July 26, 2016

JULY 26, 2016 | VOLUME XCVIII | ISSUE III HOLDING THE COMMUNITY HOSTAGE SINCE 1918

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NEWS

CULTURE

OPINIONS

SPORTS

Recent graduate banned from campus

Vegan eating can be cheap and tasty

The Ubyssey welcomes President Ono with a wish list to Santa

Record number of UBC athletes heading to summer Olympics

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SCIENCE How to change racial bias in children

THE UBYSSEY

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// PAGE 2

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

YOUR GUIDE TO UBC EVENTS & PEOPLE

EVENTS

2

OUR CAMPUS

Steve Price coaches the best university swimmers in Canada SUNDAY JULY 31 SUNSET BEACH FESTIVAL 11 A.M. @ SUNSET BEACH Celebrate Pride in one of Vancouver’s most beautiful waterfront parks along with hundreds of exhibitors, many bands and organizations.

FREE

SUNDAY JULY 31 KINGS OF VANCOUVER III @ IKB

Enjoy some Super Smash Bros. 4 and Melee! Sign up before July 14 for early bird reates.

$5 EARLY BIRD - $10 REGULAR

PHOTO JEREMY JOHNSON-SILVERS / THE UBYSSEY

Price lives and breathes UBC swimming.

Olivia Law Features Editor

MONDAY AUGUST 15 SUMMER ON THE MALL @ MAIN MALL

Get ready for a free outdoor celebration of our beautiful campus.

FREE

ON THE COVER PHOTO/ART BY Aiken Lao

Want to see your events listed here?

Email your event listings to printeditor@ubyssey.ca

U THE UBYSSEY

EDITORIAL

Coordinating Editor Features Editor Jack Hauen Olivia Law coordinating@ubyssey.ca features@ubyssey.ca Design Editor Aiken Lao printeditor@ubyssey.ca News Editors Sruthi Tadepalli & Samantha McCabe news@ubyssey.ca Culture Editor Samuel Du Bois culture@ubyssey.ca Sports + Rec Editor Olamide Olaniyan sports@ubyssey.ca Video Producer Kate Colenbrander video@ubyssey.ca Photo Editor Sam Barringer photo@ubyssey.ca Opinions + Blog Editor Bailey Ramsay opinions@ubyssey.ca

STAFF

Matt Langmuir, Josh Azizi, Bill Situ, Elena Volohova, Jeremy Johnson-Silvers, Julian Yu, Sruthi Tadepalli, Karen Wang, Jessie Stirling, Vicky Huang, Olamide Olaniyan, Henry Allan, Natalie Morris, Miguel Santa Maria, Sivan Spector, Sarah Nabila, Sophie Sutcliffe, Rithu Jagannath, Lucy Fox, Ben Cook, Avril Hwang, Ben Geisberg, Lilian Odera, Adam Waitzer, Avril Hwang, Emma Hicks, Ben Geisberg, Helen Zhou, Nadya Rahman, Boris Bosnjakovic, Aiden Qualizza, Jerry Yin, Arianna Leah Fischer, Tisha Dasgupta, Isabelle Commerford, Evelina Tolstykh, Mischa Milne, Julia Burnham, Gaby Lucas, Philippe Roberge, Rachel Lau, David Deng, Tendayi Moyo

JULY 26, 2016 | VOLUME XCVIII| ISSUE III BUSINESS Business Manager Austen Erhardt business@ubyssey.ca Operations Ron Gorodetsky operations@ubyssey.ca

The New Student Union Building 6133 University Boulevard Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z1 Online: ubyssey.ca Twitter: @ubyssey

LEGAL The Ubyssey is the official student newspaper of the University of British Columbia. It is published every Tuesday 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.

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The Ubyssey accepts opinion articles on any topic related to the University of British Columbia (UBC) and/or topics relevant to students attending UBC. Submissions must be written by UBC students, professors, alumni, or those in a suitable position (as determined by the opinions editor) to speak on UBC-related matters. Submissions must not contain racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, harassment or discrimination. Authors and/ or submissions will not be precluded from publication based solely on association with particular ideologies or subject matter that some may find objectionable. Approval for publication is, however, dependent on the quality of the argument and The Ubyssey editorial board’s judgment of appropriate content.

Submissions may be sent by email to opinion@ubyssey.ca. Please include your student number or other proof of identification. Anonymous submissions will be accepted on extremely rare occasions. Requests for anonymity will be granted upon agreement from four fifths of the editorial board. Full opinions policy may be found at ubyssey.ca/ submit-an-opinion 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.

“If you’re in the game of trying to win medals at the Olympics, you’re probably going to win some CIS championships along the way.”

UBC swim coach Steve Price is heading to Rio to join the Canadian team as they aim for medals at the 2016 Olympics. At the time of his interview with The Ubyssey, Price was in a posttraining camp, pre-Olympics state of mind. As the coach of one of the most successful university sports teams in Canada, with more championship wins than any other sport in any other university in the country, Price’s expectation for his swimmers is of the highest level.

“We’ve never limited ourselves with being just a varsity team,” he said. “It’s an honour to win varsity championships, but it’s not the pinnacle of our sport.”

The pinnacle being – of course – the Olympic Games. Price’s preparation for himself and his swimmers has been ongoing since the last Olympics.

“Typically at the start of a quadrennial we’ll come together, we’ll be a team, we’ll train together,” he said. “There’s very little division between the highest performers and the entry-level swimmers. As we move through the quadrennial towards the Olympics, that’s when we start to focus on the very high end because we’re going after medals.”

The Olympic year means that Price and his coaching team have to compartmentalize what they’re able to do for their swimmers, covering all areas of the sport from open water to pool training,

from altitude training camps to team building exercises. This year, Price has been in charge of Canada’s distance swimmers.

As a child, Price was stuck into swimming lessons before succumbing to competition at the age of nine. Not just a swimmer, he played hockey, baseball and soccer but transitioned full-time to the pool after a number of broken bones in the team games.

“There’s a high level of trust and confidence amongst our swimmers for our staff and programming ...

There’s a lot of planning behind the scenes.”

- STEVE PRICE

“In hockey I broke my collar bone, broke my nose – I was a defenceman so I was getting in fights and that sort of stuff,” he said. “My parents decided that maybe swimming was a little less violent.”

Price began coaching in his early 20s, shortly after giving up competing. Although a prolific freestyle sprinter in his time, Price isn’t keen to jump back into training.

“It’s one of these things where I’m around the pool all the time,” he said – truthfully, as even our interview was conducted poolside.

“When I’m not here I’d rather get outside, get some fresh air. It’s hours and hours spent here or at

other pools and so I don’t really want to spend any longer than I need to.”

Coaching isn’t just about the time spent when the athletes are training, Price noted. “There’s a high level of trust and confidence amongst our swimmers for our staff and programming,” he said.

“There’s a lot of planning behind the scenes.”

Before the season begins, Price and assistant coach Brian Johns sit and plan the entire season for every athlete on the team. His strategy is preparation, preparation, preparation.

The individual planning goes as far as specific training camps for some of the highest-level swimmers. Price had recently returned from a distance-training camp at high altitude, and programs in other fitness-related activities – such as yoga and rock climbing – for his swimmers.

“We do all our preparation before we get to competitions,” Price said on his strategy for coaching at events. “As a coaching staff, we are there to direct them, we’re there to make sure they’re moving in the right direction – but we are not there to over-coach them or over-program them – that’s not the time do it.”

In competition, Price was present but far from overbearing with his swimmers.

“The key is not to over-coach,” he said. “If you’re over-coaching, you’re just making everybody nervous, and if everybody gets nervous they’re not going to swim well.”

Price will be a member of the coaching team for the Canadian swim team this summer in Rio, and returns in the fall to the Thunderbirds, where the team will debut the new Aquatic Centre. U

// NEWS

EDITORS SRUTHI TADEPALLI + SAMANTHA MCCABE

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

3

GREEK SYSTEM //

UBC fraternity residences receiving noise complaints, “Holding the community hostage” Julia Burnham Staff Writer

UBC homeowners are quickly losing patience with the “serious and chronic noise violations,” that pour out of the UBC fraternity village “virtually every other day” according to Aaron Goodman, a neighbouring resident and faculty member at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.

Goodman noted that most nights he — and other residents — are unable to sleep.

“They walk through the community of dozens of family homes on their way to the bars at 10 or 11 p.m.. They yell and scream, and they’re drunk. On their way home at 3 a.m. when the bars close, they’re even louder, waking the whole community up. When they get to the fraternity courtyard, they turn on the stereo and blare their music untill 4 a.m.” said Goodman.

Goodman said that he has made every effort possible to quell the disturbances by reaching out to the University Endowment Lands, the University Neighbourhoods Association (UNA) and the UBC administration, and he is frustrated that “nobody is willing to take responsibility.”

He has also reached out to the RCMP repeatedly, but has been told that he is “wasting his time” calling because they do not have the authority to enforce noise bylaws at the fraternities.

“This is marketed as an integrated community. The

condos have been sold for over half a million dollars,” said Goodman. “Meanwhile, this group of hooligans is holding the community hostage.”

The fraternities are located on an academic area of campus that is not under the UNA’s jurisdiction. As such, the UNA noise bylaws are not enforceable within the fraternity village. Despite this, the UNA has still received many requests from neighbouring residents to help deal with the fraternity noise.

“We have had more success trying to find a middle ground in other neighbourhoods with other UBC venues, but the fraternities seem to be a very unique creature on the campus,” said Jan Fialkowski, the executive director of the UNA. Inter-Fraternity Council (IFC) President Brian Spencer said that he has been trying his best to decrease noise levels, but also emphasized the limits his role has in governing fraternities.

“The policies are different in each house. It is important to remember that the IFC is a coordinating body and a lot of fraternities act mostly autonomously, aside from our bylaws,” explained Spencer.

He acknowledged that the noise levels have been particularly bad in the summer months because of subletting tenants who are unaffiliated with the fraternity or the university.

“Typically, they are overseas students who come over for the summer and are looking for an

The fraternities are facing off against some very angry neighbours.

authentic North American college experience and they don’t really care about the repercussions as far as what happens [to the fraternities],” said Spencer.

He also emphasized that the fraternity members do care about the repercussions that their noise violations can have. He continued

furthermore to say that the problem is that their summer tenants have a “distinct lack of empathy about what happens to [the fraternities] after they leave and the impact that their partying leaves.”

“I would like to apologize to the residents that surround the Greek Village and to whomever

FILE PHOTO SAM BARRINGER/THE UBYSSEY

it is that has been kept up by the noise that has been coming from that compound,” said Spencer. “Just know that there are things in the works to fix it. We are addressing it and we do take this very, very seriously.” U Julia Burnham is a member of the UBC Greek system.

EARTHQUAKE//

UBC working to reduce seismic risks on campus

With the reasonable chance of an earthquake in the next 50 years, UBC is getting prepared.

Andrea Gonzalez Contributer

In order to reduce the seismic risk of buildings on campus, UBC Infrastructure Development is planning to update UBC’s seismic mitigation plan.

There is a reasonable probability — estimates range from 10 per cent to 30 per cent — within the next 50 years that Vancouver will face a significant seismic event (the

“Big One”). Out of a total inventory of 400 structures, a 2012 Seismic Risk Assessment Report dubbed 28 buildings on campus “very high risk” and 12 “high risk” — assessments that included a note of “loss of life probable” should such a seismic event occur.

