Edmonton and Change: Not a Match Made in Heaven

If Edmonton were a person, it would be about average. Maybe around 5 foot 8, 170 pounds, definitely male. He might drive a truck, probably with rims, but hopefully he doesn’t have any truck balls hanging off of it (we are in Alberta, after all). He votes for the Conservative party, if he votes at all, because he quite enjoys the status quo. Change scares him. He may rant and rave online about city politics, but he really just likes to pretend that he knows what he is talking about, and would never attend a mayoral forum. He is content with his life, his job, and his city. He likes driving to work, skiing on the weekends, and watching the hockey game with a pint of Keiths. He tells everyone he hates his brother, Calgary, but he really doesn’t give two shits and just says it because everyone else does. Edmonton doesn’t go to City Hall to look at the City Centre Redevelopment Proposals, because Edmonton just doesn’t care.

Edmonton’s issue is that a virus is slowly invading him. Let’s call her Change. Change sees potential in Edmonton, and like a girl who has never had a boyfriend before, thinks that she can transform him. Change values education, sustainability, and community living. Change wants Edmonton to exchange his truck in for a Prius, but for reasons she does not understand cannot get him to do so. Change frequents the Art Gallery of Alberta, supports local musicians, and values education. Change visits City Hall and ponders long and hard over which conceptual design is best for her city, which she sees so much potential in. Change could go a long way, but Edmonton is holding her back. The struggle between the two will likely end in Change finding another city that is better suited for her needs, and Edmonton staying the same. There is a glimpse of hope for Edmonton to give in to Change, and to slowly accept her ideas and values, but it doesn’t seem likely.

Starbucks announces its fat older brother

I'm going to extend a hearty thank you to Starbucks, for showing us once again what a gluttonous and disgusting society we are. The coffee company recently announced its new size...the Trenta. Though it sounds more like a pro wrestler than a drink size, you won't be able to wear any figure-revealing spandex after drinking this bad boy: expect your body to reveal one mad food-baby, because the contents of the Trenta are actually larger than the capacity of an average stomach.

The Trenta is 31 ounces, or 916 ml. The average capacity of an adult stomach is 900 ml. What could we possibly need a drink that is larger than our stomachs for?! Not only is the Trenta almost 4 times larger than the smallest Starbucks size (a "short"), but it can hold an entire bottle of wine (at an average of 750ml) with room to spare!

And just when you thought the North American obesity problem couldn't get any worse...

Things that need to be shared

I came across this blog while doing some travel research.

Taken from http://monkinthailand.blogspot.com/2008/01/how-do-you-pronounce-phuket.html.

This is why I couldn't survive in Thailand:

"THAILAND, WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 9, 2008

How do you pronounce Phuket?

Phuket pronunciation...

Endless schoolboyish giggles surround the pronunciation of Phuket, and indeed Phi Phi, while everyone is mystified by the new Bangkok Airport - Suvarnabhumi.

Phuket is my home, so I get a bit annoyed sometimes by people saying Fookit or FooKet or anything else with an F sound. There is no F in Phuket, but the transliteration of Thai words is sometimes nearly impossible. You can see signs in Phuket to the same places with slightly different spellings. The "Ph" in Phuket is a hard P sound, but not as hard as a normal "P", slightly softer with undertones of "B"...The island was once called Bukit, which is Malay for "hill".

No F'ing please (although I guess that could apply if talking about Nadi Phuket), the correct pronunciation of Phuket is "Poo-ket", though as I say, the P is softened slightly, the K can sound more like a G and indeed the final T is not a hard T either. Easy, huh.

Oh, and Phi Phi is "Pee Pee", which could be funny if you are 6 years old, like Phuket there is no F in Phi Phi. Oh, and Phi does not mean ghost.

What of the airport - Suvarnabhumi, Suwanapoom is how you pronounce it. The V is a W, the R is silent and the BH is a P. With 4 M's and a silent Q.

Happy New Year from Fookit.

Jamie"

Thinking Ahead

The gates open, and they're off! Hundreds of them pushing and shoving to get through the entrance, determined looks on their faces, each one claims a spot - a small victory - a big payoff for the waiting, the preparation, the stress.

