October 3, 2011 by The Ubyssey

October 3, 2011 | VOL. XCIII ISS. IX

Tattoo makeouts SINCE 1918

ERROR SCUTTLES GAZA TRANSFER An admistrative mistake meant that the controversial $700 never made it into SPHR coffers. Find out why. P3

VIFF IN REVIEW P11

THE UBYSSEY

BRO P8 GILL FOR GOLD

A firsthand account about adoption from the Downtown Eastside.

MARK BURNHAM/THE PEAK

LOCKED OUT

Barrie O’Neill, president of CUPE BC,. spoke at a rally on September 13 against the SFSS. CUPE 3338 has been locked out for 85 days after negotiations broke

Arshy Mann

Managing Editor, Web

More than two months after the Simon Fraser Student Society (SFSS) locked out its unionized staff, the atmosphere between the two remain as tense as ever. “As people learn what’s going on, it’s absolutely dividing the community,” said Richard Overgaard, national communications representative for CUPE, which represents the 15 locked out workers. The lock-out began on July 10, after the SFSS walked away from negotiations that had been happening intermittently since the collective bargaining agreement expired in 2009.

“There [wasn’t] much incentive for the union to bargain because they have such a favourable collective agreement,” said SFSS President Jeff McCann. “Negotiations had completely stalled, and the board said...there need to be changes because we’re in an [$800,000] fiscal deficit.” Since then, the gulf between workers and management has remained as wide as when the dispute began, with both sides arguing that they are looking out for student interest. The two main sticking points between the union and the SFSS are wages for new workers and the number of permanent employees. The SFSS is looking to lower wages for new hires while maintaining previous agreements for current workers, which the union argues

would put a large divide between future and current employees. The second point of contention is that the society wants to cut down the number of fulltime positions currently stipulated in the collective agreement. “Of course the membership sees that as an attack on their job security,” said Overgaard. However, McCann believes that if the society doesn’t start spending less on salaries for its workers, the SFSS will have to continue to cut services for students. According to McCann, staff salaries make up 54 per cent of the society’s budget, with the average employee being paid $30.48 per hour. Cont’d on P4

2 | Page 2 | 10.03.2011

What’s on 3

This week, may we suggest...

MON

Our Campus

One on one with the people who make UBC

CITR >>

CiTR Radio Volunteer Orientation: 6:30-7:30pm @ CiTR offices

Every first Monday of the month, CiTR holds an orientation for people interested in getting on the air, DJing events or writing for Discorder. Stop by to check out their massive record collection and see the radio magic happen live.

TUE

PIT >>

WED

AC>> JOSH CURRAN/ THE UBYSSEY

Copyright in the Classroom Seminar: 1:30-3pm @ IKB Hey faculty! You should probably attend this seminar so you know how to avoid being thrown in jail for contravening copyright laws. Steve Aoki: 9pm-1am @ the Pit Pub Holy shit! Facebook says that over 800 people plan to attend the influential electro producer’s concert at the Pit Pub. Clearly, we will finally see the Pit in its final form, in which it transforms into a multitiered mega club with a foam room, seven bars and a state of the art sound system. We’re excited for this long overdue boost to the campus club scene. Thanks, Mr. Aoki!

FRI

THU

MUSIC >>

UBC Symphony Orchestra: 8pm @ the Chan Centre Stop by the Chan box office at noon for free tickets to the evening’s performance! Class up a bit after the shameful things that are bound to happen at the Steve Aoki show.

HOCKEY>> Men’s hockey vs. Calgary: 7pm @ Winter Sports Centre The Thunderbirds have had a rocky past couple of seasons, but based on pre-season games, UBC may actually have a chance of winning some games this year. Check out the first game of the season against Calgary.

Got an event you’d like to see on this page? Send your event and your best pitch to printeditor@ubyssey.ca.

THE UBYSSEY October 3, 2011, Volume XXXIII, Issue IX

EDITORIAL

Coordinating Editor Justin McElroy

coordinating@ubyssey.ca

Managing Editor, Print Jonny Wakefield printeditor@ubyssey.ca

Managing Editor, Web Arshy Mann webeditor@ubyssey.ca

News Editors Kalyeena Makortoff & Micki Cowan news@ubyssey.ca

Art Director Geoff Lister

art@ubyssey.ca

Culture Editor Ginny Monaco

Copy Editor Karina Palmitesta

CONTACT

copy@ubyssey.ca

Business Office: Room 23 Editorial Office: Room 24 Student Union Building 6138 Student Union Blvd Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z1 tel: 604.822.2301 web: www.ubyssey.ca

Video Editor David Marino

video@ubyssey.ca

Senior Web Writer Andrew Bates abates@ubyssey.ca

webmaster@ubyssey.ca

BUSINESS

Senior Culture Writers Taylor Loren & Will Johnson

Ad Sales Ben Chen

business@ubyssey.ca

tloren@ubyssey.ca wjohnson@ubyssey.ca

advertising@ubyssey.ca

Sports Editor Drake Fenton

Andrew Hood, Bryce Warnes, Catherine Guan, David Elop, Jon Chiang, Josh Curran, Will McDonald, Tara Martellaro, Virginie Menard, Scott MacDonald, Anna Zoria

features@ubyssey.ca

Business Office:

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ijoel@ubyssey.ca

Webmaster Jeff Blake

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culture@ubyssey.ca

Features Editor Brian Platt

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STAFF

LEGAL

The Ubyssey is the official student newspaper of the University of British Columbia. It is published every Monday and Thursday by The Ubyssey Publications Society. We are an autonomous, democratically run student organization, and all students are encouraged to participate. Editorials are chosen and written by the Ubyssey staff. They are the expressed opinion of the staff, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Ubyssey Publications Society or the University of British Columbia. All editorial content appearing in The Ubyssey is the property of The Ubyssey Publications Society. Stories, opinions, photographs and artwork contained herein cannot be reproduced without the expressed, written permission of The Ubyssey Publications Society. The Ubyssey is a founding member of Canadian University Press (CUP) and adheres to CUP’s guiding principles. Letters to the editor must be under 300 words. Please include your

phone number, student number and signature (not for publication) as well as your year and faculty with all submissions. ID will be checked when submissions are dropped off at the editorial office of The Ubyssey; otherwise verification will be done by phone. The Ubyssey reserves the right to edit submissions for length and clarity. All letters must be received by 12 noon the day before intended publication. Letters received after this point will be published in the following issue unless there is an urgent time restriction or other matter deemed relevant by the Ubyssey staff. It is agreed by all persons placing display or classified advertising that if the Ubyssey Publications Society fails to publish an advertisement or if an error in the ad occurs the liability of the UPS will not be greater than the price paid for the ad. The UPS shall not be responsible for slight changes or typographical errors that do not lessen the value or the impact of the ad.

David Ng teaches biology in a way that the rest of us can understand.