The mitigation plan update is UBC’s most recent step in implementing change to their outdated system in regards to seismic risk.

FILE PHOTO SAM BARRINGER/THE UBYSSEY

As part of the new seismic plan, UBC Infrastructure Development is hoping to accelerate the seismic mitigation of high- and very high-risk buildings to bring the plan up to date in terms of seismic science and latest building codes to address the risk within the university’s logistical and financial capabilities.

“We will be reassessing all campus buildings to make sure that we are reflecting the latest seismic thinking in terms of seismic hazard,”

said John Metras, the managing director for UBC’s Infrastructure Development.

“The national building code was just updated in 2015 and it has increased requirements for seismic performance. We want to make sure that we are ahead of the curve and that we’re incorporating that enhanced building code requirement in our planning.”

Although life safety is paramount to the new plan, UBC Infrastructure Development is also exploring ways to ensure facilities are resilient, so that teaching and research can be brought back in line quickly and effectively following a seismic event.

In addition, research facilities across the UBC campus such as the Earthquake Engineering Research Facility are continuing to study the behavior of structures under potential seismic events to improve the university’s earthquake preparedness and to reduce seismic risk in the province.

On June 21, UBC’s Earthquake Engineering Research Facility performed a demonstration of their new shake table and earthquake early warning system. The warning system, developed two years ago with the Minister of Transportation, provides notifications about the intensity of a potential earthquake, thus ensuring that people can take adequate precautions to protect themselves. Meanwhile, the shake

table acts like an earthquake simulator, allowing researchers to understand and analyze how earthquakes affect structures and how they can be retrofitted to minimize seismic risk.

“Many of these structures were designed many years ago. The technology and knowledge about earthquakes has changed very fast in the last 30 years,” said Dr. Carlos Ventura, the director of the Earthquake Engineering Research Facility.

“So we need to make sure that existing structures will perform well and that people will be safe.

Also, for the new buildings, we need to be sure that the building code provisions are adequate for the earthquakes that we foresee in BC.” UBC first conducted a comprehensive seismic assessment in 1994. Since 2012’s concerning report, seismic upgrades have been completed and are currently under way in design and construction on five of those buildings, including the Henry Angus office tower and the BioSciences complex.

“UBC Infrastructure Development has been looking after seismic mitigation on campus for over 20 years. There are still a number of buildings that need to be retrofitted, but UBC has been diligent in addressing the seismic risk that some of the buildings on campus have,” said Ventura. U

4 | news |

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

CONSTRUCTION //

Extensive plans to renovate the Old SUB underway

PHOTO BORIS BOSNJAKOVIC/THE UBYSSEY

The Old SUB is going to see some big changes over the next few years.

Stephanie Wu Contributor

Plans to renovate the Old SUB — which, until recently, belonged entirely to the AMS — have existed since 2008, according to AMS Designer Michael Kingsmill.

Now that the AMS Student Nest is open and operational, the Old Sub will be renovated. The task has been undertaken by the UBC Properties Trust in service of two different clients — the AMS and the university. Both entities own separate parts of the building and each have separate plans for their respective parts.

WHAT UBC IS DOING The university — which controls the top floor, main floor and roughly half of the lower floor — will be using their area as storage and swing space over the course of the next five years as other campus buildings undergo seismic upgrading. Swing space refers to space that can be used by those who are displaced by renovations.

“The university only months ago received notice from the provincial government that they were going to receive hundreds of millions of dollars for seismic upgrading of buildings on campus here,” said Kingsmill.

Thus, as various buildings on campus are affected by renovations, students may find

themselves taking classes in the Old SUB for the duration of the upgrading.

“This renewal that’s underway right now is going to also be an investment in the long-term renewal of the building under the big plan which is called the ‘Student Life Centre,’” said Kingsmill, noting that the finishing touches will hopefully be put on in five years.

On the main floor, the Student Life Centre will be comprised of drop-in services catered toward student health and wellness.

Combinations of meeting rooms

“This new plan will ... add colour and other noticeable changes to the exterior of the building to give it kind of the ‘new look’ of ‘the 2016.’

So it’s going to be quite refreshing.”

- MICHAEL KINGSMILL

and administrative offices for student-focused services will be on the second floor to “create really what would be a university administration building for student services and support,” according to Kingsmill.

“The Old SUB really speaks to the times when it was built in the ‘60s. It’s very enclosed, it’s very introspective,” he said. “This new plan will somewhat undo some of that, puncture the outside of it, add colour and other noticeable changes to the exterior of the building and give it the new look of 2016. So it’s going to be quite refreshing.”

As for the divided lower level, the university has not yet fully determined what their half will be repurposed for at this point.

However, they appear to be leaning towards more facilities for recreational activity.

“Right now, they are just gonna shell it out and leave it pretty much empty ... before they unleash the full Student Life [Centre] plan in the five years between then and now,” said Kingsmill.

WHAT THE AMS IS DOING The AMS retains the other 35,000 square feet of the bottom floor — stretching from the Nest entrance, down along the main corridor and all the way to the exit on the North side. They plan to make this space feel

transparent and accessible, so that passersby can imagine the area as an extension of the AMS Nest.

AMS VP Administration Chris Scott describes a particularly unique projected addition — showers.

“We have 17 showers,” said Scott. “We have a men’s, women’s and a gender neutral [shower room], and we also have a universal general washroom.

All of these showers will be accompanied by lockers, so you can lock your stuff up, walk in, have your shower and come back out.”

The showers are to be selfcontained by doors and efficient enough to qualify the building for a LEED Platinum sustainability certification — awarded to only the greenest buildings with the lowest energy and water consumption.

“The showers [are] meant for commuter students who have had a late night in the library and need to come early in the morning, have a shower and go to class. It’s also friendly for students who are commuting to UBC via bike.”

Other notable planned features include a large bookable room, a bookable movement studio, a new location for Sprouts positioned right by the North entrance, a new location for the Bike Kitchen, a new entrance to

the Norm Theatre (complete with a new red carpet), a green room (for performers getting ready to go into the Norm) and a photo studio. Highly specialized rooms are also to be constructed for some clubs such as the Pottery Club, AquaSOC, FilmSOC, PhotoSOC and the Blank Vinyl Project.

Some space retained in the corridor adjacent to the stairs to the main floor has also been put aside for music practice rooms and a resource facility for foreign and exchange students — the planning of which is in the generative stages. “[The walls] will be largely glass, so you can see through.

We’re looking at making these clubs more open to the public.

We’re working with them to make sure that they’ll get more foot traffic and also make students feel more invited to participate in those activities,” said Scott.

Renovations of the area belonging to the AMS are expected to take place from August 31 through to September of next year.

“These plans ... [either] get morphed or funding becomes perhaps uncertain. Things then get pared back or funding all of a sudden is released causing things expand. They’re often doing things before they finally get settled,” said Kingsmill.

“We’ll have to wait and see.” U

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

GSS //

Graduate Student Society tried to expel student journalist and councillor Sruthi Tadepalli News Editor

The Graduate Student Society (GSS) tried to temporarily expel UBC Insiders writer Maayan Kreitzman for publishing an internal GSS report criticizing UBC’s response to sexual assault, and writing articles criticizing the handling of the report during her time as an elected GSS councillor.

Kreitzman’s article claimed that the report was intentionally suppressed by the GSS, but this is contested by the GSS who said that the report had simply not yet been reviewed and approved by councillors for release.

Gabrielle John — who until recently was the GSS’s advocacy coordinator — began preparing the report in May 2015 after the society was approached by women from the history department about issues they were facing with UBC’s sexual harassment reporting process. This case was later widely publicized and the subject of a CBC documentary.

According to Kreitzman’s article, however, as the report neared completion the GSS executive began trying to bury it — first by trying (and failing due to insufficient notice) to dismiss John two weeks before the end of her contract. Allegedly, members of the executive did not respond to the final report John sent in for three days until other graduate students sent emails expressing concerns that the GSS would sit on it. Finally, John, in Kreitzman’s article, said that a meeting with past GSS president Tobias Friedel made clear that the report would not be published or circulated in its current form.

When UBC Insiders received the report through an anonymous source, John gave them permission to publish the report when they approached her — as did those interviewed for the creation of the report.

This version of events is contested by the GSS, who say that the report was going to be published, but that it was considered insider at the time Kreitzman published it because it had not been brought before Council. According to Genevieve Cruz, current president of the GSS, the article’s timeline also didn’t accommodate the GSS’s process for releasing information or reports.

“It doesn’t work the same way as journalism, where you have one person deciding, like an editor, and then they release it,” said Cruz. “Council has to see it. Until Council has seen it, it is going to be internal — it cannot have that GSS stamp on it.”

“There were three people on that report, but there are ten thousand graduate students.

Could [Council] have made it better? Of course. There’s a whole process for that,” said Cruz.

The motion to expel Kreitzman appears to boil down to two reasons. The first is the belief of some GSS members that Kreitzman shirked her fiduciary duty as an elected councillor, meaning her duty to act solely in another party’s benefit, and the second problem were allegations in the article(s) publicly criticizing the GSS executive — especially then president Tobias Friedel — written by a councillor.

“This went outside of process and completely ruined our reputation a bit and hampered our ability to lobby for these things and advocate for things we care about … especially sexual violence,” said Cruz.

Kreitzman remains confused as to why this has turned into an issue big enough for the GSS to warrant spending approximately five months of time and resources. Before the motion to expel her — and even in the immediate aftermath of the report — she was not approached or

According to Kreitzman’s article, as the report neared completion the GSS executive began trying to bury it — first by trying (and failing due to insufficient notice) to dismiss John two weeks before the end of her contract.

spoken to about her writing for UBC Insiders or any potential conflicts of interest.

“I think the example of cracking down on members and councillors that disagree with the executives is an awful precedent to set for anyone’s involvement in the society. It really speaks to the fragility of the democracy within the GSS and its inability to look at very reasonable critique and demands for accountability,” said Kreitzman.

Many members of the GSS, however, take the view that publishing the internal report and critiquing the GSS while being a councillor was wrong and something they do not want to be repeated.

“If this document had come directly to Council and Council had had time to evaluate it and put it forward as a stance from the GSS without being prior to that published or commented, this would have been way stronger as a statement to the GSS,” said GSS councillor Katerina Othonos.

“Councillors should know that

they need to bring this forward to the council so … we bring forward something strong that is beneficial for all graduate students.”

By expelling Kreitzman, some members of the GSS wanted to send a message about the role of a councillor and conflicts of interest.

This perspective led to the HR Committee, due to their lack of connection to the issue, being given the responsibility of examining the situation and potential repercussions.

After the committee looked into the issue, it was decided that there would be a vote to decide whether Kreitzman should be expelled from the GSS for a year. The council voted against expelling Kreitzman. While the vote was closed, Kreitzman reported the results as six abstentions, 19 in favour and 13 opposed. In order for the motion to succeed, a majority was required.

Kreitzman’s argument pertained to the lack of basis for her expulsion in the Society’s Constitution and Bylaws.

“Any allegations that do not pertain to the Society’s Constitution or Bylaws are irrelevant to the process by which a member may be expelled from the GSS,” said Kreitzman in her case notes.

Cruz noted that different interpretations of the bylaws were presented, from both the GSS’s side and Kreitzman’s, but that in the end there was no true “right” side. Rather, it all came down to the vote and which side was more convincing to councillors.

When looking to the future, Cruz says the GSS now sees the need for a conflict of interest policy, but does not have immediate plans to create one.

