’s university basketball championship March 9-11 at the Field House.

“Even though I am still playing basketball it is not the same,” Browne wrote to Michelle Healey recently in an e-mail exchange. “Nothing will ever beat playing in a Sea-Hawk uniform at home. I am getting chills just thinking about it and wishing I could shove on my old No. 9 jersey and hear my name being called in front of thousands of fans as I run on to the court.”

That’s the type of environment MUN coach Doug Partridge has built in his 15 seasons as Sea-Hawks boss. The Halifax native has led MUN to five Atlantic titles, and thus, five Canadian championships.

Although the team has yet to be successful at nationals — no AUS team has ever won a CIS national crown, in fact — Partridge says the hope is to stand atop the heap at the end of the season.

“That’s our goal. We’re battling to be the first team from our conference, so

why not go all the way?” Partridge says. by MUN. “To have it come to pass that Partridge is preparing his club for the we’d host nationals, I don’t think that’s Atlantic championship at St. Mary’s something somebody would have conbefore the Sea-Hawks set their eyes on sidered a possibility when I started the national stage. (MUN is the second coaching here. To be the coach at this seed heading into the weekend’s tourna- time and to have it all come together is ment, and will play in a semifinal game all very special.”

Partridge is optimistic his club can get March 3.)

“Hopefully we can do something at to the next level. This year, the coach has the benefit of home nationals, make a bit of court advantage. And noise in some way although a national shape or form,” he says We’ve been CIS host team has in a raspy voice — sure never won the title in to be hoarse before successful not its 35-year history, next Saturday. In his 15 years, Partridge has creating a basketball Partridge believes he can break that barrier. taken a team that had team, but creating a MUN finished 9-1 at never made the playthe Field House this offs to a club that is family of people who season, far superior considered one of the its 5-5 road best in Atlantic all sit together during than record. The club has Canada, and among the seven wins against top top in the country games and cheer.”

10 teams this year.

“That’d be nice, to “I felt we had good look back and see how Doug Partridge talent and that we did far we’ve come from a the work, but you don’t team that never made the playoffs to now, where it’s a given know how you stack up with other teams,” he says. “That was our other you’ll be there every year.

“Now, it’s a story when we lose point of emphasis. You’ve got to get out and play the teams from Canada West, instead of win.”

Had you told Doug Partridge in his play the best teams in the country as first season that MUN would eventually much as we can. I think we were able to host a national tournament, he would do that. Over the course of the season have laughed at you. Back then, his pie we’ve proven to ourselves and others in the sky would have been hosting that we will be a player.”

All season long, the team understood Atlantics.

“We hosted the conference and that the season would end at the national was a great thing, and I thought that championship. But that hasn’t distracted was as far as it would go,” he says of the club from its original goal: winning the 2003 event at the Field House won the AUS title to get a better seeding next

weekend. (As host club, the team would be the lowest ranked of the eight seeds.)

“We know we’re going to be in this tournament and we want to represent ourselves and our school well,” Katherine Quackenbush said in the fall.

“Since May we’ve been focused on this journey.”

Partridge says this weekend is about forging an identity.

“They know there might be an easier road (at nationals) if we win AUs,” he says. “This team was also a disappointment last year. They kind of let down some of the former players and people who have worn the jersey, by not playing up to the standards people expect from us.

“Going into AUs is different. This time it’s trying to make a statement about its abilities: we deserve to wear the uniform, we deserve to be SeaHawks and uphold this tradition.”

That tradition has been set by Michelle Healey, Ann Murrin, Erica Coultas, Kerri Highmore, Amy Dalton and of course, Browne. Whenever MUN plays in the Atlantics, Partridge sees former players in the stands. It’s because he’s created a sense of belonging to something.

“It’s a family here,” he says. “We’ve been successful not creating a basketball team, but creating a family of people who all sit together during games and cheer. It’s not unusual for former players to follow us to Atlantics from wherever they are, taking time out of their busy schedules because they want See “Mean old uncle,” page 30

More black eyes for minor hockey Another maniacal parent loses his cool in front of everybody, and berates his own child

F

or years, minor hockey has taken a bad rap from many in the media, me included. The sport has taken a beating over the years.

Let’s forget for a moment that a lot of it has been deserved. Over-zealous parents, super-intense coaches, moronic executive decisions and a general stupidity among the masses have ruled minor hockey in this province for years. The game is worse off for it.

However, there are good things about hockey. First of all, it’s a great sport to play. It’s fast, entertaining and exciting to watch. The kids who play it enjoy it tremendously.