David Ng: Science rules! Geoffrey Woollard Contributor

Trying to set up an interview with Dr David Ng was no easy feat. He sat like a praying mantis in his uber-ergonomic chair, reviewing his schedule on an elongated monitor twice as high as it was wide: “No, Thursday I’m teaching all day... I’m in every day at 7:30am and I teach at 9.” Eventually though, an interview was scheduled. Ng, a professor known for using Price Is Right-esque games to teach students about the cost of equipment, is the supervisor of the Advanced Molecular Biology Laboratory. It’s the education arm of Michael Smith Laboratories, the university’s biotechnology lab named after the former UBC professor who won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1993. Ng oversees programs that teach science to the general public. The longest running program in his lab is the molecular biology

workshops. One student review on the website called it a “well-oiled machine...[so] easy to follow, even an economist can do it!” In only a few minutes of speaking with him, Ng’s genuine interest in his projects became obvious. Joanne Fox, his next door neighbor and colleague, described his energy as a sort of “boyish fun: ‘that sounds cool, let’s do it!’” A project currently taking up Ng’s time is the Phylomon project. Started in response to a paper published in Science magazine that reported that kids knew much more about the creatures of the Pokémon universe than real life organisms, Ng is creating a game where children learn about real animals. He hopes the project, which can be seen at phylogame.org, will inspire others to make teaching science at a young age more accessible. “The reality is the most attractive thing to a kid is something that looks a little Pokémonish,” said Ng. “I’m hoping over time we can get some museums to step away and be

a little more risky.” While Ng said Phylomon hasn’t gone viral yet, he’s pleased with the progress that it’s made, with many artists and scientists contributing to the project. It’s just another example of the varied career Ng has made for himself while at UBC. “Over the years, I’ve been able to build a reputation of taking on unconventional projects...when I start things, the degree of success is all relative, because we don’t actually know what the degree of success should be.” U

David Ng Occupation Researcher, Michael Smith Labs On getting kids to learn about nature “The reality is the most attractive thing to a kid is something that looks a little Pokémonish.”

News

10.03.2011 |

Editors: Kalyeena Makortoff & Micki Cowan

AMS SECURITY >>

AMS Security votes to unionize, but switches to COPE378 Dominic Lai Contributor

AMS Security has voted in favour of unionizing, but it won’t be through United Food and Commercial Workers 1518 (UFCW1518) as expected. Instead, they’ll be negotiating through the Canadian Office and Professional Workers Union (COPE378). Andy Neufeld of UFCW1518 explained the switch. “We felt it made more sense for the members to belong to a union that was

already established at UBC, and especially adjacent to where they work already,” he said. COPE378 is the union that represents staff at the AMS. The union also represents employees from BC Hydro, the Insurance Corporation of BC, Capilano University, TransLink, Coast Mountain Bus and Terasen. “We talked with the members about that and they were in agreement, [and] COPE 378 was in agreement, so it’s just in the process now of driving that forward,”

said Neufeld. AMS Security officer Irfan Reayat said he fears AMS Security will be penalized for successfully unionizing. He said that a number of steps taken by the AMS “indicates that the AMS management is least interested in addressing the real issues, but more inclined to punish the security department for their decision to get unionized. “In the end, I am satisfied with the election results, but anticipate retaliatory actions from the AMS management towards me and the

rest of the security department that can include the replacement of some of the employees in the department,” he said. Once the switch-over is complete, negotiations on pay and benefits between the AMS and the union will begin. “We’re now moving into a period of collective bargaining, so that’s all we can really say at this point,” said AMS President Jeremy McElroy. “When an agreement has been made between the two organizations, that

agreement will be made public… We’ll be able to comment further at that point.” Reayat sees the possibility of things becoming more positive following negotiations. “Notwithstanding the current circumstance, it is also a good opportunity for them to substantially improve the credibility of the AMS not only as a student organization, but also as a good employer,” he said. U —with files from Micki Cowan.

GAZAGATE >>

TECHNOLOGY >>

Jonny Wakefield

Navigating Pacific Spirit Park—on your iPhone

Gaza transfer stalled due to accounting “mishap” Managing Editor, Print

Last year’s contentious money transfer from an AMS resource group was discovered to have never gone through. Last January, the AMS Social Justice Centre (SJC) was set to transfer $700 to the student club, Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR). The money would fund the Canada Boat to Gaza, an aid and protest flotilla. The SJC is a resource group which receives part of a $1.50 student fee paid by every UBC student. The transfer was first frozen by the AMS in November 2010 and caused over two months of debate before finally being approved. AMS VP Finance Elin Tayyar has called it an accounting mishap. While the actual donation came out of the SPHR accounts on April 20, 2011, records show that it was never funded by the SJC because the transfer never came through. “That’s very interesting,” said Omar Chabaan, the president of the SPHR. “We did not know about that.” Chabaan said that the SPHR did change treasurers in the middle of the term, so that could be why it was missed. Arielle Friedman, who was in charge of the SJC finances during this period, was also surprised to find out. “That’s terrible,” she said. “To my knowledge, it had gone through.” When asked how it went unnoticed, Friedman responded, “Seven hundred dollars is not a huge portion of our total budget.” After noting the issue last Wednesday, Tayyar sent out an email to councillors.

JOSH CURRAN/THE UBYSSEY

Keegan Landrigan Contributor

GEOFF LISTER/THE UBYSSEY

An AMS Council decision in December 2010 approved the $700 transfer, which, ten months later, has yet to go through.

“It has recently come to my attention that last year’s transfer of $700 from the SJC to SPHR was not actually processed due to an apparent mishap in the accounting procedure. This information was brought to my attention through a discussion regarding resource group budgets.” The donation was originally frozen in November, 2010. On November 25, then-AMS president Bijan Ahmadian tweeted that he called security to remove Chabaan from his office.

Campus was deluged with pamphlets and email campaigns as opposing sides argued over the donation. An AMS Council meeting on December 1 attracted hundreds of students to the Norm Theatre, where Council voted 26-10 in favour of approving the transfer. The transfer was then put on hold while an investigation was conducted as to whether it would violate any rules about donating to terrorist groups. Tayyar was instructed

to consult the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and Fintrac, a financial tracking organization that investigates money laundering and transfers to terrorist organizations. Eventually it was concluded that the donation did not violate any rules. On January 29, the transaction was finally approved by Council. Eight months later, the transfer may now actually go through. U

SUS election results

Provincial doctors program not producing

UBC launches fundraising campaign

UBC’s Northern Medical Program aspires to train doctors who will stay after graduation and serve communities in northern BC, where doctors are desperately needed. However, students accepted into the program are not obligated to practice family medicine in northern BC. The province has invested $100 million in the program since it began in 2004, as CBC pointed out in a recent article. Out of the first class of 24 graduates in 2008, only 12 chose to enter family medicine, and among those, only five have started a rural family practice in BC.

On September 28, UBC launched a $1.5 billion fundraising campaign with the goal of doubling the number of alumni engaged in the life of the university by 2015. In the planning years leading up to the campaign launch, the university raised $760 million towards the final goal. The number of alumni involved with UBC has increased by more than 50 per cent over the last three years. The university is aiming to double engagement to 50,000 alumni annually by the end of the campaign. The campaign, named Start an Evolution, is said to be the largest fundraising campaign in Canadian university history. U

—with files from Brian Platt.

News briefs Modern Green residential complex goes on sale Units at a new UBC residential complex called “Yu” have been designed to appeal to immigrant Chinese buyers. The building is being constructed by one of China’s largest property developers, Modern Green. Yu is said to be an extension of UBC’s “living laboratory” initiative, in terms of its sustainability developments. Opening by the end of 2012, prices for the 106 units start at about $450,000. In 2010, Modern Green donated $3.5 million towards research by UBC’s Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability.

The results of the UBC Science Undergraduate Society’s 2011 fall election have been tabulated. The four winners of the position of general officer, with a combined 49.5 per cent of the vote, are Vanilla Sun, Carmen Wong, Stella Fang and Divya Patel. Serena Ng and Justin Chang were each elected to be AMS representative, with 39 per cent of the vote each. Winning by six votes, Joyce Chang was elected for Coordinated Science Program representative. Out of 18 candidates, Arun Dhir and Cynthia Lam were elected as first-year representatives. Since only a single vote was cast in the Science One representative race, the results are yet to be announced.