“It did expose a lot of gaps in GSS policy, but the more immediate thing we want to address now is sexual assault,” said Cruz. U

| news | 5

SECURITY //

Recent UBC science graduate banned from campus Jack Hauen Coordinating Editor

Johnson Nguyen, a recent graduate from UBC’s Faculty of Science, has been banned from campus following unsettling behaviour.

A letter sent out by UBC chemistry department head Michael Wolf to the chemistry department warned of Nguyen’s recent conduct, which included asking after female students who had previously had little or no contact with him. According to Wolfe, when Nguyen was told the female students were unavailable, he became “very agitated and unstable, to the point that campus security and the RCMP were called in.”

The letter also noted that Nguyen received multiple warnings from the RCMP before being issued a Notice of Restriction, barring him from campus.

The full letter appears below: I would like to bring to your attention an important issue regarding a recently graduated student in the Faculty of Science.

This student, Johnson Nguyen, has been coming to multiple Physics and Chemistry research labs asking after some female undergraduate students (all of which had little to no interactions with him in the past) who were in various physics and chemistry classes of his last year. When he was told they were not around, he became very agitated and unstable, to the point that campus security and the RCMP were called in. This behaviour, and more, has continued despite police warnings, and consequently a Notice of Restriction has been issued, banning him from campus, in accordance with UBC policy.

If you see this individual on campus, and especially in one of our buildings and asking about the location of people working in our labs, please call 911 and then campus security immediately.

There has been no violent behaviour in any incidents so far, but please do not take unnecessary risks. A picture appears below.

-Mike Barry Eccleton, the director of Campus Security, has issued a statement on the incident encouraging anyone who is afraid for their safety to call 911 or UBC RCMP immediately.

“When incidents of concerning behaviour occur on campus, the university has a variety of mechanisms to address them – including banning individuals from campus,” said Eccleton.

Due to privacy concerns, no comment from UBC will be issued on the specific incident. U

Got news?

Message news@ubyssey.ca PHOTO SAM BARRINGER/THE UBYSSEY

// FEATURES

EDITOR OLIVIA LAW

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

6

paddling upstream

The extraordinary, complicated history of UBC’s women’s rowing team WORDS OLAMIDE OLANIYAN / ILLUSTRATION AIKEN LAO

B

orn in Saskatchewan and growing up in a cattle ranch in British Columbia, Susan Baiton had never picked up an oar, or rowed in a boat.

It wasn’t until her first year at university in the fall of 1976, when Sue Baiton, 18, was walking across campus with a friend and came across the men’s rowing team practicing drills. She had never rowed in her life, but it looked interesting. The men’s coach at the time, Rod Bell-Irving, spotted the two and approached them. There was going to be a meeting that weekend at the Vancouver Rowing Club. He told them, “If you’re interested, come on down.”

“That was kind of the beginning of it all,” said Susan, her last name now Wilkinson, over the phone. “That was the initial development of the UBC women’s crew, and I was on that first team.” Wilkinson was joined by 10 other women in the rowing crew.

This was happening at a time when women’s participation in sport was becoming a central issue at UBC. Women’s soccer, bowling and squash had just been included earlier that year. At the time, $4.20 of the $5 student athletic fee went to the men’s programs and 80 cents went to the women, but in November there was a referendum to increase the athletic student fee from $5 to $7, an increase which would go towards supporting the women’s teams.

In the highest AMS vote turnout at that point, 71.7 per cent of 6,100 students voted in favour of the increase. Women’s sports were finally receiving some love.

At about the same time, the UBC rowing program was undergoing rapid change. Rod Bell-Irving had been a volunteer coach and in 1976 turned over the crew to Al Morrow – a UBC graduate student in Physical Education and a regular at international competitions. He had just retired from national team level rowing after the 1976 Montreal Olympics when the position suddenly became available.

This initial two years of coaching with a small honorarium in compensation prompted Morrow’s long, unanticipated career in rowing. He went on to coach for the University of Victoria in 1978 and in

1986 joined the Rowing Canada team.

He is currently the Performance Director for the lightweight men’s program and is at Rio de Janeiro in his ninth year at the Olympics

TEAM BUILDING The program was just coming off of a decade-long golden era under head coach Frank Reads in the 1950s, and subsequent high of the 60s. But now, the team was in an unanticipated position. Morrow would be the fifth head coach in as many years. The team at the time functioned like the competitive clubs of today – like sailing, lacrosse and tennis. They ran like a varsity program but did not belong to any Canadian- or BC-wide leagues, and so they mostly competed in Regattas and international competitions all over Canada and the world.

Morrow had a friend, Glenn Battersby, who was a coxswain — the member of the crew that is in charge of navigation and keeping time, and also steers the shell — in the coxed pair races at the 1972 Olympics in Munich who had been in the last cut

of the Olympic team in Montreal.

“He and I determined that it was about time that there be a women’s team, and we got permission to establish the women’s team at UBC

Glenn had much hope in the team.

He told The Ubyssey that for such an unseasoned team, a lot of growth and improvement could be expected. The only way to go was up.

“Personally, I don’t want to see women at the Big Block banquet.

If you invite women team members, then girlfriends and wives will also want to be included.

Then the tradition will be broken.”

-John Bilingsly, former Big Block president, 1977 from the athletics department,” said Morrow. Battersby became the first coach of the UBC women’s crew.

It was on. The team was ready. On November 20 1976, the crew attended their first competition, at the annual Green Lake Fall Regatta in Seattle, Washington. Despite the team’s modest placing in the competition,

They went on to race at major competitions and regattas all over North America like the Opening day Regatta in Seattle, a personal highlight for Wilkinson where she rowed in the UBC women’s eight.

This growth was not without its difficulties. The team faced a lack of equipment and access to facilities.

“Probably the biggest challenge for the UBC women was that we didn’t have equipment,” said Wilkinson, who is now on the Board of Directors for Rowing BC. “Our equipment was essentially cast-off equipment from the men’s crews. It wasn’t designed for women and it didn’t fit us, and so it took us a long, long time to have any equipment that was suitable for women’s rowers.”

The crew didn’t get their get their first piece of new equipment until July 1977. The women’s four that they obtained was funded by Ed Snead, a Vancouver Rowing Club alumni who won the first single sculls of Vancouver in 1928 and also won the Junior 140lb singles at the Canadian Henley in 1932.

Rowing as a sport is cruel, bitter and unforgiving to newcomers.

With the winter practices and the thousands of kilometers of distance covered in training, the team’s experiences weren’t always entirely pleasant.

“It’s a rather gruelling sport,” said Wilkinson, describing her practices.

“Everybody’s hands were torn from the ends of the oars. We were rowing very, very cold, wet weather. It’s a sport where you train for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of kilometres.”

Another obstacle the women’s rowing team faced, and probably one they least expected, presented itself at the Big Block banquet.

THE BIG BLOCK BUNGLE The Big Block Banquet is an event recognizing the best varsity athletes at UBC. Up until 1977, the event was traditionally exclusive to male. In a time when sexist publication the Red Rag thrived on the UBC campus and a naked women rode a horse across campus in the annual Lady Godiva, for many this was yet another indicator of deeply entrenched sexism at UBC. Five female coxswains on some of the men’s crews were excluded from the banquet. However for some – including some of the athletes – this barring made sense. The women were not formally recognized on the crews despite being active participants. In fact, they were not recognized by either the men’s or women’s athletics associations and

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

thus would not have been eligible to attend the event.

One of the coxswains, Lona Smith, told The Ubyssey in March 1977, “One thing that bothers me is that I’m recognized as far as I’m an asset to the team yet I receive no formal recognition. They can’t expect to use me all year and then not recognize me.”

However, she said that, “If they’re going to make a rule they should stick with it and not allow any women to join the team at all.”

She maintained that if it was in their constitution, then they should respect that.

Some athletes were largely unaware that there were any reservations against women joining these institution, at least until they look back at those moments.

Wilkinson was one of them.

For Wilkinson, winning her first Big Block in 1977/1978 was one of the highlights of her UBC career.

The year she won was the first time women were in attendance at the Big Block Banquet.

“It was a lot of change. I was more interested in rowing and in my social circles in rowing,” she said. “Certainly the rowers that I knew were not in any way unhappy with women becoming part of the group, as far as I knew.”

It wasn’t until later on she realized that there had been a movement to prevent women’s involvement in the awards.

She understood that it had traditionally been a “stag” affair and was a traditionally male-exclusive event. She also knew that there was definitely some pushback because of this. Wilkinson felt in that moment, to some extent, that by the time she was receiving her award, that it had become a non-issue.

“I really can’t say a whole bunch more about that because it seems to me when it was all said and done.

By the time we were attending the Big Block I would expect that much of the issues had been resolved,” Wilkinson said.

“Personally, I don’t want to see women at the Big Block banquet,” John Bilingsley, former Big Block

president told The Ubyssey on March 26, 1977.

He continued, “Once you open the banquet up it’s going to snowball into a mixed affair. If you invite women team members, then girlfriends and wives will also want to be included,” he claimed in the article. “Then the tradition will be broken, something I really wouldn’t like to see.”

VRC-UBC Despite living near UBC, with no shortage of beaches and open water, and despite being a fantastic swimmer, Tricia Smith – like Sue Wilkinson – had never picked up an oar. Again, a chance encounter changed that.

In January 1973, Smith was a high school student, but since she lived close to UBC, she would usually study at the library on campus.

One day, she bumped into an old friend, Anne Ross, who she swam competitively against in high school.

Ross had already graduated and was then a student at UBC.

because I was a competitive swimmer,” said Smith. “Swimmers get up every morning and never miss workouts.”

Tricia Smith was part of the first group of women at the place usually described as some kind of holy temple for rowing – the Vancouver Rowing Club. Led by Dutch rower Els Mols,the crew comprised of several girls from UBC including Ross.

Forty years, four Olympics and seven medals later, Smith looks back and recalls some of the the biggest challenges the team faced in the beginning. They faced their difficulties. Their first changing room was previously a men’s “clothes-drying” room, and they weren’t allowed to use some of the rowing equipment. Women were only allowed to race 1,000 metres, which Smith explained was because the perception then was that women could not physically handle the regular 2,000. Yet she still loved the

“One thing that bothers me is that I’m recognized as far as I’m an asset to the team yet I receive no formal recognition. They can’t expect to use me all year and then not recognize me.”

-Lona Smith, rowing team coxswain, 1977 After catching up, Ross asked her to come try out for the rowing team, to which Smith replied “what’s rowing?”. When Ross mentioned the Oxford and Cambridge races, Smith finally understood. Curious about this new sport, she then followed up up with, “Do women do that?”

It turned out that one of Ross’ other crew members always slept in – unfortunately, because rowing is a team sport. You need everyone present to pick up an oar. Ross invited Smith because they had both swam together and she trusted her.

“She knew I was dependable

sport.

The early seventies were a period when rowing was exclusive to men, and so there were some rather strange and strict rules. Smith describes a horror story where a team of women from the United States came to Vancouver for a regatta and were prohibited from putting their boat into the water.

“There was something about some little issues with the boats and this one particular person comes to our coach and is trying to blame us for it and we didn’t have anything to do with it,” said Smith about some particular moments when the tensions flared up. She didn’t care, and felt it was their personal problem. “ I thought that was quite strange. We were very very careful with all the equipment.”

LEGACY In a ceremony earlier this month, with speeches from UBC members including president Santa Ono,

| FEATURES | 7

and senior athletics director Gilles Lepine and Louise Cowin, the UBC community sent off a record number of athletes to the Olympic games.