Take last weekend for example.

DON POWER

Power Point Some of you may know my son plays minor hockey. The rest of you now do, too. Mount Pearl’s minor hockey association held an atom house league tournament, and my son’s team was entered, along with teams from as far away as Gander.

Because his head coach is in Whitehorse with the Canada Games

men’s hockey team (I think it’s great that he’s got a coach in atom who is an accomplished bench boss), I was conscripted to join the squad on the bench.

(As an aside, I don’t normally coach hockey. I decided a while ago to avoid it, because I coach my son’s baseball team during the summer. And since he doesn’t listen to me in that venue, I didn’t need another six months of him not listening to me in a different sport.

I chose to step aside, and watch from the bleachers.)

Anyway, because the team was short-staffed, I was asked to join the bench. And it was a great time. The kids were outstanding, having fun with

each other before, during and after the games. But you learn things standing on a bench with 15 or so 10-year-olds.

You realize that it REALLY IS a game.

Before the championship game at the Glacier, won by Gander, every kid on both teams was individually introduced under a spotlight while skating out to their respective bluelines. Tell me they won’t remember that.

These kids enjoy winning, but it’s not all consuming. When these kids were on the bench, they didn’t care about the score or anything else. I had questions like “can I play forward, because I want to score?” or “Did you

bring out my Gatorade?” thrown at me.

The best question was, “Coach, how many more leagues do I need to play in before I get to the NHL?” One kid asked me if my foot was sore, which is another column completely. Another wanted to know if he would get another shift just after coming off. Several thought it was the coolest thing in the world to get a penalty.

It’s everybody else who cares about the score.

Such as the parent at a recent novice select game. Novice select is for boys See “Is there any leadership,” page 30

30 • INDEPENDENTSPORTS

MARCH 2, 2007

PAUL SMITH

The Rock

Outdoors

I

t was at least four decades ago, but I can still vividly recall my first SkiDoo ride. Back then, snowmobiles were all referred to as Ski-Doos, due to domination of the marketplace by Bombardier, who still markets snowmobiles under their original name.

It was late winter 1967 and my family and I moved from St. John’s to St. Anthony — quite a culture shock in those days. In St. Anthony, there was no TV, no downtown shopping and no pavement, but there were amazing powered yellow sleds that zoomed over the tons of snow that seemed to cover the entire world. I was intrigued.

Even the harbour was frozen solid, and shortly after we arrived, provided the playing surface for the games portion of St. Anthony Days. There were threelegged races, wheelbarrow races, skating, and just about every sort of contest you can imagine taking place on harbour ice.

But it was the grand finale that excited me most: snowmobile races. Best of all, there were rides around the harbour for the kids after the race was over. After dragging a poor kid from modern St. John’s to what seemed a world away, how could my parents possibly deny me a Ski-Doo ride?

You know the high-pitched whine made by those methanol-burning turbocharged Formula 1 race cars as they hug corners in excess of 100-mph? The 1967 snowmobile race in St. Anthony was nothing like that, but the crowd was just as enthusiastic.

I’m not an expert on snowmobile history but I believe the modern snowmobile was born in 1959 at Valcourt, Que. when J. Armand Bombardier marketed and mass-produced the first small snowmobile. If that’s correct, this race was just eight years after the first Ski-Doo, and although technology had advanced, horsepower and comfort were both limited.

I have no idea who won, I just remem-

ber lots of whooping, yelling and jumping up and down. It was my first exposure to mass hysteria — kinda like European football. The day was so unusually mild that pools of fresh melt water lay around the harbour. Spray flew high in the air, making the machines appear faster, at least faster than the dog teams that raced earlier. There was a particularly deep pool of water near the finish line that dampened the spirits of daring spectators who got a little too close.

Solutions for crossword on page 28

Solutions for sudoku on page 28

The season of the sled You won’t see that at the Molson Indy and you wouldn’t get post-race rides.

My turn finally came and I planted my butt on the Ski-Doo behind one of the daring snow jockeys. My mother’s warnings to “hang on tight” were drowned out by the sputter of the noisy two-strokes. The belt engaged in the clutch and we were off, skimming across the frozen harbour.

The cold stung my face each time I peeped around the driver’s broad shoulders. I think he thought he was still racing; we hit the water at top speed, sending water flying up over my head that created rainbows all around me in the bright sunlight. Like a roller coaster, my ride was awesome and time flew too quickly. I jumped off, ran to my parents, and asked for a Ski-Doo. Nearly a decade passed before I finally got one.