Getting lost in Pacific Spirit Park might soon be a thing of the past. Metro Vancouver has released an app for the iPhone called iParks Navigator, which displays maps that track your position on trails using Geographical Information Systems servers and the iPhone’s location technology. iParks Navigator is the second parks app released by Metro Vancouver. First was iParks Explorer, which provided static general information about Metro Vancouver parks. “The response was really quite remarkable,” said Stephen Suddes, project leader for both apps and manager of Public Programs and Community Development at Metro Vancouver. “We probably got over 10,000 downloads of [iParks Explorer] in the last year.” Suddes said Navigator is important to sustainability. It means less dependence on printing brochures that are quickly out of date. Additional Navigator features include news about facilities, trails, nature and safety. It also provides access to photos and videos. “It can give a bit of a vicarious experience,” said Dawn Hanna, Visitor Services specialist for Metro Vancouver. “Basically it gives you a jumping off point for a lot of different ways to experience the park.” Because cell phone signals are weak in the backcountry, Metro Vancouver has disabled many Navigator features in parks such as Lynn Headwaters Regional Park. But iParks is a useful tool for parks that are close to civilization and have well-established trails like UBC-adjacent Pacific Spirit Park—the most heavily used park in Metro Vancouver at 1.3 million visits a year. U

4 | News | 10.03.2011 SFU LOCKOUT >>

Student union staff lock-out continues at SFU

As CUPE members and SFSS clash, cross-campus divisions deepen Cont’d from P1 “We recognize that we want to reach a fair agreement, but there’s been cuts and cuts and cuts to the budget, and we need to put a stop to that,” he said. “Our constitution says that we’re supposed to organize events for students, we’re supposed to represent students and we’re supposed to advocate for students, and that’s exactly what we intend to do. It doesn’t say that we should employ people at all costs.” However, Maria Persdotter, SFSS member and SFU undergraduate student, said students should have had a chance to give input. “As a student here at SFU and a member of the SFSS, I’m deeply insulted that I was never consulted on this. The lock-out started in the middle of the summer when most students were not in school, which gave the student body very little opportunity to respond to the lockout,” she said. “I definitely understand the lock-out as [an] ideologically motivated attack on workers and on the union.”

Service cuts “It’s not just hurting workers, it’s hurting our ability to access essential services,” said Persdotter. CUPE said that as long as the lock-out continues, students will be

The lounge space for both centres remains open—although students would have to cross the picket line to access them—but staff services are no longer being provided there.

Without an end in sight

CUPE workers are still locked out after months of intermittent negotiations with the SFSS.

deprived of many of the society’s services, including the copy centre, the Women’s Centre and Out On Campus, the SFSS’s LGBTQ support centre. “They do a lot of advocacy work, peer support and in some circumstances, even crisis support,” said Overgaard of the two support centres. “So for example, if a student

were in crisis, they would have a safe space and a support network to tap into. “And because of the lock-out, the trained staff who run these centres aren’t available to students. And I think it has had a significant impact on both women who need a safe place and a peer support network they don’t have and also to GLBTQ

GEOFF LISTER PHOTO/THE UBYSSEY

students at SFU who, some of them might be in the closet and some of them might be out but not very supported at home, and that was just a safe space for them.” However, McCann said that the board of directors has been forced to make cuts to the programming for both centres in the past few years due to budgetary concerns.

Both sides claim that they want the lock-out to end, but no end appears to be in sight. The SFSS said that they’re waiting for a counter from the union on an offer that was made by the board on September 1, but was rejected by the CUPE membership. “As far as I’m concerned, the ball’s in their court,” said McCann. “I had contacted one of their national representatives and they said that they were crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s. “They’ve said that they have a counter just sitting there and they’re not willing to give it to us.” Overgaard maintained that the union won’t present a counter until the SFSS ends the lock-out. “What the union has said to the board is that we cannot negotiate with the members locked out, because all they do is wave a proposal at the members, who are under duress, who are sitting on the picket line with no wages. So what we have told the board is that we will absolutely bargain and present counter offers, but get these people back to work; end the lockout.” U

10.03.2011 | News | 5 STUDENT SPACE >>

Campus space for commuter students, but for a price Micki Cowan News Editor

UBC is exploring the idea of building a series of customized student spaces called collegia in order to to reduce the disconnect from campus that some commuter students feel. However, it may be limited to those who can pay the price. “[A collegium] would provide them a home away from home, a lounge space, where they begin to be part of a community of people outside the classes,” said Janet Teasdale, senior director of Student Development and Services. “We think it will make a tremendous difference in the sense of belonging and sense of affiliation and ultimately the sense of student success for students at UBC.” While still in the early stages of development, only two collegia have been approved so far, one in each phase of the Ponderosa Commons building project. Each collegium would have 300400 student memberships. While the fee is yet to be determined, AMS VP Academic Matt Parson, who has been part of the initial planning stages, said it may be around $75 per month. Students with membership to a particular collegium would benefit from amenities such as assured seating, a microwave to warm their lunch or a place to play a game of cards. The model for UBC’s collegia comes from the successful

implementation of collegia at Trinity Western and UBC Okanagan. While Trinity Western does charge a membership fee, UBC Okanagan does not. Teasdale said that a fee is necessary at UBC Vancouver to assist with the operational costs, which include a student concierge to answer questions. On the price, Parson said, “You’ve got to find the balance between being accessible and affordable, and operationally neutral on the budget. If it is restricted membership, is it fair that only those 300 people are creating a cost that’s being subsidized by other students?” But Parson said it’s an initiative worth exploring, considering the under-served commuter student population. “There is data supporting that they are the least involved, there’s a lot of problems with them not being able to find a sense of community [or] feeling like you’re a number within this huge campus of UBC,” he said. “There’s a whole host of things like mental health issues that are trying to tag along to those types of problems when people don’t feel any sense of belonging at university.” There will be limited spaces, and how membership will be decided is yet to be determined. “Ultimately the goal isn’t to create an upper echelon where it’s selective of the students that can and can not get into collegia,” said Parson. “The goal is to be able to provide enough spots for all students that would want that.”

Commuter students who could foot the bill for the collegia would have a lounge space for studying and relaxing.

The question of access was brought up when Teasdale presented the idea of collegia to AMS Council on September 28. Jamie Paris, the Graduate Student Society representative to the AMS, asked if there would be scholarships available for students who couldn’t afford to pay the fee. But as the model is still in its initial planning stages, the question

could not be answered directly. Dalaina Helberg, a UBC student whose commute is an hour and a half from Commercial Drive, said she sees merit in the general idea of collegia. Due to her long commute, she is not as involved in campus as she might be. “I think it’s a good idea, I just don’t know what price I could justify going into it...$70 per month

INDIANA JOEL/THE UBYSSEY

even would be too much. I would certainly make use of it if it was free.” For UBC Vancouver, free collegia are not in the current plans. “A user-pay model where the student contributes some funding to the operation of the space is because they’re going to directly benefit from the space,” said Teasdale. “And not everyone will.” U

Sports

10.03.2011 |

Editor: Drake Fenton

T-Bird Standings Football Calgary Sask. UBC Manitoba Regina Alberta

5 3 3 2 2 0

0 2 2 3 3 5

Soccer (M) W L 1 2 2 3 2 3 6 7

2 1 2 1 3 2 1 0

Soccer (W) W L

UBC TWU Victoria Calgary Alberta Sask. Fraser Valley Lethbridge TWU Alberta UBC Calgary Victoria Sask. Fraser Valley Manitoba Lethbridge Regina

Rugby (W)

MICHAEL THIBAULT/THE UBYSSEY

Lethbridge Calgary Alberta UBC Victoria

4 4 4 4 3 3 1 1

6 6 5 4 4 4 3 2 0 0

1 2 1 2 2 3 3 6 7 7

0 0 1 2 2 1 2 0 1 1

3 2 2 0 0

0 1 3 3 3

The UBC women’s rugby team was defeated by the University of Calgary 34-10 last Friday. UBC must win their next game against the University of Victoria to make the playoffs.