Also at the ceremony was Canadian Olympic Committee president and candidate for the International Olympic committee Tricia Smith.

UBC rowing has an important but quiet role in the university’s Olympic history. Oarsman Ned Pratt was the first UBC student to win an Olympic medal, a bronze at the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles. The most decorated UBC athlete was Kathleen Heddle, who won two gold medals at Barcelona in 1992, then followed up with a gold and a bronze at Atlanta four years later. The entire program boasts an incredible amount of Olympic athletes and medals – 76 athletes and a total of 46 medals.

But probably these were the most important years for the program.

They were the years in which the the program started its metamorphosis into the one we see today. Most Canadians remember 1976, the summer of the Olympics at Montreal as exciting – the first Olympics hosted in their country. But it was also something else. It was the first time women were allowed to compete in rowing.

It’s tempting to view this period as a huge progressive moment in UBC history – storming the archaic strongholds of the patriarchy. But that narrative would not do this period justice. It was slow-going, deliberate, harsh. Rather than a wildfire that blazed up suddenly, the moment was the little ebbing flame on the beach that was coaxed into existence. U

// CULTURE

EDITOR SAMUEL DU BOIS

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

THEATRE //

Pericles is fun and beautiful to watch Samuel Du Bois Culture Editor

The stage of Pericles is an old, dilapidated temple, with crumbling pillars and ripped up floor tiles.

Bowls, statues and other artifacts are strewn about like the rubble itself and at the centre of it all is an altar at which a covered figure chants while the opening music fills the room.

Following this, we meet Cerimon (David Warburton) who has hired a local brothel girl to help him make healing potions to mend the ailing king Pericles. As they work, Cerimon begins to tell the story of how the great king came into such misfortune and suffering, using statues found around the temple as characters and stacked pots for a set.

The experience of watching what is essentially the exposition acted out with puppets is quite a surreal experience, and at first was uncomfortable to watch. Though used for a few good jokes and evidently building on the largely fun tone which was to follow, there was still a bit of an uneasy adjustment period. Thankfully this quickly dispelled when the transition from statues to actors was made and the true brilliance of the set and costume design was brought into full realization.

Within Cerimon’s tale, all of the actors are coated in white, uneven makeup, with an aged quality given to their clothes and props to make them look like the stone figures being used. Similarly, the large sheet, which is used very creatively as everything from a ship to a horse, is patterned in this

Gallery 2.0 has a new look but the rest is familiar

PHOTO SAM BARRINGER/THE UBYSSEY

Samuel Du Bois Culture Editor

The actors are coated in white makeup to make them look like stone figures.

way. It all gives the performance the perspective of being imagined by the brothel girl who sits by and watches as these stone men and women enact a history slowly leading up to her present circumstances.

This is a brilliant device which adds a crucial layer to a production already full of cinematic flare.

Throughout, the lights and music are ever present to accentuate and underline crucial moments, or elaborate on the mystical tone which saturates everything.

Kamyar Pazandeh makes for a strong Pericles who has no trouble

commanding the stage with the kind of presence demanded of an Ancient Greek hero and he is met on all sides by an apt group of actors who never falter in delivering an exuberant, sometimes deliberately hammy rendition of Shakespeare’s play.

Really the biggest issue with the play rests with Shakespeare himself. Pericles never remotely reaches the heights of classics like Hamlet or Othello, and several times comes across as just ridiculous. The last act in particular, one which is evidently intended to be powerfully

PHOTO COURTESY DAVID BLUE

emotional, seems to be as campy and melodramatic as a soap opera.

The good that comes of this is that no one, not even the actors, takes it too seriously, and when the audience laughs at the unintentionally funny, they take it in stride. Since this is a lesser-known play with a much more adventurous, operatic plot, there was less pressure to make something profound. Instead, Pericles is fun and beautiful to watch. U Pericles will be performed until September 18.

Othello disappointed at Bard on the Beach

PHOTO COURTESY DAVID BLUE

Bard on the Beach’s third production of the season was a somewhat modernized version of Othello.

Bard on the Beach’s third production of the season was a somewhat modernized version of Othello that was well enough performed and staged, but still failed to find the greatness of the source material.

The stage, which is shared by the company’s production of Pericles, was decorated like the war-torn ruins of a Greco-style building. This cleverly befits both plays, as Othello has been relocated

AMS //

Gallery 2.0 opened its doors recently to the patronage equivalent of a golf clap.

MORE THEATRE //

Samuel Du Bois Culture Editor

8

from its usual Italian locale to the American Civil War. The new setting had a truly great potential to reshape how each character’s nature and motivation might be interpreted. Iago might suddenly become a bigoted southerner and Othello a man fighting not only for his side of the war, but also his own freedom or equality to his fellows.

It certainly does speak well for Shakespeare that the play can be so seamlessly modernized and remain relevant, though it probably does not speak well of society that most

of the racial themes are entirely relatable to times and places that came hundreds of years after.

The problem is that the only real attempts to draw meaning from the setting lay in a few word changes (such as wine to moonshine) and a change in uniforms. Otherwise this was just Othello with a new coat of paint and little else. In fact, by the end of the first act, it was largely forgotten that the setting was different at all. Whereas The Merry Wives of Windsor wholly embraced its new setting and drew every possible interpretation or joke out of it, Othello remained immensely conservative.

This would have been quite forgivable if the performances had not also been largely unremarkable and quite safe. Othello (Luc Roderique) was played with force, a commanding voice and a physical presence, but that overlooks a very affectionate, fraternal aspect of his personality which other actors have emphasized. When this is done, his tragic downfall becomes all the more affecting because the audience knows how much he loves Iago, right until the end.

It is a quintessential part of the character which played no part here, and made it hard to feel much sympathy.

Iago’s portrayal by Kayvon Kelly was similarly problematic in

that he was always conniving and tricking, with a perpetual dastardly manner whenever he was on stage.

This was not all bad, and there were certainly moments where he was commanding the entire stage quite well. However, Iago’s strength as a character is that he is a man who operates on two levels; he is in appearance a friend to all, “honest Iago,” and one who is so strongly loved by Othello, but he is also revealed in his soliloquies and actions to be a sociopathic liar and manipulator, driven by an immensely diabolical hatred. He must be convincing on both levels, and is best when he almost fools the audience into liking him. Here he was so plainly ill-intentioned that a lot of his complexity was lost and with it his great villainy.

The performance was a good one, that leveraged enough emotion and theatricality to be engaging. That being said, Othello fell short of greatness by failing to interrogate the depth and complexity in both the source material and new setting which it might have made it truly unique. It also did not help matters that the audience could hear The Merry Wives of Windsor playing its raucous musical numbers in the other tent. U Othello will be running until September 17.

In case you missed it, the Gallery 2.0 opened its doors for the first time last Monday. Though a sign at the bottom of the Nest’s stairs announced its arrival, the event was otherwise extremely subdued, and since then it has remained pretty quiet.

Occupying the space formerly held by the doomed Perch, Gallery 2.0 does not look much different from it predecessor, though perhaps with a few extra couches.

In many ways the place appears far better than it has any right to.

The glass light fixtures, amazing rooftop patio and nice-looking furniture make it feel almost too nice to just hang out in, though that is by no means a complaint. Sunsets and the view of the mountains are pretty spectacular and not being underground is always a welcome feature in a club or restaurant.

As for the food and drinks you will get when looking at that impressive view, they are remarkably uninspired. The menu is pretty much a carbon copy of the Pit’s, with only mild alterations. The food is still fine, but one can’t help thinking that they missed a huge opportunity here. The price is still pretty good, with a burger costing $12 and most beers running $5.75 for a pint. It all tastes just fine, but still the lack of difference makes for a bit of an underwhelming experience.

Drinks-wise, the electric long-island ice tea is pretty good, though its resemblance to the source material is a bit distant. The beer menu has a nice spectrum of both craft and conventional beer and the other cocktails seem well done. That being said, the bar is remarkably sparse when it comes to whiskeys and other straight spirits, making Mahoney’s still the place to go for a more traditional and thorough alcohol menu.

The only other complaint is that the kitchen closes at 7, which is not nearly late enough to catch the crowds you might expect the management to be angling for. It might only be the summer hours, but as it is, this means they are losing many good opportunities.

These complaints are relatively minor though, and in the end this is still a great place to hang out, with lots of spots to sit in and some excellent pricing. Whether or not it will become the beloved haunt that the original Gallery was will remain to be seen. U

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

| CULTURE | 9

FOOD //

The ultimate guide to vegan eating in Vancouver Alexis Wolfe Contributor

People are quick to highlight the often exaggerated struggles of surviving comfortably as a vegan or someone eating a mainly plantbased diet. However, what these people fail to realize is that with a little additional research and an awareness of your surroundings, surviving as a vegan in Metro Vancouver is actually quite doable — even enjoyable.

Not only is Vancouver generally quite accommodating, it is also something of a hub for vegan fare, as well as an awareness of food preferences, particularities and allergies (gluten free, raw, nut-free, etc.).

Sure, eating amazing food is not always an option as immediately available for vegans, in comparison to those who are not, but if one is willing to put in a tiny bit of effort, getting by as a vegan is not only simple but also an opportunity to do something positive for one’s health, the planet and animals.

Eating vegan in Vancouver is less about accidental discovery and more about careful planning.

To that end, here are some places to remember for those seeking to pursue a healthy vegan lifestyle.

SUSHI Sushi is undoubtedly the most consistent and dependable food source for vegans living in Vancouver. One can adequately feed oneself at nearly any sushi restaurant. However, a suggestion for above and beyond vegan or vegetarian sushi would be Sushi Gallery at 10th and Alma. Not only is it really close to campus and relatively cheaper than other sushi joints, it is also the host for what could be the most extensive vegan sushi menu around. Options extend far beyond the typical kappa and avocado roll and are accompanied by unlimited self-serve vegan miso soup and tea. Sushi Gallery also keeps a separate prep area for all vegetarian orders.

DIM SUM Following the theme of cheap vegan options, Water80 Dim

PHOTO COURTESY SUZETTE NU

Not only is Vancouver generally quite accommodating, it is also something of a hub for vegan fare, as well as an awareness of food preferences, particularities and allergies.

Sum at Cambie and 12th is a good choice. Water80 is unique in that it is hidden away from the awareness of most vegan UBC students. Located in the City Square Mall, Water80 offers vegan dim sum and soup at a fair price. Five bucks gets you the vegan bamboo shoot, mushroom noodle soup, and for under $7 you can get the vegan dim sum combo — or just get both.

PHO Just one more 99 stop up the hill, Pho Chau Vietnamese Restaurant also comes through for vegans. Similar to Water80, the woman who runs Pho Chau is likely an angel and she pays particular attention making sure the vegetable pho is 100 per cent vegan. Pho Chau is near Main and Broadway and has what is arguably the best vegan pho

broth ever created. This place is cash only but a general expenditure of $710 is likely to satisfy.

LATE NIGHT Another really nice vegan option is Ethiopian food. Harambe, Addis, Gojo, Axum and Fassil Ethiopian Restaurants, all located in East Vancouver, offer some of the best vegan dishes imaginable. While it isn’t the cheapest on the list, with the vegan combo usually coming in around $12.99, it is a lot of food and 100% vegan despite seeming a little too good to be true. Harambe is open until midnight on Friday and Saturday and 11 p.m. every other night, so keep that in mind if you’re out around Commercial Drive one night.