In 1967 St. Anthony, Bombardier’s early Ski-Doos were machines of utility — tending trap lines, hauling firewood, and so on. In 1974 I was living in Spaniard’s Bay and enough of my buddies had snowmobiles that I thought I

was justified in arguing I was unjustly deprived.

My dad bought me a 21 horsepower Boa-Ski, essentially to play on. Gas was cheap, and play I did. By this time there were dozens of companies making snowmobiles — Boa-Ski, Mercury, Johnson, Evenrude, Ski-whiz, SkiRoule, John Deere, Polaris, Arctic Cat, Sno-Jet and more. Of course the market would not be able to sustain so many players in the long term and only the lean, mean and lucky would survive.

For three winters I tore up snow on my old Boa-Ski, managing to almost kill myself only once. I was cruising up Shearstown pond at full throttle, which was nothing compared to today’s snow rockets, a mere 45 mph. I was suddenly catapulted into the air and landed on the snow, back first, with a dull thud. My snowmobile went end over end in the air and landed upright no more than five feet from where I lay prone on the pond.

Upon examination I figured out what had happened. A ski had cracked off and dug in, sending the machine end over end and me into thin air. I installed

a new ski and went back at it again. I never did tell my father how close the call was. The next year I sold the snowmobile and put the money towards a motorcycle — another safe teenage toy.

Today, only four companies make snowmobiles, the survivors of the 1970s free for all. Ski-Doo, the only surviving Canadian company and the original, is still in the game producing sleds for all niches of the market — utility, touring, performance and trail. Two American companies rose from the ashes — Polaris and Arctic Cat — and both produce excellent sleds. Not surprisingly, Japanese engineering has had a significant say in snowmobile development. Yamaha rounds out the pack with its full line of quality built snow machines.

Since February began, winter 2007 has been ideal for sledding and I’m without a machine. I think next season I might hit the trails again.

Paul Smith is an outdoors enthusiast and freelance writer living in Spaniard’s Bay. flyfishtherock@hotmail.com

‘Mean old uncle’

hope

From page 29 to see what happens to the SeaHawks.

“That type of thing is what makes me happiest, way more so than the winning or losing.”

If the Sea-Hawks are indeed a family, then Partridge is the patriarch, the man at the head of the table.

“Maybe the mean old uncle,” he begs to differ, before turning serious.

“I feel good about what we’ve done.

A lot of people are win-at-all-cost people. They sort of do whatever they can to win: put players on the floor who haven’t practised, whatever it takes.

People might have that impression of me, and I want to win as bad as anybody I know, but I want to win right. I want to do things properly and I want my players to do things properly.

For every question there is an answer.

We’re here.

Hope through education, support and solutions.

1.800. 321.1433

www.arthritis.ca

“If someone’s not willing to sacrifice to be here, they need to go somewhere else where they can shine and do their thing. That’s fine, but it’s just not going to happen here.

“At the end of the day, the great players and the lesser players are all held to the same standard. If Jenine Browne messed up, I was in her face as much as I would be in the face of our 12th player if she messed up.

“That’s discipline, and you don’t win without discipline. You can try all you want, but you just don’t win if you don’t have discipline. It never works out.”

Next weekend in front of a raucous home crowd, Doug Partridge will see if it does work out, once more for the first time. donniep@nl.rogers.com

Is there any leadership at HNL? From page 29 and girls aged seven or eight. Read that line again before I tell you the story.

At O’Hehir Arena recently, Northeast played Avalon in a novice select exhibition. Avalon lost, and as it was relayed to me, the father of one Avalon player walked on the ice and picked up his boy. Most parents thought the kid was sick and just being helped off.

But the father took the kid, planked him down on a set of steps just off the ice, and took the boy’s stick out of his hands, and promptly cracked it, before slamming the pieces into a nearby garbage can, all the while in an animated one-sided ‘discussion’ with the kid.

(As an aside, if this maniac does this with his child in public, can you imagine how he acts in the sanctity of his own home? That’s scary!)

Other parents looked on in shock and disbelief, so much that nobody apparently said anything; but then, what would you say to a lunatic? (Note to said lunatic: you are the reason hockey parents have a bad name. Note to other parents: Next time you see this man,

tell him so. He deserves to be chastised for his actions.)

Sadly, this madman is not alone. In Central Newfoundland, a junior team tried to physically intimidate a midget team in an exhibition game. It got so bad, the midget coach pulled his team off the ice, fearing for the safety of his players. And the coach got suspended!