Up and down weekend for T-Birds at home WOMEN’S RUGBY: CALGARY 34, UBC 10 On Friday afternoon at Wolfson Field, the University of Calgary women’s rugby team picked up their first-ever win in CIS competition, defeating UBC 34-10. The loss was a heartbreaker for the Thunderbirds, leaving the team with an 0-3 record and putting their chances of making the playoffs in jeopardy. This defeat was not the pummelling UBC suffered against the conference’s two dominant powerhouses last weekend. This was a close game and the outcome was determined by two brief lapses in an otherwise strong performance— lapses during which Calgary scored four tries. Calgary added to an early penalty score with two tries in three minutes. Jodie Hicks and Lizzie MacKinnon scored in the 13th and 15th minute respectively, making the score 15-0 for Calgary. UBC was able to respond in the 31st minute, with a try by flanker Paniz Pahlavanlu. In the second half, Calgary stormed out of the gate once again, with two quick tries from Brynna Walker and Katherine Procyshyn, making the score 27-5 in Calgary’s favour. UBC put the pressure on and attempted to mount a comeback, but Calgary responded well and Kayla Lissel broke past UBC’s defence on the right wing to make the score 34-5. With the score out of reach, UBC kept up its determined play, exemplified by scrum half Megan Hamm. While orchestrating the back line,

Hamm constantly worried Calgary’s defence. In the 66th minute, she scored UBC’s second try of the match—all the while playing with a broken nose. Unfortunately Calgary was able to absorb the pressure and successfully defended their lead for the 13 remaining minutes. UBC head coach Lesley McKenzie said her team lacked mental toughness and believed that would change with time. “I’m upset with the way they played, because they’re better than the way they’ve been playing,” she said. McKenzie was pleased that the team put together good stretches of play, but said the team has a problem with consistency. “The decisions that we make in certain areas of the field are doing us a disservice in terms of our overall play. We’re a bit naive in pressure situations and that will come with time but right now, unfortunately, they’re learning the hard way.” In order for the ‘Birds to make the playoffs, they will have to beat the University of Victoria in a road game two weeks from now. The high stakes of that contest should be a motivating factor for the UBC players. With the benefit of a two-week break, McKenzie said the team will be up to the challenge. “I could point to every single person who was out there who did something positive. It’s going to be a challenge for these guys to pick themselves up mentally. But there were some really awesome things today I’m really encouraged by.” U —Colin Chia

MEN’S SOCCER: UBC 3, CALGARY 2 They had to fight for it, but they’re still undefeated. The UBC men’s soccer team fought back from a 2-0 deficit to defeat the University of Calgary Dinos 3-2 Saturday night at Thunderbird Park. “It feels great that we’ve come back from 2-0 down, so that’s the positive, but how we got to 2-0 down wasn’t very pretty,” said UBC head coach Mike Mosher. Calgary scored their first goal at the eight minute mark after Dinos defender Izak Lawrence rounded the T-Birds defence to Jeremy Jenkyns, who buried the ball in the back of the net. Seven minutes later, Lawrence was pulled down in the penalty area and picked up a goal. “It was quite unexpected to come out and be so poor to start the game today,” Mosher said. “We had to start connecting our passes. We were giving the ball away too easily early on.” But at 35 minutes, Sean Haley was able to jump on a spilled ball by Calgary keeper Colin Hasick, putting UBC on the board for the first time. “It was huge. They had momentum and sort of had us on our heels, but we needed to get something,” Mosher said. For the rest of the game, UBC climbed back into the contest, but found difficulty burying late in the first half and early in the second. At least four separate chances from Navid Mashinchi, Sean Haley and others missed the

ERIC INASI/THE UBYSSEY

UBC stormed back from a 2-0 deficit to remain undefeated in Canada West action.

net. “We know we’ve got enough firepower to score goals that we can get ourselves back in games,” Mosher said. The game turned when halftime substitute Kent O’Connor put the ball in on a fast-moving play, and Paul Clerc slotted off a corner to give UBC the lead. “The last one was the corner, and we’ve continued to work on those,” Mosher said. “We’ve got two goals off of set pieces yesterday, and we’ve got another one today. We’ve been good on set pieces.” The match, which had been physical, continued to get chippy as the game wound down, with three red cards given in the last 11 minutes. Calgary had 18 fouls to UBC’s 9. “I don’t know that it was

any more physical than any other game,” Mosher said. “It’s a competitive conference.” With 7 games gone in a 14game season, UBC now sits at the top of the table with 15 points, though 4 points separate first and sixth. Only one spot in the national championship is open for five of those teams, as third-place Victoria automatically qualifies as the host. “It’s good, but it’s halfway. That was the goal of this group, to go through the 14 game schedule without losing a game,” Mosher said. “We’re halfway there, and we probably had a few scary moments along the way, but it’s good.” U —Andrew Bates

10.03.2011 | Sports | 7 MEN’S SOCCER >>

FOOTBALL >>

COURTESY OF THE SHEAF

‘Birds blow half-time lead Drake Fenton Sports Editor

On Friday night at Griffiths Stadium in Saskatoon, the UBC Thunderbirds football team fell short in a 36-33 loss to the University of Saskatchewan Huskies. With 1:03 left in the fourth quarter, Huskies’ quarterback Jahlani Gilbert-Knorren rushed 15 yards for a touchdown to give Saskatchewan a decisive 36-26 lead. UBC managed to drive down the field on their ensuing possession, with Billy Greene rushing for a touchdown with four seconds left on the clock, but it was too little too late. “I don’t think we played especially well. Offensively we couldn’t get in sync the whole night [and] we were really inconsistent,” said UBC head coach Shawn Olson. “Defensively, I thought we played pretty well for three quarters and then the fourth quarter kind of fell apart.” Though UBC was inconsistent in their play, they were consistent statistically. As it has been all season, the offence put up huge numbers

JOSH CURRAN/THE UBYSSEY

One goal left for captain Gill Soccer captain hopes leadership will lead to national title Andrew Bates Senior Web Writer

He started playing soccer with older boys, but now fifth-year centreback Jason Gill is the one encouraging the young bucks. According to the UBC captain, there were jitters before the men’s soccer team’s 4-0 season-opening win against Victoria on September 9. “We had our young second-year centreback, and some other guys were antsy too,” he said. “I just told them, just look, it’s another game. Go out there, you can control what you can control.” Gill, an Abbotsford native, started playing when he was nine. “As a kid, I went to play a year up with the older guys,” he said. “Playing with them, I wasn’t really interested in going to university or anything, I was just thinking, ‘I’ll play until high school’s over.’” Coach Mike Mosher describes him as a reliable influence in the centre of UBC’s defence. “Jason’s been a key piece in our defending corps last year and the last several years,” he said. “If you look at the statistics for the last couple of years, we’ve had a very low

number of goals scored upon us.” The captain’s armband fell to Gill following the 2009 season. “I was kind of surprised, but it was obviously something to be proud of and I’ve just kind of went with it and got the guys’ respect, and it’s mutual,” he said. “It’s been a good thing going.” For Mosher, Gill’s attributes made him a clear choice. “He has character, integrity and he’s got the respect of his teammates. He’s a calm individual and he’s a calming influence on his team,” he said. “He’s a guy that I can trust and I can always go to as a coach. He’ll make the right decision at different times.” Gill tries to take that approach to the field. “I’m more of a finesse centreback; I’m composed...Every game pretty much means everything, so go out, do what you do, keep it simple, and nothing that you’re not able to do, and things will fall for you.” After university, Gill said he was unsure of his plans, citing a difficulty to make the professional leap as a Canadian player. “You’ve got to face adversity in those times,”