Al Basha is undoubtedly the MVP in terms of feeding desperate vegans after a night out. The vegetable

FILE PHOTO JACK HAUEN/THE UBYSSEY

falafel wrap is only $5.75, and it’s unreal. Most importantly, Al Basha is open until 3 a.m. every single night.

Veggie falafel is typically the most reliable source of sustenance if you are living life and it’s past 11 p.m.

Budgies Burritos on Main and Broadway is also open until midnight, if you’re into that. Budgies is a vegetarian burrito joint where the substitution of dairy (sour cream, cheese) is exchanged at no extra cost for extra guacamole — something to be admired.

Finally, a documentation of vegan late night options cannot be completed without a mandatory inclusion of the Naam. The Naam is an all-vegetarian 24 hour restaurant on MacDonald and 4th where the food and service can be underwhelming but regardless it deserves an honorable mention solely for making vegetarian and vegan food at all hours.

expensive.” Of course, this is entirely false. As I am sure most vegans discover, their meals often end up being the cheapest when compared to their omnivorous counterparts.

For those of us who are practical, it is best to avoid Whole Foods and search the aisles of less pretentious grocery havens.

UBC FOOD TRUCKS The introduction of new food trucks to the UBC campus is both a blessing and a curse.

While the consideration of these food trucks in including vegan options is commendable, this gift is accompanied with the realization that an increased availability of vegan food on campus may destabilize your finances.

It’s About Thai has a vegan option of red or green tofu coconut curry while Roaming Bowl offers a Vietnamese cucumber salad and a veggie teriyaki bowl.

SUNRISE MARKET If you’re ever in Chinatown and feel like it would be nice to buy around five mangoes for one dollar, Sunrise Market will come through. At Powell and Gore Street, Sunrise sells the absolute cheapest produce, tropical fruit and other vegan treasures. The fruit and vegetables typically come with the condition that they be eaten almost immediately but if that was already the plan, you’re set! Also, if $1 bags are something you’re into, look no further.

GROCERY SHOPPING People generally hold the belief that vegan food shopping is expensive and this is likely because they shopped at Whole Foods once, saw the price of a vegan version of a typically non-vegan food and their jaw dropped. For many this confirms the suspicion that being vegan is “too

PERSIA FOODS Any vegan UBC student knows and loves Persia Foods. While there are several locations throughout Vancouver (Commercial, Main), the closest store to UBC is at West Broadway and MacDonald.

Persia Foods is coveted for remarkably cheap produce and holds a place in my heart for their dates and pita bread. Regardless of what “type” of vegan you are, dates, bread and vegetables likely play a central role in your life and Persia Foods always comes through.

So there it is — despite popularized conceptions about the vegan life, eating a plant-based diet is rarely an experience solely involving fresh pressed $8 juice and kale Caesar salad. There are indeed places where vegans and their omnivorous counterparts alike can enjoy food, sometimes it just takes time to figure out where they are. U

10 | CULTURE |

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

DANCE //

EDGE 1 is a spectacular showcase of dance and movement

PHOTO COURTESY J. ALEX BRINSON

The show opened with the Body Narrative Collective’s Here on the Ground, a multidisciplinary narrative exploring the relationship between two friends — Julia and Meghan — and the experiences they have shared.

stood in a slow, anxiety-inducing process. As if to compensate, the woman devoted herself to stacking the remainder of the chairs into a daunting structure. The man destroys. The woman builds.

In the background, Ayn Rand could be heard impassively

declaring her preference for manmade skyscrapers over nature’s creations. The didactics of George Orwell and Claude Levi-Strauss, among others, were also channeled through voice recordings, providing narration and a sense of foreboding. If the ability to evoke

emotion is a sign of great art, then Isaac y Diola excels in keeping the audience in suspense with a mixture of awe and fright up to the very last second, closing off on a literal bang to end off the first night of a spectacular showcase of dance and movement. U

Whether you want to write one article a semester or an article a day, there’s a place for you at The Ubyssey — this paper has survived and thrived since 1918 because it has truly been a student paper, open to any student who wants to take part.

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JOIN US.

AN

The opening night of this year’s Dancing on the Edge festival last Thursday featured an exciting and diverse program with platypuses, large radios and formidable chair towers.

The show opened with the Body Narrative Collective’s Here on the Ground, a multidisciplinary narrative exploring the relationship between two friends — Julia and Meghan — and the experiences they have shared. Taking turns as storyteller, Julia and Meghan pair simple poem-like phrases with precise dance movements as if articulating their sentences with their bodies.

As the women share stories of their pregnancies, aerial dance routines and families, we notice a few recurring themes — striking similarities between the two friends’ life events, platypuses that haunt Julia’s dreams and familiar dance movements returning in different contexts. As the production engages in themes of birth and death as well as love and loss, these motions also cycle and repeat throughout the narrative.

Here on the Ground weaves in and out of flashbacks as Meghan and Julia’s conversation drifts between anecdotes, highlighting different moments in time.

Through the clever use of props and music, the scenes transition seamlessly. At one point, the women even manage to reenact

an aerial dance routine from the ground. The end result is heartwarming and touching, yet light and whimsical.

Former Vancouverite Joshua Beamish of MOVE: The Company immediately took the show in a distinctly different direction with his ensuing solo act New Work. Set to minimal music, the full spotlight was on Beamish as he made his way across the floor in silence with intricate movements and skilled contortions.

Crackling radio sounds accompanied Beamish in his opening and resurfaced near the end of his performance. As the noises intensified, so did Beamish’s actions. Starting out almost uncertain and explorative at first, his movements increased with dizzying frequency and startling resolve, finishing in a climactic flurry.

In the last act, Isaac y Diola piques curiosity from the first moment as the stage lights slowly brightened to reveal an eerie scene of scattered chairs and two unclothed bodies stacked on the ground. Suddenly, one started moving, reaching forward to pull himself out from underneath his female companion who also gains life moments later.

As the two individuals separated to explore the surroundings around them, they left behind discrete traces in a juxtaposition of creation and destruction. The man was immersed in sawing off the legs of the chair upon which he

BR

Karen Wang Contributor

Visit ubyssey.ca/volunteer for more information.

U

THE UBYSSEY

// OPINIONS

EDITOR BAILEY RAMSAY

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

ADMIN //

The Ubyssey’s wish list for Santa Ubyssey Staff

What jolly man is moving up North (from the United States)? Santa of course — Santa Ono. While we warmly welcome our new 15th president to UBC, there are some things that definitely need to change around here. The Ubyssey has kindly taken the time to create a wish list in an attempt to point Ono in the right direction.

Follow through on your promise to engage the university community.

After being named UBC’s president, Ono told the Vancouver Sun he wanted to “engage the entire university community” — something UBC has been known to lack. School spirit is severely wanting with only a few glimmers when it comes to Thunderbird football.

In 2014, The Globe and Mail wrote, “[UBC] has made genuine efforts to improve undergraduate education and achieved one of the lowest student-to-professor ratios in the country. Still, students gave mixed reviews on a national student survey, landing UBC well below average on Canadian students’ overall satisfaction.”

As UBC’s independent student newspaper, we know firsthand just how challenging it is to involve students with topics pertaining to their university. Maybe our jolly

new president will be able to change student life on campus to be more engaging.

Run UBC like a university, not like a business One of the criticisms about Gupta was that he had experience in running businesses, but not universities. And of course we don’t wish for Ono to go the way of Gupta.

Last year, the overwhelming majority of students and faculty were in favour of divestment, but those voices were largely ignored as the Board of Governors voted to not divest from fossil fuels. He’ll have to nudge the Board of Governors in the right direction. They’re starting to take baby steps toward transparency, but they need some encouragement to help them along.

Please provide us with timely interviews We know you’re busy, but it really helps us out when admin (especially the president) don’t leave us hanging for days on end when we request an interview. This was a great start.

Let loose your reindeer on campus Enough with the puppies from the Wellness Centre and mini horses outside the Nest, we want new animals to play with on campus — reindeer. Specifically speaking, we want Rudolph, who will match all of our red noses come the winter rain.

Is Santa the one for the job? We certainly hope so.

Also, we don’t want him to actually get rid of the puppies and the mini horses. We love them all and they can coexist peacefully with the reindeer.

wants to build his UBC following.

For the love of god, we beg of him to please bestow upon us our own cool hashtag — one that comes from the heart.

Actually hear students and implement feedback Especially after last year’s arguably unjustified tuition hike, we have high hopes for the man who stopped a tuition hike at the University of Cincinnati by sacrificing his bonus.

We aren’t asking for that specifically, but a similar crusader sentiment for students would be greatly appreciated.

Twitter also worked wonders for student communication at the University of Cincinnati and he’ll have to keep it up here too if he

Don’t leave UBC for the University of Toronto Santa, you’ve just come to town.

We’ve already lost Stephen Toope and Arvind Gupta to U of T, so please don’t leave us. It’s UBC’s time to take the first place ranking in this country and you may just be the person to lead us there. We personally promise to bake you cookies and bring you milk if you do so.

Sincerely, The Ubyssey U

Positively Sex: De-stress with orgasmic meditation

Daphnee Levesque Contributor

“You take naps, listen to playlists tagged “chill” and procrasturbate on every paper you write, but still find yourself stressed every time exams roll around. Although you’ve been meaning to for a long time, you still haven’t taken up meditation. Maybe you need a more direct approach.

Say, straight for the clitoris?

Orgasmic meditation — or OMing — is a mindfulness meditation practice focused on female pleasure. The name might look like a contradiction as the serene face of the the average meditator doesn’t bring to mind the scrunched-up and sweaty face of the average orgasmer.

Mindfulness meditation, however, doesn’t require a full lotus. It can be practiced during anything from yoga to cleaning to running. Maybe

it was only a matter of time before somebody decided to combine it with sex.

That somebody is Nicole Daedone. In 2004, she founded OneTaste, a company which promotes, teaches about and socializes OMing. In her TedX talk, she described going to a party when she was training to become a Buddhist nun. A stranger took her upstairs and introduced her to the practice that OneTaste now outlines in free YouTube tutorials.

First, she would have taken her pants off and laid on her back on the floor, cushioned by a pillows with her legs “butterflied open.”

Fully clothed and aided by a light, her partner would have begun to describe what he saw. Not judging, not using words like “beautiful” — simply observing. Now, with the thumb of one hand, her partner would cap the introitus or entrance

FILE PHOTO TAISHA MITCHELL/THE UBYSSEY

to her vagina. With the lubed-up tip of an index finger and using no more pressure than he’d put on an eyelid, he’d delicately stroke the upper-left quadrant of her clitoris. The entire process takes 15 minutes, guided with a timer.

The entire time, both of them are focused on the point of connection — his finger on her clitoris. Most women don’t orgasm during while some do, but that’s not the point.

The point is to make space and time for safe sexual touch and the stroker benefits from this as much as the strokee lying splay-legged on the floor. The communication, nonexpectation and non-judgement in OMing are a sharp contrast to the idea of “it is my duty to execute this sexual act to completion.” Living in the moment and savouring sex is, strangely, not part of the typical narrative, but OMing puts that right in the spotlight.

ADVICE //

Ask Natalie: Surviving summer classes

PHOTO COURTESY SAMANTHA HOELSCHER

HEALTH //

Sexual healing did not originate with Marvin Gaye.

11

The very last step of the practice is sharing frames or describing a snapshot moment of a feeling in the session using physical descriptors such as, “I felt warm buzzing from your fingertip.” Some couples report experiencing the same, ineffable physical sensation at the same moment.