(He’s since been reinstated.)

How about the Port aux Basques coach of a female team who took his team off the ice after the referee became aggressive? The referee! This coach, too, was admonished, but ultimately absolved.

Is there any leadership at HNL? Current chairman Gerry Evans and minor chair Marilyn Dawe need to stand up and make a statement that this sort of behaviour will not be tolerated.

The crazy dad who carried his son off the ice should be barred from arenas everywhere. He shouldn’t be allowed on the ice. He should lose the right to even be in the arena.

Perhaps then, the boy can play the game for fun. donniep@nl.rogers.com

MARCH 2, 2007

INDEPENDENTSPORTS • 31

‘I made a mistake,’ says McCabe

By Rosie DiManno Torstar wire service

F

or those wondering, it does matter and it does hurt, a blast of boos.

Bryan McCabe took a pounding Feb. 28, his ears full of jeers, the punching bag de jour for a most putrid performance by the Toronto Maple Leafs, target for all that displeased and disgruntled the hometown crowd in a 6-1 loss to the Buffalo Sabres.

The defenceman stood by his locker afterwards, holding up a hand to delay proceedings until the full media scrum had been assembled “so I don’t have to go through this twice.”

Other Leafs in the past have been similarly subjected to caterwauling, some of them ridden out of town on a crescendo of heckling, from Larry Murphy to Aki Berg in recent memory.

McCabe isn’t going anywhere, though a fitful night’s sleep likely lay ahead.

Some athletes pretend they can’t hear it, as if deafened to mockery.

McCabe won’t pretend.

“It’s kind of hard to block that out,” he noted, of the sheer intensity of cascading raspberries every time he touched the puck in the third period, when any notion of a Toronto comeback was soundly dispelled.

“But that’s Toronto for you. It seems like there’s always someone, every year.

It’s the first it’s ever really happened to me. What can you do? Just play through it. I’ll be better next game.”

It would be difficult to be worse, as McCabe acknowledged.

Some nights, the misplays don’t matter much; other nights, they resonate and become amplified.

“I’m a guy who works my ass off every night. I made a mistake. Hockey’s a game of mistakes. My teammates know what I do for them and that’s all that matters to me.”

Still, stiff upper lip and all, he was clearly rattled.

“I made a mistake on the third goal.

That’s the way it goes. There are a hundred mistakes out there a night.”

Might it have been, McCabe was asked, to some extent at least, a public commentary on the massive $28.5 million (U.S.) contract he scored from GM John Ferguson Jr.?

Given all that dough, he is expected to show he’s worthy of it, without lapses.

“I have no idea. I don’t know what they think. They pay their money, they can do whatever they want.”

Leafs coach Paul Maurice was among those who stressed that this lopsided loss could hardly be laid at the feet of one player.

McCabe’s turnover was flagrant, yet there were three Leafs standing around uselessly in the slot when Derek Roy took the shot.

“On the play that started it, there’s five other players on the ice, four of them not in great position to help him off the turnover.”

Maurice was confident that McCabe would shake it off.

“I think he’s a pretty strong-minded lad. He’s been here long enough to know that’s going to happen in a 6-1 game, that somebody is going to be booed.

“Over the course of his career here, he’s heard a lot more cheers than he has boos. But it can’t be easy for him to hear it, or anybody on the bench to hear it. It’s a team sport.”

Captain Mats Sundin, looking particularly glum — he’s been in a sour mood of late — came strongly to his teammate’s defence, reminding that McCabe has been the Leafs’ pre-eminent rearguard in recent years.

“We’re all good friends in here. He knows that we’re behind him and we support him. He knows that there’s nothing he has done to put himself in the position that he’s in.’’

Twelve years in Toronto, Sundin pointed out, he’s heard his own fair share of boos.

Doesn’t make it any easier to tolerate.

“Hearing that ... it’s tough. That’s frustrating. The fans are as frustrated as we are on the ice. So that’s their way of showing their frustration. And you can’t blame them when we’re losing 6-1.’’

Said McCabe: “It wasn’t my night.’’

Ditto for them all.

Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Victor Zambrano throws batting practice at the Blue Jays baseball spring training facility in Dunedin, Florida, Feb. 24, 2007.

Mike Cassese/Reuters

Pitching? News is good Zambrano healing very quickly from elbow surgery, as Thomson tweaks throwing motion DUNEDIN, FLA

By Cathal Kelly Torstar wire service

P

itchers Victor Zambrano and John Thomson, two of the Jays’ off-season gambles, faced batters for the first time Feb. 27.