he said. “You’ve gotta be lucky too, which is huge. Just keep battling through and hopefully something comes your way.” But Gill, a political science student, thinks he’s picked up skills employers will want. “Employers will love that leadership role. Not only that, but I get the respect of my peers and I give them respect back. It’s just something nice to have.” Gill is happy with his five years at UBC, but has one more goal to accomplish. “It’s exciting to be here for the last year, but at the same time it’s almost the end, so just wanting to win, coming away with things,” he said. He was at the helm last year as the T-Birds lost 1-0 to York University in the national championship game, and there’s one word he uses to describe the experience: devastating. “We still talk about that to this day. Pregame, postgame, everything...Coming so close, just this bitter feeling in your mouth, you just want to get back at it, and that’s what we’ve been trying to do all summer and this season. “We just want to get back to nationals.” U

and the defence gave up big numbers against the run. Billy Greene rushed for 73 yards for 3 touchdowns, and passed for 382 yards, with 1 touchdown and 1 interception. His go-to receiver Jordan Grieve pulled in 10 catches for 115 yards. The Huskies rushing attack piled up 311 yards against UBC’s defence. With only 2:25 left in the fourth quarter, and UBC trailing 29-26, the Huskies drove down the field in 6 plays for 65 yards and a touchdown. Those six plays were five rushes and one incomplete pass. “I feel like we didn’t play well enough to deserve a win,” Olson said. “The big thing that let us down was our focus and that’s been our strength to this point. I kind of felt we just weren’t mentally focused through the whole [game].” UBC dropped to 3-2, while Saskatchewan improved to 3-2. Both teams are now tied for second place in the Canada West. UBC has a bye week coming up before facing the University of Regina on October 15 at Thunderbird Stadium. U

8 | Feature | 10.03.2011

Beautiful

Baby By Will Johnson

My little brother Tyler was a still lump under a pile of light baby blankets. He was six weeks old and weighed less than five pounds—about the same as a small cat. He lay motionless in his crib. Only his quiet, trembling breaths gave any indication that he was alive. Upstairs in the foster home, his three older siblings played on the floor of the bright living room while he slept in darkness.

stood in the bedroom doorway and looked at this tiny, alien human being. His pale features were unusually delicate, as though he were a porcelain doll. I wanted to cradle him gently, close to my chest, in case he broke. Tyler was born prematurely in the early morning of January 12, 1996. His mother, an addict from the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, was high on cocaine while she was in labour. Tyler was her fourth child in less than five years. All of her kids had been taken from her custody by the government. The doctors rescued Tyler from her body before she could do any more damage, before she could continue poisoning him with street drugs and despair. She never saw him, never held him, never knew him. By the time she woke up he was gone, hooked up to machines and being monitored by medical professionals. The first time I held Tyler in my arms, I was surprised by his moist warmth. He gazed up at me with sleepy blue eyes. I kissed him lightly on the forehead. He had been living with his older brother and two older sisters in a foster home in Ladner, BC since his birth. Their social workers had been struggling to place the kids, as they hoped to keep the four siblings together. My parents, already with their own four children, had originally been considering adopting a sibling group of two. But upon meeting Ashley, Cody, Amanda and Tyler, their plans instantly changed. They adopted all four. Tyler was ten months old when my family finalized the adoption. We brought him home to our house in Tsawwassen. He was a quiet, wide-eyed baby. With time his jowls started to round, his legs grew into doughy folds, his tiny fingers fattened. He would gum my pinkie finger and gurgle at the world around him. He had a burbling, innocent laugh. Tyler liked to toss food from his high chair, liked to smear goop into his white blond hair

and onto his face. He tried to form words. When he learned to walk, we would prop him up in our living room and send him toddling across the floor to a family member’s outstretched hands. We have pictures of his first steps, his hands reaching out as he wobbles across the carpet in his baby blue jumper.

Tyler was, without a doubt, the baby of the

family. Everyone doted on him, fought over him, competed for his attention. But though he found a comfortable perch on his older siblings’ hips and often fell asleep on my dad’s chest, he also liked to wander around the house alone. He crawled onto counters to prepare his own cereal and learned how to use my dad’s stereo system, making a mess of our CD collection in the process. It was a lazy afternoon and Tyler had been crawling around the house for a few hours while the rest of the family did chores and watched TV. He was two years old. No one noticed him crawl into my sister’s room, lug himself onto a chair and reach up for the windowsill. He looked out at our front yard. Then, as he tried to pull himself higher, he lost his balance and toppled out of the second-storey window. Tyler’s wail was a familiar sound in our house. At first, no one took special notice. “Where’s Tyler?” someone asked. My sisters, my parents, everyone ran up and down the hallways trying to find the source of his screams. We searched from room to room, but he was nowhere to be seen. Finally, one of my sisters found him tangled upside down in our front yard hedge, just below the window. My Dad reached down, searched around and grasped Tyler by the ankle. He lifted Tyler back inside.

I loved being an older brother. I loaded Tyler into a little blue trailer behind my bicycle,

along with his older brother Cody. I strapped them into their seats, with one of them facing backwards while the other watched me struggle to pump them up hills. We would coast through the lush suburban streets, down to the Dairy Queen across town. We sat in the grass and ate dilly bars, or bought candy from 7-11. I biked them to Centennial Beach, sweat soaking through the back of my T-shirt. Then came training wheels. My parents had to buy new bikes every year or two as the boys grew. When they were old enough we cruised around the streets together, exploring hiking trails in the woods and the endless cul-de-sacs and side streets, many crowded with sprawling mansions. Both the boys started to learn how to do wheelies or ride without hands, cutting through parks and hurling their bikes off jumps. Pretty soon they were both more comfortable on their bikes than I ever was. Tyler is such a product of the Tsawwassen suburbs, it’s hard for me to imagine the life he almost lived—maybe bouncing around foster homes or ending up on the back alleys of Vancouver. When I see homeless teenagers, I wonder if that might be what Tyler would look like if the Ministry of Children and Families hadn’t taken him into their custody. He’s never known poverty or hunger. He’s never had to deal with abusive and neglectful parents. His older siblings, Ashley and Cody, lived with their birth parents for the first few years of their lives, but both Amanda and Tyler were taken away at birth. Tyler doesn’t know any other life. Tyler inherited my penchant for dangerous outdoor sports. He is always looking for that adrenaline kick, whether he’s cliff jumping or swimming through rapids. Our backyard trampoline was one his favourite spots to play. He loved to put the sprinkler on during humid summer days, then run and bounce through the spray. The kids would

10.03.2011 | Feature

crowd on the tramp to play “crack the egg” or to attempt new tricks. Tyler got bounced clear off one evening and landed on his head, breaking his collarbone. My sister Kathryn cradled him in her arms, but he never cried— he just turned pale and gazed up at the sky with glassy, distant eyes.

These days, Tyler likes to play video games

in his bedroom or drive out to Surrey to visit his girlfriend, Brooke. He hangs out at the mall and plays soccer with his friends. He’s the goalie, and late into the evening he’ll be playing at Winskill Park in Tsawwassen, blocking shots and booting the ball back into the field after a save. A couple years ago, he flew to California for a soccer camp and got to meet David Beckham. He keeps his hair long, sticking out in every direction from under his $50 baseball cap. Our family headed up to Davis Lake, a remote camping spot in the BC Interior, during the summer of 2009. My uncle took the boys fishing, while we lazed around in our tents, read books and went for long leisurely swims. I’d moved to Victoria for university a few years earlier, so the few days with my family were a welcome break. Tyler had grown lanky and athletic, his 13-year-old body starting to pick up the normal muscular armour of adolescence. His soft voice was getting gravelly. I was surprised to find he could keep up with me when we swam across the lake. He didn’t need me anymore. I took pictures of my brothers while they swung over the water on two rope swings suspended from a looming tree branch. After getting bored of solo jumps, the boys decided