OMing is to sex as yoga is to fitness and OneTaste is to OMing as Lululemon is to yoga — from the merchandising, to the accusations of being a cult. The company offers a wide range of products and services from $10 social events, to $195 intro workshops and multiple thousanddollar training, certification and private mansion retreats.

Sexual healing did not originate with Marvin Gaye. Sex releases a whole mess of feel-good chemicals into your brain, raising your pain tolerance and making you feel better on the whole. Orgasmic meditation creates a safe, open and nonjudgemental sexual environment — the kind of environment that’s vital to good sex. It’s the kind of environment that, unfortunately, many people don’t have access to in their daily lives.

Whether you’re dropping thousands on private workshops and mansion retreats or getting your coaching from YouTube, enjoying the journey instead of chugging along to that orgasmic finish line is a great way to experience sex. And hey, you won’t even need your yoga pants.

Shoutout to Adrien Fried for the introduction and the education.

This article wouldn’t exist without you. U

FILE PHOTO JOSH CURRAN/THE UBYSSEY

“There’s a reason I don’t take summer classes and that reason is because of three-hour lectures.”

Natalie Morris Staff Writer

I’m having such a hard time with the long classes in summer school. I’m so unbelievably bored in three-hour lectures and zone out, not retaining any info. Any tips for avoiding this slump and actually learning something?”

Ahh, the joy of summer courses. There’s a reason I don’t take them and that reason is because it’s a three-hour lecture.

They may be the bane of your summer, but maybe they will cut a year off your degree or make your education slightly more affordable.

Hopefully your professor offers mid-lecture breaks in order to make the classes not completely horrific. If not, consider giving yourself a quick break in the middle of the lecture — five minutes or less. Not a huge one as you’re still paying for the class and you don’t want to miss anything important, but it’s important to actually retain the information you’re trying to learn.

Try different types of note taking to see if one works for you better during the summer. Pen and paper? Laptop? Printing off the slides in advance? Try to find the method that works best for you.

Another important thing is to make sure you’re getting enough sleep. Last summer when I was taking summer courses, I would be coming off of a six-hour shift and was often running on less than six hours of sleep. I’m someone who needs their sleep. Inevitably, I would doze off in the middle of class, regrettably multiple times.

Get enough sleep.

Also try to find someone to be your class buddy and make each other accountable for the class. Not only will it make you more likely to actually go to class, but you’ll feel enough peer pressure to at least try to look like you’re paying attention. Yay peer pressure!

Finally — and this probably won’t be helpful at this point but — try to pick a class you’ll find interesting. The best way to stay awake is to actually care.

Good luck for your summer courses and remember to enjoy the sun every once in awhile! U

// SCIENCE

EDITOR KOBY MICHAELS

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

PSYCHOLOGY //

You can change racial bias in older children Koby Michaels Science Editor

We all have biases, whether they are implicit or explicit. New research from UBC showed that it is possible to reduce racial bias in older children.

Previous studies have shown that children develop bias at an early age, is the first of its kind to look at how to reduce racial bias in children, according to a UBC press release. These biases are implicit, meaning they are involved in our attitudes and stereotypes that affect our behaviour and decisions.

The study took 369 white and Asian children between the ages of five and 12. The children were then told four fictional short stories. The first group heard four stories about black individuals contributing positively to their community and a second group heard the same stories except the main character was white. The third group heard happy stories to test whether or not people in a positive mood were more or less bias.

After hearing the story, each child took a test to measure their implicit racial bias that tested how quickly they associated pictures of black and white people with positive or negative words.

In children aged five to eight, there was no reduction in implicit racial bias and they more quickly associated negative words with

FILE PHOTO JOSH CURRAN/THE UBYSSEY

Racial biased can be completely “wiped away” in kids nine to 12.

black people and positive words with white people.

However, in kids aged nine to 12 the results were more heartening.

This age group showed only showed an implicit racial bias when they heard the story about the white character. When they heard the story about the black character benefiting their community, they did not show a racial bias — they had no racial preference. The third group of kids, the ones who heard happy stories, showed the same racial bias the the group who heard stories about a white character.

“In nine to 12 year olds it not only reduced their race bias, it wiped it away,” said Andrew Baron, research supervisor and an associate professor of psychology at UBC. This suggests that older kids can have their racial bias reduced or

eliminated by telling them positive stories of marginalized groups.

The study’s lead author, Antonya Gonzalez, a graduate student at UBC’s department of psychology said, “This study suggests that if we want to start having a conversation about reducing implicit racial bias in adults, we need to intervene in the minds of children when prejudice first starts to take root.”

The research does offer some hope into reducing peoples, especially children’s bias. In light of this, and previous work done in Baron’s lab, the psychologists think the way we teach children about discrimination could have a huge effect.

“The most potent way to educate and change society is to create circumstances where kids of privilege can experience

discrimination,” said Baron. “That kind of emotional experience is really important for kids to deal with and internalize to understand that discrimination is not just something that other people do, or that’s in our history book, but that it’s something we all have the potential to do.”

Changing bias in adults requires repeated, sustained intervention, and just acknowledging these biases can be a powerful first step.

“I really invite anyone who is interested in understanding unconscious race bias to take this test that’s freely available by Harvard University,” said Baron.

“It’s a great resource just to start the conversation to say, ‘look, there is unconscious bias, that doesn’t mean you act on it all the time but it is there.’”

Baron also suggested that thinking of bias as “implicit, automatic, split-second decisions that people” is important. “When we start to think of bias that way, we need to think about how early does it form in development and when is the best time to try and change it,” he said.

“In all of my research I’ve come to the conclusion that we’ve all got unconscious racial bias. The next question is, what do you do with that knowledge? The origins of this seems to be, from other work of mine, is that we are born to prefer what is familiar.”

This research was done at UBC’s Living Lab at Science World. U

MENTAL HEALTH //

BC physicians not providing minimum treatment for half of patients with depression

ILLUSTRATION AIKEN LAO/THE UBYSSEY

Half of patients in the province diagnosed with depression who seek help from a physician are receiving inadequate care.

David Nixon Contributor

Depressed British Columbians may not be receiving the care they need.

Half of patients in the province diagnosed with depression who seek help from a physician are receiving inadequate care. The other half are receiving the minimum adequate treatment, according to a new UBC study.

“We’ve always suspected that there are a lot of people that are not getting enough care for their depression,” said PhD candidate Joseph Puyat, the study’s coauthor. “But it’s only now using the data we have that we were able to quantify the magnitude of the problem.”

The researchers reviewed health data from almost 110,000

British Columbians diagnosed with depression by physicians between 2010 and 2011. Their possible treatments fell into two categories: talk therapy or drug therapy.

Minimum care for talk therapy is four sessions while minimum care for antidepressants is 12 weeks. The researchers found 13 per cent of patients in psychotherapy received a minimum level of care, compared to 47 per cent of patients in drug therapy. Overall, 53 per cent of patients received minimum care.

Puyat is quick to point out that his research doesn’t tell the whole story. The opposite of inadequate care is not optimal or even adequate care, his research has nothing to do with treatment outcomes. A 2012 Statistics Canada report found that only six of 10 people with depression in Canada are even in contact with the healthcare system.

“So if I extrapolate my findings to those six people, it’s not 50 per cent who aren’t receiving the minimum treatment, it’s more like 30 per cent,” said Puyat, who also noted that more won’t be diagnosed with depression, often because of stigma associated with mental illness.

“None of us are surprised that only half of people are getting even minimally accepted level of treatment, unfortunately,” said Raymond Lam, a UBC professor and psychiatrist at the Djavad

Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health. “It’s something we still see all the time, people are just not getting evidence-based treatments or appropriate levels of treatment.”

Lam points out that while Puyat’s study is an important piece of the puzzle, it’s limited by physician data.

Physicians are the go-to stop for antidepressant treatment but “most people getting counseling or psychotherapy for depression are getting it from psychologists, social workers, or other mental health professionals.”

But Canada’s Medical Service Plan does not cover visits to mental health professionals as it does for physiotherapists, unless prescribed one. Referral visits can have wait times, ranging from months to a year. Paying for psychotherapy can cost around $150 a visit.

Before 2008, physician-led psychotherapy was more rare.

Family physicians in Canada are paid by the visit, and visits with depressed patients cost money because they take longer than average. Plus, physicians were only allowed to bill four sessions of psychotherapy per patient per year, which only just meets that minimum standard of care.

In recognition of these factors, B.C. launched an $8 million community-based mental health initiative in 2008. Under this initiative, physicians would be paid an annual sum for each patient for

whom they assumed the role of primary mental health caregiver.

The initiative also allowed physicians to bill eight sessions instead of four. Family physicians are also increasingly being trained in cognitive behaviour therapy.

Lam and Puyat agree things are getting better, but they said it’s far from enough. In 1990, depression was the fourth leading cause of disability. In 2000, it was third. By 2013, it was second. In 2008, the Toronto-based Centre for Addiction and Mental Health published a study saying mental illness in general costs Canadians $51 billion a year.

Puyat said his research indicates provinces must review their mental health care systems and how patients access them.

He also urged that better data must be collected. Treatments of depression aren’t often measuredbased, meaning physicians are often compensated for reporting a depressed patient’s visit, not the outcome of the visit. And patients can cease treatment without a word, leaving it unknown whether their symptoms improved or worsened.

The study was published on March 24, 2016, in The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry.

Puyat is now studying the B.C. community-based mental health initiative to see if it has been successful in improving treatment outcomes. U

12

MEW? //

New dwarf planet found near Neptune with UBC’s help

PHOTO COURTESY ALEX PARKER/OSSOS TEAM

The yellow ellipse marks the orbit of the new dwarf planet.

Joshua Azizi Staff Writer

A new dwarf planet orbiting near Neptune has been discovered by an international team of researchers, including astronomers from UBC. The dwarf planet — currently designated as 2015 RR245 — was found using the Canada-FranceHawaii Telescope on the summit of Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano in Hawaii. The telescope took three photos at hourly intervals focusing on a certain point in the sky near Neptune. These photos revealed a previously-unidentified bright dot that moved slightly to the right after each shot. This discovery was made by the Outer Solar System Origins Survey (OSSOS), which scans through the solar system to discover transNeptunian objects such as dwarf planets.

“This is the biggest object we have seen in three years of searching,” said Brett Gladman, a professor of astronomy at UBC involved in the research.

Although not much information can be confirmed about RR245 this early in the research phase, Gladman predicts that its surface mostly consists of various different kinds of ices — methane, ammonia, water — and its diameter is about 700 kilometres, which is about a third of the size of Pluto and less than a tenth of the size of Earth.

What’s perhaps most noticeable about RR245 is its massive orbit — it is currently estimated that it takes around 700 years for it to complete one rotation around the sun. This means that it goes out pretty far away from the sun, thus leading to some pretty intense temperature changes.

“There’s a huge temperature difference between its closest approach from the sun and its furthest distance from the sun, so it’s going to be interesting to try and study the surface of this object,” said Gladman. He estimates that it will reach its closest distance to Earth in 2096.

After Gladman and the rest of OSSOS get a better understanding of the orbit which the dwarf planet takes, they can submit a proper name for the planet to the International Astronomical Union.

“The precise orbit isn’t known yet and therefore depending on which type of orbit it is, we would use a different naming scheme.”