Zambrano was looking to assess the state of his recovering elbow. Thomson was tinkering with his delivery. Both experiments seem to have been a success.

Zambrano is nine months into the healing process after Tommy John surgery on his right elbow. It’s generally expected that players require a full year to recover from the radical reconstruction named for the former big leaguer who was the first to receive it.

This is the second such surgery in Zambrano’s career — the first came in 1996. The list of pitchers who’ve thrived after two Tommy Johns is short, although it does include Jays middle reliever Jason Frasor.

After signing him as a free agent, the club initially projected Zambrano would be ready by mid-season. Three weeks ago, GM J.P. Ricciardi said the pace of the former New York Mets recovery might make him available by May. While declining to speculate on dates, Zambrano was clearly counting in weeks, rather than months.

“I’m feeling pretty good, so I think I’m really close,” the 31-year-old Venezuelan said after the second of two intrasquad games yesterday.

“We’re approaching it like it’s a normal spring training for him,” manager John Gibbons said of the quicker-than-expected recovery. “There are no limitations.”

May still seems to be the projected time for the right-hander, “but it could be sooner,” Gibbons said.

The club’s decision will depend on how Zambrano performs through the rest of spring training, especially how well he handles fatigue.

He showed zip and control with his fastball and threw his breaking pitch to batters for the first time since going under the knife. Zambrano struck out two and surrendered one home run in an inning’s work.

“To be healthy is what matters now,” Zambrano said on the short walk back to the clubhouse. “I used all my pitches so it’s going well.”

Since this is the not the first time he’s come back from ligament replacement, Gibbons is counting on the veteran pitcher to assess his own readiness.

“You’ve gotta trust him,” Gibbons said.

Whenever he does join the team, Zambrano will initially be used out of the bullpen. Eventually, he

will compete for a starting spot with Thomson and another free-agent veteran recovering from injury, Tomo Ohka.

For Thomson, it was his first intrasquad game in a 14-year career.

“This is different. It’s good,” he said. “I got to get out there and see a hitter before a game.”

His performance — a very positive three up, three down with one strikeout — was not as important as a change Thomson is making to his pitching motion.

“I’ve quit going over my head (on the windup),” Thomson said. “I was getting a little bit long.”

Instead, he now hitches slightly to the side, giving him the advantage of a shorter delivery. After conferring with pitching coach Brad Arnsberg after

the outing, Thomson judged the change a success so far.

Like Zambrano (a career 45-41), Thomson has been an impact player in the majors. In his most recent healthy season, 2004, he went 14-8 for the Atlanta Braves. Since then a series of injuries — including blisters, shoulder inflammation and an unusual finger break — have hampered him.

His contract, an initial $500,000 (U.S.) rising to $1.5 million if he makes the opening day roster, contains incentives. Though nobody’s taken him aside here in Florida, Thomson said he is working under the impression that a starting job is his to lose.

“That’s the reason I signed here,” Thomson said.

“They said I was going to be in the rotation.”

INDEPENDENTCLASSIFIED FRIDAY THROUGH THURSDAY, MARCH 2-8, 2007 — PAGE 32

FEATURED HOME 30 COLLINGWOOD CRESCENT

Photos by Gillian Fisher/The Independent

Southcott Estates

Leslie-Ann Stephenson

Gillian Fisher

Welcome to 30 Collingwood Crescent, located in prestigious Admiralty Wood subdivision in Mount Pearl. This is absolutely one of the finest homes on a half-acre lot in the city and is ranked in the Top 5 houses in Mount Pearl. This-6-year old home was built with an amazing attention paid to functional design and details upon finishing and features 5 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, Living room, dining room, and family room with propane fireplace and custom mantle. It also boasts a fully developed basement with a wet bar, dance floor, and bathroom; 9-foot ceilings on the main level; 7 Zone hot water radiation heat system with in-floor heating in foyer, kitchen, and family room; and a custom designed kitchen with maple cabinets and hard surface custom designed counter tops. The master bedroom features a full ensuite with a claw-foot tub, walk in closet with mahogany stained shelving for organizing your wardrobe, and a propane fireplace. With Hardwood and ceramic tile throughout the main level and 2nd floor, and a grand dark wood staircase upon entry you will realize what a delight coming home to 30 Collingwood Crescent would be. For more information on this Mount Pearl gem please contact Richard Kennedy of Coldwell Banker Hanlon at 682 6943 or online at www.newhomesnf.com.