to swing together. Tyler would jump off the platform with Cody following close behind. They swooped over the water and let go, trying to flail into creative poses for the camera. They successfully completed their tandem jumps a couple times, and I have pictures of them suspended miraculously in mid-air, just before they plopped into the lake. In one photo, Tyler smiles excitedly, his eyes bulged, his hat swiveled sideways on his head. The sun illuminates the smooth surface of the water as a swathe of evergreen trees reaches out behind him. Cody is suspended above him, his back to the camera, falling in Tyler’s direction. On the fourth or fifth attempt, the boys decided to switch the order. While Cody jumped first, Tyler followed close behind. The tree creaked as the ropes pulled tight and my brothers flew away from me. Cody reached the apex of the swing, but hesitated a moment before letting go. Tyler came rushing up behind him and crashed into his back. While Cody plummeted into the water, Tyler forgot to let go. I watched, the camera still up to my eye, as Tyler swung back towards the unforgiving bark of the tree. There wasn’t enough time to panic, to yell, to do anything. With a sickening “thwunk,” he crashed into the trunk and crumpled into the shallow water below. Curled in the fetal position half-submerged, surrounded by the murky tendrils of the tree roots, he didn’t move. Cody scooped Tyler from the water, held his limp body in his arms, tried to get him to wake up. Tyler’s mouth hung open, his head lolling to one side. His eyes were closed. “Tyler, Tyler. Can you hear me?” His eyes fluttered open after about 20 seconds. Cody and I squatted in the shallows, our hands holding Tyler’s little body.

I was only afraid for a moment. I asked him to move his arms, his legs. I wanted to make sure he hadn’t broken his spine. He seemed sleepy and drugged, mumbling and dazed, but he was okay. Swinging my camera around my back, I hauled Tyler up in my arms and cradled him like he was a baby again. I felt his warm, sunbaked skin against mine. His head slumped against my neck, his wet hair dripped down my chest. I whispered in his ear, “Don’t worry, you’re okay. I’ve got you, Tyler. I’ve got you.” U

Will Johnson is a Vancouver writer and a regular columnist for The Ubyssey. To read more about his adopted family, check out Somebody’s Child, a non-fiction anthology published by Touchwood Editions in September 2011.

Culture

10.03.2011 |

Editor: Ginny Monaco

MUSIC >>

UBC rockers 41st and Home take it to the streets Peter Wojnar Contributor

COURTESY OF THE ARTIST

41st and Home gets in on the facepaint thing that’s currently popular with indie bands

The members of 41st and Home give new meaning to the term “garage band.” When UBC students Thom Kolb and Garth Covernton met at a guitar club event, Covernton told Kolb about the soundproofed, instrument-filled garage in his dad’s house. The roots of the band took hold and it quickly expanded to include pianist Patrick Fiore, a coworker of Kolb’s, violinist Sejal Lal and bassist George Knuff. Kolb assumed the singer/guitarist position while Covernton took to the drums. The band recorded and released their second album, Raised by Wolves, in the spring of 2011. The album is a more energetic work than their first effort, Left in Places, with more experimentation in rhythm and time. Though the powerful sounds of the album may sound as though they were recorded in a studio, Raised by Wolves is, true to form, a garage album. “We set up inside the garage and we thought we’d record demos in there and then try to get a label backing and go into a proper studio, but then the demos just turned into the album. We recorded everything in there,” said Kolb. George Knuff, the band’s

bassist, also moonlights as an audio engineer—so with some rented and borrowed equipment and a reading break, the band finished recording the album a little over a month after its conception. The band spent the past summer on tour with Behind Sapphire. Despite the fact that every member of the band got sick towards the end, making for physically and mentally exhausting shows, they report it as a success. “In the last show, we had a 15 minute intermission, which I spent dry heaving,” said Kolb. He added, “Now we know what the worst possible scenario for a show is, so that was good in some ways.” Back from the tour, the band began to think about a music video for the song “Gorbachev” off Raised by Wolves. “‘Gorbachev’ is a fun song, and so we wanted to make a fun video for it while maintaining a semiserious tone,” said Kolb. Hesitant to give away too many details, he added, “There are a lot of water balloons, a lot of water guns… a lot of water.” The band is currently a part of the Peak Performance Project, and will be playing a showcase on October 6 at the Redroom. They are also raising proceeds for the Orphan Wildlife Rehabilitation Society with a forthcoming remix EP and a few shows around campus. U

VIFF reviews The Skin I Live In

How to Die in Oregon

Ginny Monaco

Kayi Wong

Culture Editor

Contributor

Pedro Almodovar’s The Skin I Live In stars Antonio Banderas as Roberto Legard, a plastic surgeon obsessed with perfecting a synthetic skin, and Elena Anaya as Vera, the captive woman he experiments on. After losing his wife and daughter to a car accident and suicide, respectively, Legard retreats into his Toledo mansion–which happens to double as an operating room and Vera’s prison. The bulk of the story is one consecutive flashback, framed as a dream sequence and bookended with hokey title cards. Structurally, the reveal of Vera’s true identity is unsatisfying and expected. Vera’s intentions towards the end of the film are not expressly clear. Rather, the film flips between painting her as a helpless victim or a careful mastermind of an escape plot. The audience is inclined to believe the former, as the latter feels too obvious. When the film takes the turn it does, the viewer is left wanting. While the cinematography is technically flawless, the sterility of the the film’s overall aesthetic prevents the audience from truly connecting with virtually any of the characters. Skin’s most successful element is its treatment of gender, a familiar theme for Almodovar. The director also sticks to his trademark melodrama tropes— identity, betrayal, date rape, murder—which, while handled carefully, feel overused and drawn out.

Anyone who has watched How to Die in Oregon will tell you that it is an intense film, and you will need tissue paper. And they are right. The documentary is a collection of accounts from terminally ill patients in Oregon who have decided to set a date to “die with dignity.” Since Oregon voted to become the first US state to approve the “Death with Dignity Act” in 1994, at least 500 Oregonians have chosen physician-assisted death. The documentary revolves around cancer patients who decided on a more controlled and less excruciating departure from life. One of the things the film does well is break with the misconception that choosing physician-assisted death is an easy decision or an “easy way out.” How to Die in Oregon witnesses patients going in and out of that decision, and the difficulties of those who are not able to choose it. Oregon’s act only allows the mentally competent to make such decision, meaning the film is filled with quick-witted patients who continue to make jokes on their deathbed. Despite their determination and strength, the audience sees the excruciating pain the patients have to endure due to their illnesses. Director Peter Robertson nabbed the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for US Documentary, and rightly so. Somehow, Robertson was able to avoid any sense of exploitation or imposition and create a thoughtful portrait of this controversial topic. U

COURTESY OF VIFF

A scene from The Skin I Live In, starring Antonio Banderas.

Michael Scott MacDonald Contributor

In the unsettling Austrian drama, Michael, a young boy is held captive by a socially awkward insurance salesman. The relationship between the boy and his captor is explored through their interactions and an investigation of each of their lives while they’re apart. Initially it is very uncomfortable to see how the man interacts with his submissive young captive, but with time, the situation takes on a sense of normality. This is certainly one of the biggest strengths of the film. It draws the attention of the audience while making them feel uncomfortable and unsure of how to interpret the scenes. The film does not make any overt judgments on the

relationship between the boy and his captor; it simply leaves it up to the audience. This approach works very well. It is hard to imagine the film being able to evoke such a strong emotional response and capture the viewer so entirely if it were done in another way. Michael is, in many ways, extremely experimental. Dialogue is minimal; the majority of the film is silent and relies on visual and emotional cues to convey its story. This only makes it more unsettling and adds to the phenomenal atmosphere of tension and uncertainty that characterizes the film. The area in which Michael falls short is the plot itself. Punctuated by a series of events and interactions rather than an actual plot progression, the film occasionally leaves the viewer confused. Although this may have been deliberate, it detracts from the film as a whole.