Whether or not you can play Pokemon Go on this planet is currently unknown, but if there’s anywhere that you’re going to find Mew, it’s there. U

// SPORTS+REC

EDITOR OLAMIDE OLANIYAN

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

OLYMPICS //

Record number of UBC athletes heading to Rio Lucy Fox Staff Writer

Sitting in the shadows of the stands at Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre, a mass of black, white and red jackets stand out amidst a sea of Thunderbird blue and yellow.

Quiet and calm compared to the chaotic snaps of cameras and the bustle of media, university dignitaries, coaches, friends and family, the group has an air of anticipation about them, as if trying to contain their excitement. Who are they? They are a fraction of the 29 UBC athletes heading to Rio de Janeiro to compete in the 2016 Summer Olympics.

“This is a record-setting contingent, the largest delegation of any Canadian university,” said UBC President Santa Ono. “I dare say, maybe one of the largest delegations in the world. I’m incredibly proud.”

This year, UBC is sending an impressive number of student athletes to the games, alongside another 17 UBC community members that will make up some of the coaching, management and support staff, medical and paramedical teams, and Canadian Olympic Committee members in Rio. What’s more, many are heading to their first ever Olympic games, and the significance of the trip is not lost on those within the T-Bird ranks or among their supporters.

“There is nothing like the Olympic games. Those of you who have been there know that.

They are magical,” said Canadian Olympic Committee president, Olympian, and former UBC rower Tricia Smith.

She also paraphrases the founder of the International Olympic Committee: “Pierre de Coubertin spoke about the most important thing in life is not the triumph, but the struggle, and the essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well, and that is the magic of the games. Every single person there, over 10,000 athletes, every single person in every single sport from almost every country in the world is there to fight well. To be their absolute best in that 17 days.”

Whether you are in the pool, on the field, track, court or water, as Smith said, “Take your story, put it out there on that day, and we’ll be cheering for you.”

Among those heading to the games is UBC alumni and captain of the Canadian women’s swimming team Martha McCabe.

Rio will be McCabe’s second Olympics, after she placed fifth in the 200m breaststroke in London four years ago. Last year, the Toronto native earned a silver medal in the same event at the Pan-Am games in her hometown.

A 2012 UBC graduate, McCabe solidified her spot on Canada’s

GRAPHIC SAM BARRINGER/THE UBYSSEY

29 UBC athletes are headed to the Rio 2016 Olympics, the largest delegation of any Canadian university.

team for Rio in early April after placing second at the Canadian Olympic Trials. Just one month later, she was named swim team captain for the games.

A veteran amongst the UBC Rio contingent, McCabe is a proud member of the UBC Athletics family. Speaking in front of fellow swimmers Emily Overholt and Erika SeltenreichHodgson, McCabe praised the support network not only in the Thunderbird swim team, but amongst the sports community at the university.

“So many people ask me, ‘How is it possible that you athletes not only hold it together, but excel in those moments where you’re all alone in that spotlight?’ Well, my answer is that we don’t …

Approaching your lane before a race and feeling alone can be scary. It’s uncomfortable, it’s stressful, and it definitely doesn’t bode well for a good race. But I can honestly say that never, in all my years swimming at UBC … have I felt alone in the times that it’s mattered most,” McCabe said.

“UBC is not just a support system for us, it’s really our family of excellence, and it helps build who were going to be and who we are for the rest of our lives.”

Outside of the pool, another trio to look out for during the

games are race walkers Inaki Gomez, Ben Thorne and Evan Dunfee. They make up threefourths of Canada’s men’s race walking team that competed at the 2016 IAAF World Race Walking Team Championships in May. Last year, Thorne won bronze in the 20km race walk at the IAAF World Championship, while Dunfee currently holds the Canadian record in 50km race walk and Gomez regained the Canadian record for 20km.

Currently, the three of them are ranked 16th (Dunfee), seventh (Gomez) and fifth (Thorne) in the 20km race. As a team — adding their fourth member Mathieu Bilodeau into the conversation — the Canadian boys earned silver in the the IAAF World Race Walking Team Championships in Rome this year.

On the other hand, Olympic first-timers like Taylor Curran are looking forward to their first run at an Olympic gold in Brazil. A fellow Vancouver native, Curran has 105 senior team caps since making his debut in 2009. The 24 year-old competed in his first Commonwealth Games just two years ago, and was a part of the silver medal-winning team in the Pan Am Games just last year in Toronto. He might also be one of the newest UBC graduates on

the team, having just earned his Bachelor’s of Applied Science in Civil Engineering, with a minor in Commerce, this past May. When asked how he’s feeling about the upcoming games, Curran said, “I’m really excited. We just had the announcement a few days ago, so it’s all becoming real pretty quick. But yeah, super excited.”

These, among others, represent a diverse and passionate group of UBC athletes heading to the games in August. From wheelchair rugby to sailing, from coaching staff to Canadian Olympic committee members, the ‘Birds head to Rio with an incredible number of UBC family members alongside them.

“As the 29 and counting of us move from Vancouver to Rio and pour our hearts out at the games, we’ll have our UBC family by our side,” McCabe said. “Sometimes physically, always spiritually, and I think that’s something we can all be proud of.”

As UBC VP Students Louise Cowin said, “When sports fans fix their eyes on Brazil this summer for the Rio 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games, they will not only see the red and white of the Canadian maple leaf, but also the deep blue of UBC and the blue and gold of the UBC Thunderbirds.” U

13

BOATY MCRUDEFACE //

UBC dragon boaters interrupted by yacht Isabelle Commerford Staff Writer

On June 18, members of UBC’s dragon boat team, UBC Thunder, participated in the first day of races at the annual Concord Pacific Dragon Boat Festival.

Lower mainland teams were joined at False Creek by others from around the globe to celebrate a weekend of dragon boat racing. The festival involved live music and vendors for nearly 200 teams in attendance.

At the closing of Saturday’s race day, the UBC Thunder had their women competing in their Guts & Glory 2,000 metre event. The 14 participating teams raced from Science World to the Cambie Street Bridge and back.

On their way there, a chartered yacht interrupted the course despite the area being marked for recreational use for the weekend.

“It was dangerous for the paddlers and those who were on the boats,” said Andrea Ho, a member of the UBC team watching the incident. “I was pretty worried and upset about it.”

Another member of the team participating in the race, Alison Lim, said, “Our team felt that the boat operator interrupted the race out of spite even though the race officials had given them a warning that the race was in progress.”

“The water safety teams responded quickly, calmly and efficiently,” said Lim. With the safety of the racers at stake, water safety teams responded immediately by stopping the race to alert the boat of its intrusion. Incoming boats were expected to remain west of the Cambie Street Bridge or otherwise yield to any nonmotorized vessels. The dragon boats were halted and directed back to the beginning after finding their course blocked.

Footage of the incident has since been sent to police for further investigation. A charter yacht disturbing a hand-paddled boat’s path violates Canadian Shipping Regulation dictating that it is the job of the more maneuverable vessel to make way.

The dragon boats themselves were released from the starting line in ten second intervals in order to avoid congestion. It is the fastest time that determines the winner of the women’s 2,000 metre Guts & Glory, not the first to cross the finish line.

Despite the interruption, UBC Thunder managed to place third in the race after it was released.

“I think I speak for all of our women when I say that I couldn’t feel prouder of how far we’ve come as a team,” said Lim. “It’s a sport that involves everyone, and there’s always encouragement and feedback amongst the team,” added Ho. “I can easily say that joining UBC Thunder was one of the best decisions that I’ve made during my post-secondary career,” said Lim. U

14 | SPORTS+REC |

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

RECREATION //

Places to Be: Tranquil mornings at Buntzen Lake Kelsea Franzke Contributor

I look out of the window from my bed to be greeted with dew coating the glass and dark foggy skies. It’s mid-July, but I swear it could be October. In the dark, I pull on my wool socks and rain jacket, and head out the door all while trying to wake myself up. I’m using a tremendous amount of effort to avoid spilling my tea.

Late last night when we spoke about canoeing at Buntzen Lake, it seemed like a fantastic idea. I’ve been looking forward to a day spent at the lake in the sunshine with some good friends for quite some time. Now, driving down the highway at 7 a.m. with heavy rain sprinkling on the windshield, I realize that my desired day at the lake won’t be fulfilled today and can’t help but feel a little disappointed as we drive.

Fortunately, my negative thoughts disperse when we take a quick detour to White Pine Beach at Sasamat Lake, just 15 minutes from Buntzen. Apart from a few dogs and their owners going for their morning walks, the beach is quiet and the water is calm. There’s a trail through the trees to the left of the beach that we follow around the lake, stopping every so often to snap photos of the heavy branches and green water.

About 20 minutes in, we arrive at a

bridge which carries us to the other side of the lake.

Connected to the bridge are small docks jutting out into the water, dedicated fishermen sat upon it with their bait buckets and flannel jackets. The quiet scene seems to be disturbed by our presence, so we keep walking, attempting to hush our voices and muffle our footsteps as much as possible. Once we make our way back to the beach, the three of us head to the truck and are soon on our way again.

We arrive at Buntzen Lake and begin the arduous process of taking the canoe off the truck — not an easy task for one person who’s five-foot-two, one person with a hurt shoulder and the last getting annoyed at the incompetency of the other two. When we finally have the canoe down and in the water, we grab our life jackets, a couple of snacks and are ready for smooth sailing.

As we slowly paddle through the placid water, a certain tranquility washes over us. The surrounding mountains loom overhead with mist rising from the treetops and the clouds suspended in the air are starting to burn away from the sun. As we drift, I feel my skin becoming damp from the morning fog and the cool water droplets being splashed in by the paddles, but my body feels warm.

PHOTO KELSEA FRANZKE/THE UBYSSEY

It’s mid-July, but I swear it could be October.

I’m not sure if the warmth is radiating from my burning muscles as I paddle or simply from how content I feel to be surrounded by my friends in this captivating setting.

Either or, my mind is at ease and my heart feels full. We continue to paddle farther and farther away from the beach and when I turn around, the dock appears to have been swallowed by the fog. We’re floating in the middle of the lake, surrounded solely by water, flora and the sound of our voices.

Looking through the lens of my camera, I feel as though it’s

impossible to take a bad photograph here. The colours are subdued yet crisp and the backdrop of the water and mountains act as the perfect canvas. The camera shutter seems to carry over the water, echoing back to us as if a reminder to take photos, but to leave everything as is — something we should all keep in mind when venturing out into the natural world.

We finally decide to head back when we hear the splashing of people jumping off the dock.

Although it’s an overcast day that feels like it could be the middle

of fall, I can’t deny the sounds of summer when I hear screams of delight and the splashing of water.

With my feet back on solid ground, I slowly walk away from the dock with paddles in hand and a smile on my face.

Although the weather may not be what I initially had hoped for, there’s nothing I would change. From the fishermen on the dock in the morning, to the icy water splashing in the canoe, everything felt right. It’s not everyday that one gets to spend a quiet morning drifting in a canoe in the middle of Buntzen Lake. U

UNDER THEIR FEATHERS //

New Aquatic Centre finally coming together

The new Aquatic Centre is projected to cost $39.9 million.

Marcus Yun Contributor

Soon there will be another new building opening its doors on campus.

As many may have noticed, UBC’s new Aquatic Centre has begun to take shape in recent months. The current Aquatic Centre — built in 1978 — was very modern at the time of its erection.

But by today’s standards, the

facility may seem outdated.