FILM >>

A film only a fan could love

COURTESY OF MARK GALVANNI

Andrew Bates Web Writer

On a Saturday last month, fans lined up outside the Rio Theatre five hours early to buy tickets for a screening and Q&A session of a film described as “the Citizen Kane of bad movies.” How could you have planned for that? “Nobody predicted anything,” said Tommy Wiseau, the director of The Room , a 2003 film that’s a melodramatic romance or a dark comedy, depending on how you look at it. “It’s just, you know, I wanted people to see The Room , that’s about it.” The Room is among a number of films that can be described as “sobad-it’s-good”, a special niche within the arena of cult classic films—or films that were not commercially successful, yet attract a fanbase months or years after release. “It’s kind of like, I myself am special for liking this thing. This thing gives me my specialness,” said Ray Hsu, a UBC creative writing professor. “It’s not as if I enjoy this thing that’s really bad, that’s not the point. It’s the fact that I’m not bourgeois about it. I don’t simply like good things, anyone can like good things. “[It’s] the fact that I like bad things, and I know that they’re bad.” At the Olio Festival, The Room played in three separate screenings, and the theatre filled up in the afternoon to watch a “Masterclass in Filmmaking” with the film’s enigmatic director, writer and star. Audience participants were hauled onstage to make a barebones movie over a couple of hours, and they got to see the method that went into creating The Room. “Basically, you know, I’m a stage actor. The words are secondary, the chemistry’s much more important. Emotion is more important,” Wiseau said. “Some people don’t give us credit, but I don’t care, as long as the audience enjoy themself [sic], they can say whatever they want, you know, and that’s the idea behind [it]. Have fun with it, that’s part of entertainment.” But Hsu says that the answer isn’t that clear-cut, which is part of the film’s mystique. “There is no other answer that Tommy Wiseau could give you,” Hsu said. “Part of what’s really appealing about him is that you don’t know if he’s full of shit. You don’t know whether he’s a character, and constantly playing a character, or if he’s not. “It’s that kind of thing that can break, and it’s that sort of thing that actually is fundamental, I think, to a really good meme. You don’t know if it’s serious or not,” Hsu said. “It’s a bubble that you can never pop. We don’t know. We don’t know if he’ll ever pop it. We don’t know if he knows that it’s poppable.” “I don’t consider any [films as] cult classics,” Wiseau said. “I don’t even consider The Room to be cult, you know. I mean, people enjoy it, and whatever they call it, that’s theirs.” U

12 | Games | 10.03.2011

CROSSWORD Down 1— Actress Olin 2— Broadcasting 3— Confuse 4— Style of cooking 5— That girl 6— Place of contentment 7— Bakery worker 8— Pequod captain 9— Sherpa’s home 10— 7th letter of Greek alphabet 11— Apex 12— Dr. of rap 15— Perfumes 20—Adorn 21—French possessive 23— Bright star 25— Apartment sign 26— Whiskey type 27— Moon of Jupiter 29— Pertaining to the moon 30— UK record label 32— Michelangelo work 33— More 35— On the job 37— Flutter 39— “Hollywood Squares” win 40— Della’s creator 43— Wicked 46— Silhouette 48— “…and seven years ____” 50— Spot on the skin 52— Japanese beer brand 54— Like Cheerios 55— Mountain nymph 57— Bed support 58— Markers 60— Word for intellectual pursuits 61— Enzyme ending 62— Portable bed 63— Director Jean-Godard 65— Acapulco article

Across 1— Slender freshwater fish 6— Capital of Shaanxi province, China 10— Airport abbr. 13— Clothe 14— Dull pain 15— Agitate 16— Low point 17— Tide type 18— Cloak 19— Has a bug 20— Bearded 22— Checked 24— Legume 28— Small node 31— Grocery, e.g. 32— Annoy 34— Actress Thurman 36— Lost traction 37— Mend 38— Plant of the buttercup family 41— Conductor ____ —Pekka Salonen 42— Permits 44— Hawaiian acacia 45— Angry 47— Heart chambers 49— Alloy of copper and zinc 51— Monetary unit of Tonga 53— Playground retort 56— Rummage 59— Zhivago’s love 61— Legal rights org. 64— Baseball family name 65— Unit of volume 66— Redding’s genre 67— Drag 68— ______ a time 69— And so on 70— ______ boy! 71— Dispatches; across

(CUP) — Puzzles provided by BestCrosswords.com. Used with permission.

Sudoku by KrazyDad

10.03.2011 | Humour | 13

DAY EIGHT: WHY IS SHIA LABEOUF HIDING FROM THE UBYSSEY ?

Comicsmaster by Maria Cirstea

Want to see your comic in print? Send your samples to printeditor@ubyssey.ca, and they may run in the paper.

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Opinion

10.03.2011 |

Editor: Brian Platt

Go ahead, be a snoop Editor’s Notebook Brian Platt

UBC’s new collegia program: if you’re low on cash, you’re out of luck.

RAFEL QUINTERO/THE UBYSSEY

The Last Word

Parting shots and snap judgments on today’s issues Insite decision allows us to move on with the real work Friday’s Supreme Court ruling on Insite—which allowed the safe injection site’s exemption from Canada’s drug laws to stand, but still broadly upheld the federal government’s jurisdiction—was predictable from a legal standpoint. Yet the palpable relief of many in this city shows that this was no mere legal matter; it was a vindication of the values of our city. On the other side of the Rocky Mountains, Insite is a curiosity, a peculiarity. In many ways, it’s a Rorschach test for your opinion on drug policy—particularly if you’re uninformed on the issues surrounding hard drug addiction. As a result, Insite is a lightning rod of controversy for those who have a War on Drugs mindset. But if you live in this city, if you study harm reduction, if you’ve talked to any health care professional, you know that Insite is working and saves lives. It makes our streets safer and gives relief to the destitute. And much to the amazement of the Conservative government, it does its work every day without causing the end of civil society as we know it. With this ruling, we’ve finally seen the end of threats from the federal government to close Insite down, and can now focus our energy entirely on how to treat addiction and reduce the harm it causes to everyone. It should have been this way from the beginning.

BC must improve its access to information procedures BC is the slowest province in Canada for responding to freedom of information (FOI) requests, according to an audit conducted by the Canadian Newspapers Association and the Canadian Community Newspapers Association. This is a big problem. FOI requests are one of the most important tools we have for keeping public institutions accountable. Elections are just one part of what

makes a democracy different from a dictatorship; the ability to ask questions and get answers about how our public institutions operate is just as important. Furthermore, journalists, who are responsible for the lion’s share of those requests, often need timely responses in order to properly source the stories they are working on. The Ubyssey is well aware of the slow response rate, as we have multiple FOI requests in with the university right now that we are patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for. We can at least be happy that the audit showed that when the requests do get filled, they are often more comprehensive than other provinces. And of course, getting answers late is better than not getting them at all. But it’s still inexcusable that BC is slower to respond to public requests than any other Canadian jurisdiction.

The long wait for riot charges had better be worth it Last week, the Vancouver Police Department announced they will be serving warrants to media outlets in order to obtain footage from the Stanley Cup riot. Apart from the question of whether this is appropriate (Peter Klein, the head of UBC’s School of Journalism, has criticized the move), this is yet another occasion for us to ask what the hell is taking so long. It’s approaching four months since the riot took place, and the police are only now getting around to checking media footage? It also took over two months for the police to put up pictures of suspected rioters on their website, long after most people had shifted their attention to other matters. The one thing that will redeem this process is if the police are able to lay serious charges that stick. They report that at least forty charges will be laid by end of October. That’s a pretty small number given the amount of people involved in the violence, but at least it’s something. The old saying that justice delayed is justice denied may not yet

apply in the Vancouver riot case, but if this goes on much longer, it will.

The National Post apology was well-deserved Last week, people were offended at something published in the National Post. That, in itself, is not necessarily news. The difference in this case was that it wasn’t something they wrote, but rather, a full-page advertisement which attacked the Ontario government for providing basic LGBTQ education in elementary schools. The ad showed a picture of a young girl and implied that such teaching would “corrupt” her. After much deserved criticism, the Post, to their credit, unambiguously apologized for the ad and pulled it from circulation. They donated the proceeds from the advertisement to an organization which “promotes the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people.” For the record, we have a policy of not accepting any ads which promote cigarettes, combat roles with the Canadian forces or ads which aren’t “sex-positive.” If we do get an offer for an ad that our business office feels is controversial, we, as a staff, check it over to make sure we’re comfortable with the content before it is published. When readers judge a publication, they don’t discriminate between content and advertisements. One can only hope the National Post’s salespeople remember that in the future.

Despite their fluffly tails, squirrels are gross It is wrong that squirrels are often viewed as cute and cuddly while rats are abhorred as disgusting and disease-ridden. The only real difference between them is the fluffy tail. Ignore that, and it becomes obvious that squirrels are just as ugly and conniving as rats are. Squirrels have gotten away with this ruse for far too long. It’s time to recognize them for what they are. U

Last July, a Canadian-owned boat that planned to run the Israeli naval blockade around Gaza was blocked from leaving a Greek port. This week, The Ubyssey discovered that the $700 transfer from the Social Justice Centre (SJC) to the Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights club (SPHR) for the purposes of donating to that boat was never actually processed, despite being approved by AMS Council. So if you’re keeping score at home: last year, the AMS was swamped by months of annoying and polarizing arguments—and even conducted a preposterous terrorism “investigation”—over a small amount of resource group money that was never actually donated to a ship that never actually sailed to the blockade. Good grief. For those who weren’t here when UBC was making national headlines as we heatedly debated whether our money should be given to some hardy sailors trying to run a blockade, let me assure you, it was a rather ridiculous time. I know this especially well because I was on AMS Council during the whole debacle. Full disclosure: I voted against the initial motion to transfer the money, and then in favour of the final approval. Nobody looks good coming out of this. The AMS looks frivolous for having gone through all kinds of maneuvers to vet the transfer, and then never exercising the due diligence to actually transfer the money. The SJC and SPHR both look incompetent for not having noticed the money never moved from one account to the other. Neither organization has a big enough budget

that $700 should be able to slip through the cracks. Will you mind if I turn this into a teaching moment? Well too bad, I’m going to anyway. Here’s a little tip: as an AMS member, you have the right to inspect all the financial documents of the society. All you have to do is ask to see them. The only reason this failed transfer came to light is because The Ubyssey decided to take a look at the SJC’s financial transactions for last year—which is apparently more often than the SJC does, given that this had gone unnoticed. The AMS has over 300 clubs, plus the various faculty student societies, the resource groups and an assortment of services, businesses and committees. It can’t possibly keep tabs on everyone. So you should. Many student organizations spend thousands of dollars and are managed by inexperienced young people with the proclivity to drink a lot of booze. The only hope of holding them to any level of governance accountability is through crowd-sourcing. Is there an organization that you’re particularly interested in, annoyed with or suspicious of? Exercise your right to check out what they’ve been spending their cash on! All right, most of it will be boring. And most students clubs only operate with money given by members who signed up with them, so it doesn’t really matter if they decide to blow it all through silly decisions. But the organizations on campus who take money from every student—this includes the AMS itself, the undergraduate societies, the Graduate Student Society and the resource groups—deserve your scrutiny. Ubyssey reporters do this as much as possible, but heck, we’re all volunteers or barely paid fulltime editors who sometimes try to attend classes. Checking up on these groups doesn’t have to be malicious. It’s just that if you don’t do it, nobody will. U

Don’t charge for collegia Editor’s Notebook Andrew Bates UBC has come up with a great idea that they will surely ruin. For two years, the university has tested a program to create things called “collegia” at UBC Okanagan in Kelowna. The intention was to address the difficulties that arise from being a commuter campus. Collegia are a blend of a computer lab and a student club lounge: they have some desks, couches, tables and workstations for studying, and a full-service kitchen with a fridge. At the Okanagan campus, there are two of them. One is for first- and second-years, and one is for thirdand fourth-years. The UBC-O collegia are excellent. They provide a place to relax for students who don’t have memberships to social clubs on campus. It really makes the hours you spend on campus before catching the bus home a lot more enjoyable, and it creates a stronger bond between commuter students and the university. Does it sound like you could use some of those here? The VP Students office is thinking about doing it, but there will be one key difference: they’re going to charge for it.

According to Matt Parson, the AMS VP Academic, they may charge the same price as parking—around $75 a month. This is not going to be a great way for UBC to get commuter students to engage with the university and spend more time on campus. It is going to be a great way to get more money from students that can afford it. UBC-O has around 6000 students and 2 collegia. Vancouver has over 40,000 students and would also start with 2 collegia, located in the to-be-built Ponderosa Hub. The hub’s student housing is already projected to be very expensive. Putting pay-for-use collegia there furthers Ponderosa’s atmosphere as a country club for those with cash. Some students will have a beautiful commuter lounge or an expensive on-campus suite, while the rest of us proletarians have to sit in the hallway at Irving K. Barber until we bus 45 minutes back to our basement suites. If you’re going to build collegia, don’t model them after those nice airport lounges that you have pay a cover charge to get into. Model them as a free service for students who are otherwise going to spend most of their time off campus. The university is absolutely right when they say that having collegia will help students succeed. But what they haven’t said is: only if you can pay for it. U

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10.03.2011 |

Pictures and words on your university experience

When bad television consumes your life Melodramatic Musings Will Johnson A few years ago I came home from work to find my roommate Kristin curled up in a blanket watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer. “What the hell is this?” I asked, seeing the corny makeup and bad 90s fashion. “It’s Buffy,” she said. “This is the best show ever.” Incidentally, I had already discovered the best show ever (The Sopranos) and had a comfortable line-up of HBO shows to keep me busy. I was a self-admitted television snob and I wasn’t interested in wasting my time with trashy garbage. But Kristin insisted I sit down and watch an episode with her. “Please, Will? Please? Keep me company?” She stuck out her lip and gazed up at me with her best puppy-dog face. She looked so helpless there, in the glow of the television. I decided to oblige her. “Okay, just one episode, though,” I said. Fast forward a week, and both Kristin and I called in sick to work so we could plough through a 12-hour Buffy marathon. We only took breaks to eat or go to the bathroom, and one quick trip to get Kristin cigarettes from the nearby gas station. Around hour ten, I started to complain. “Kristin, I feel like shit. I think I’m just gonna go to bed.”

“No, Will! We can make it! We’re almost done the third season!” She was like an army general waving me into battle. I couldn’t argue with her. And when she threatened to finish the season without me, I relented. Ultimately, I ended up watching seven seasons of Buffy and five seasons of Angel in about three months. It was a strange time in my life. Nowadays, I find myself blindly following shows I can’t even begin to defend. I watched Lost right to the last episode, even though 60 per cent of it was cliché-riddled, poorly scripted sci-fi nonsense. I watched Dexter long after it started to suck. Same with Big Love. Lately, I’ve been devotedly watching True Blood and Entourage, even though at times they’re both blatantly terrible, sub-par shows. I keep watching, hoping that maybe, maybe, they’ll get better. But they don’t. It’s like I’m in a stifling, unfulfilling relationship, just waiting for something better to come along before I go through the messy break-up. But Boardwalk Empire and Breaking Bad can’t be on all the time, and sometimes I just want something quick and dirty. I admit it. I have a problem. But at least I don’t watch Jersey Shore. U Follow Will Johnson at @GoodWillJohnson or check out the Melodramatic Musings website at www.goodwilljohnson.com. INDIANA JOEL ILLUSTRATION/THE UBYSSEY

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