The main difference between the current Aquatic Centre and the new one will be that the new facility will carry four separate tanks to accommodate different levels and purposes of swimmers simultaneously. The increase in the number of tanks is a tremendous improvement in comparison to the two tanks that the current one holds. According to Stephane Delisle — the senior manager of

PHOTO JEREMY JOHNSON-SILVERS/THE UBYSSEY

Programs and Operations of the UBC Aquatic Centre — having only two tanks “limits our ability with respect to programming when you’re talking community servicing.” The new facility will also introduce a gender neutral/ universal changing room, which the old one lacks.

While many features are being added to the Aquatic Centre, there are a few things that will be taken away in the transition from the old

facility. The new Aquatic Centre will not feature a weight room.

According to Delisle “the focus of the design for the new Aquatic Centre was very much on aquatics.”

Without funding, the steam and sauna room also faces exclusion.

However, Delisle said that the work has been done to ensure that the steam and sauna will be able to be installed with ease once funding is received in the future.

Fortunately for many students, the mezzanine will be a continued feature. So yes, students will still be able to sleep in the Aquatic Centre.

The budget for the project has been revealed to be $39.9 million.

“That came from the fact that we needed to accommodate a new modern facility that met our needs, but also we didn’t need to have a grand massive space,” said Delisle. He also mentioned in an email that funding is to be raised through “land development cost of sales as a community amenity expense, donor fundraising and Infrastructure Impact Charges.”

Delisle stated that the biggest obstacle in building the new Aquatic Centre was the space management and “making it work with the long-term planning of the campus, fitting in the bus loop and all those kinds of things.”

According to Delisle, there will be “a short transition period where both facilities will be running and move smoothly into the new pool … then the plan would be that the current aquatic centre would be demolished, recycled ... then McInnis field will be rebuilt in the site of the current Aquatic Centre”.

When a building is under construction on campus, the question of why they are building it always exists. For the new Aquatic Centre, the reason was simple: “We have the want to expand the opportunity for people to have an aquatic experience whether it is a leisure experience, whether it is a recreational or whether it is a workout experience. We want a community environment with people socializing, exercising and recreating in that space,” said Delisle. It is believed that the goal is to fulfill the needs of not only students and faculty, but also the needs of the city.

The opening of the new Aquatic Centre will greatly improve the training situation for UBC’s varsity swim team as well. With the current Aquatic Centre — there is only one tank, excluding the hot tub — that must be shared amongst varsity athletes and people who just want to have a nice workout or have fun. The increase in the number of tanks in the new Aquatic Centre makes it seems like a much more convenient situation will be put in place for the varsity swim team.

“In working closely with the coaching staff, they’re excited about the fact that we will have a 50m tank that at times can be dedicated to high performance training, yet we can still have other people in the pool. So we can accommodate different client groups simultaneously in the new pool,” said Delisle. The new Aquatic Centre will also be able to host large scale events such as national championships. U

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

| SPORTS+REC | 15

SOFTBALL //

Words by ‘Birds: Challenging the third strike and fouling off life’s curveballs Quinn Dhaliwal Contributor

Quinn Dhaliwal was a student and Thunderbird who has just completed her four years at UBC this spring.

In her second year, UBC softball launched a lawsuit against UBC after it lost its varsity status — and won. She captained the team in her senior season.

And just like that, it was done.

Gone in a blink of an eye. Four of the most amazing, challenging and rewarding years of my life.

My years spent as a Thunderbird varsity athlete came to an end this past April.

I started playing softball when I was five years old and have been playing ever since. That’s 16 years of playing a game that I absolutely love. I can still remember that day in grade 12 when Dad picked me up from my high school history class with a Subway sandwich in hand. He was ready to drive me from Delta to Vancouver for my university tour with my coach and future teammates. Before I knew it, we were at UBC. Everything about softball has helped shape me into the woman I am today. My years at UBC have certainly been the most memorable years in my sporting career. Softball is one game that is loaded with constant failures, but it has given me some of the biggest successes of my life. You spend so many of your days committed to your sport as a varsity athlete that you never really believe that it’ll ever come to an end.

But in my second year, my fate as a Thunderbird was put into question after a UBC broadcast email announced that the softball team would be cropped from UBC athletics. I can still remember everything so vividly about that day. I was standing in my Fairview apartment with one of my teammates and we both opened and read the email together. We couldn’t even believe it. We read the words over and over again, but they didn’t sink in.

So many questions flooded my brain. How was this fair? How could they just cut us? Did they understand what this would mean for all of us? I remember feeling completely numb. Betrayed. Hurt. I couldn’t and didn’t want the words to be true. I remember it didn’t

PHOTO SAM BARRINGER/THE UBYSSEY

“In all honesty, sometimes it was hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

seem real until later that day. I was walking to meet my friend for coffee at the Starbucks in the Old SUB and people were staring at me and saying sorry. Even people I didn’t know, offering me apologetic stares. People I did know, came up to me and gave me long hugs. Then it became real and sunk in. My life as a softball player, everything I was, my passion and what I thought my future would hold for my last two years as a Thunderbird could be over.

Our head coach gathered us in for a team meeting that day.

After our meeting was over — it was filled with some tears and lots of confusion and questions — the decision was unanimous.

We weren’t giving up without a fight. It was a strange feeling to be representing your university as an athlete, but realizing that your own university had deemed your team as an unwanted part of the Thunderbird family.

We played games and travelled to different softball parks not fully knowing if that would be the last time we would be wearing “UBC” across our chest. Our head coach would come to practices completely exhausted from

PHOTO SAM BARRINGER/THE UBYSSEY

comprising a five-year plan that proved we had the ability to fund ourselves. We also filed a lawsuit against the university in opposition to their decision to cut us from athletics.

We never wanted monetary value in the lawsuit, all we wanted was for softball to remain a sport at UBC. It wasn’t even just thoughts of our own softball careers coming to an end that made our fire and hope stay alive — it was the lives of hopeful softball players that wanted to attend UBC. Eliminating softball at UBC would mean one less post-secondary institution that young softball players could add to their list.

Getting softball back to its varsity status was a rollercoaster filled with many highs and lows of emotions. Just when it seemed like it could truly happen, another decision was put in opposition against us. I remember biking back from practice just after one of our 6:30 a.m. gym practices at War Memorial. A gentleman yelled outside of his car window, “Go UBC softball! I’m rooting for you all!” I’ll never forget that moment.

We had support from so many different varieties of people — fellow softball teams within our conference, fellow varsity teams in UBC, women’s leadership groups, our families and alumni.

It constantly gave us hope. In all honesty, sometimes it was hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. What I mean by this is that it wasn’t easy playing softball not knowing if my fellow teammates and I could ever finish our eligibility at UBC. Not knowing if I ever would get to become a senior. Would the start of the most amazing years of our life be cut short? During my second and third year, every time I went up to bat or ran from the dugout to my position to second base, I began treating every game like it could be my last.

During practice in the April of my third year, our coach called us all in during batting practice.

We all were gathered around the field, some of us shagging balls or

up to bat and the pitchers were off to the side with the catchers.

He had been on the phone for the first 20 minutes of practice. We huddled around the coach and I just remember the biggest smile forming across his face. “We made it,” he said. “We’re back in varsity status.”

Being an athlete at UBC was full of many unexpected moments.

Obviously, the biggest one was softball getting cut from athletics.

However, that doesn’t at all define my years as a Thunderbird.

If anything, it makes me smile thinking about the adversity we overcame together.

I’ll never forget that moment. It came true, everything we had been working towards for the past two years was finally true. We hugged, we smiled and we were officially reinstated. It was true, it wasn’t just false hope anymore. It was easy for us to accept our fate without a fight. But we didn’t. Instead, we never gave up and look at where that brought us. Softball was rightfully brought back as a varsity sport at UBC. We did it and we did it together as a family.

I finished my senior year as captain of the softball team this past spring. Four of the most memorable years of my softball career finally came to an end. In this closing chapter, the program

experienced so many amazing milestones. We gained access to our first-ever home field at Softball City in South Surrey. We also played our first season in the Cascade Collegiate Conference. It still doesn’t feel real that it’s over.

I will be forever in debt by how much the sport of softball has given me, especially my years at UBC. Every day before I played a game as a Thunderbird, I would read the quote by women’s world cup winner Mia Hamm that said, “Somewhere beyond the athlete you’ve become, the hours of practice and the coaches who have pushed you, is the little girl who fell in love with the game and never looked back. Play for her.” It’s something I always lived by as an athlete. If you don’t love the sport with your whole heart, you won’t be truly playing for yourself.

Being an athlete at UBC was full of many unexpected moments. Obviously, the biggest one was softball getting cut from athletics. However, that doesn’t at all define my years as a Thunderbird. If anything, it makes me smile thinking about the adversity we overcame together. I’ll miss everything about the game of softball. The seventh-inning walk off hits, the laughs during practice, the early morning weights, the awful tan lines, the feeling of dirt against your cleats and everything else in between.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned during my years here at UBC as a softball player, it’s that one shouldn’t look at any challenge as a called third strike. You control your own fate. Life will always throw you curveballs, but it’s how you foul them off that shows your true character.

It’s time to begin the next chapter in my life. Being an athlete at UBC has given me lifelong friends in my teammates and life lessons learned from overcoming obstacles in a hard practice.

It’s given me an education I’m passionate about and it’s even brought me love. I’ll forever be a Thunderbird, but it’s time for this bird to fly into new horizons. U

16 | GAMES+COMIC |

TUESDAY, JULY 26, 2016

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CROSSWORD PUZZLE ACROSS 1- Scrub (a mission); 6- Not as much; 10- Queue after Q; 14- Echolocation; 15- Thought; 16- Over-50 org.; 17- 1985 Kate Nelligan film; 18- Island feast; 19- Long and Peeples; 20- Founder of Detroit; 22- One who carries a golfer’s clubs; 24- ___ Raton; 25- Wandering; 26- Night flight; 30- Brouhaha; 32- Not “fer”; 33- Blueprint detail, for short; 35- ___ Gras; 40- Buzzard food; 42- Radiators; 44- Computer key; 45- Greek portico; 47- Would ___ to you?; 48- Car; 50- Key in again; 52- Introduction; 56- Breathe hard; 58- In and of ___; 59- Difficult problem; 64- ___ she blows!; 65- Crazy as ___; 67- ___ Camera; 68- Actress Sofer; 69- Of Thee ___; 70- Dudley Do-Right’s org.; 71- Part of QED; 72- Governs; 73- Lock openers;

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DOWN 1- Just ___!; 2- Gaucho’s weapon; 3- Like a line, briefly; 4- Wife of a rajah; 5- Hat; 6- Light purple; 7- Send to school; 8- Where the buoys are; 9- Intoxicated; 10- Abbreviated time off; 11- You ___ mouthful!; 12- Habituate; 13- Unexpected victory; 21- Silt deposit; 23- Smell, usually a pleasant one; 26- Speed contest; 27- Alaska’s first governor; 28- Grime; 29- Suffix with exist; 31- Cuatro doubled; 34- Over here!; 36- Squabbling; 37- Be dependent; 38- Faucet fault; 39- Psychiatrist’s response; 41- Thin as ___; 43- Wages; 46- Garden’s necessity; 49- Biased; 51- List ender; 52- Brit’s bottle measure; 53- Old anesthetic; 54- Yoga posture; 55- Clear of vermin; 57- Make up; 60- “Star Trek” captain; 61- Chantilly product; 62- TV award; 63- Emulates Eminem; 66- Baton Rouge sch.; COURTESY KRAZYDAD.COM