A marathon? A concert? A sample sale?

No. Libraries during finals season.

As I struggled to find a spot in Rutherford today I realized that April will be here soon enough, and with it will return the competition for the best seats around. In my first few years of University I attempted to study at Starbucks during finals, until I finally tried out the library and realized (gasp!) that I could actually read a chapter of my textbooks in less than 5 hours if I wasn't surrounded by friends to chat with and coffee shop noises to distract me. Since then I've picked my favourite study hole: Med Sci. However, this comes with new challenges, such as being run over by stampeding pre-med students on Sunday morning at opening time. My first such experience was overwhelming: I watched people bolt through the doors, throw their mittens down the central atrium to claim tables three floors below, and elbow each other for the cubicles under the skylights.

This year I will prepare myself in advance. Maybe I should start breathing exercises and yoga to prepare myself from the stress of fighting the crowds. I could always purchase new runners and be the first through the doors. Perhaps I could take self-defense classes, stick my elbows out, and fight my way to victory.

Or maybe, just maybe...I'll go back to Starbucks. Because the fact that I'm stressed about it two months in advance just doesn't seem worth it.

Do you want fries with that degree?

Ok, I get it: having a degree is commonplace. My Bachelor of Arts means little more to employers than anyone else's. A Masters is the new Bachelors, and a Bachelors is the new High School Diploma. As someone who is on the verge of graduating, and not planning on jumping up the ladder of post-secondary this upcoming September, this scares me. Here I go, four (...ish) years later, with...what exactly? What have I accomplished during my undergrad? Have I really just levelled the playing field of employment, or have I come out bettered to some extent? The fact of the matter is, I have basically accepted that I will be getting an entry-level, low-paying, probably boring job once I no longer bear the title of Student, and until I am willing to pick that title up again I'll probably have to settle for what I can get.

This is depressing for more than a few reasons. Aside from the obvious, it is upsetting because I feel like I have gotten heaps of value out of my degree. I've spent the last half-decade of my life learning how to think critically, write convincingly, and generally opening my eyes to learn about the vast world around me. Or so I feel, anyways. But the value that I have gotten out of this degree doesn't seem to translate into employability. I really hope that I'm wrong, and I'm crossing my fingers that - in a world where degrees are like hamburgers - someone takes a chance on my all-too-common McPsyc Degree and hires me into a decent position. Maybe I'll find a job that I love, and work my way up - putting off grad school until I really want to go back. I'm fairly certain though, that like many of my friends who were/are in this situation already, I'll find myself disappointed, send in applications for grad school, and peace out of Canada for as long as I can fund myself. Not the end of the world, of course, but mildly depressing at the same time.

Early Menopause in the Art Gallery

While I mostly enjoyed our class field-trip to the Art Gallery, it was a little uncomfortable. Something was weird about the temperature in the building. Moving from room to room, I felt like I was entering slightly different climates. One exhibit would be cold and dry, another warm and humid, and the rest somewhere in between. By the end of the hour and a half, I felt like I was going a little crazy.

Fast forward a month (or however long ago that was...I'm pretty sleep-deprived) and I'm sitting at home reading the Journal online. There's an article about new exhibits coming to the AGA. Lo and behold, it explains my awkward inability to regulate temperature at the AGA! Apparently, the new gallery has a climate control system which holds each exhibit at the exact right temperature and humidity needed for the particular mediums to stay preserved. Who knew! I did a little googling and decided it's actually pretty interesting. Each exhibit is like a high-maintenance baby, and the AGA can support them fully, whereas the old Edmonton Art Gallery could not. Either way, I'm glad it's the building and not me...

http://www.eiccontrol.com/productos/productos/productos%20onset/art-collection.pdf

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/travel/Gallery+Alberta+announces+next+exhibits/3988639/story.html

On the first day of Chanukah my true love gave to me...a forest fire?

Chanukah started on Wednesday night. Jews around the world symbolically lit the first of eight candles in the yearly celebration to commemorate the revolt of the Maccabees and the Second Temple in Jerusalem. As the story goes, the Maccabees reclaimed the temple but returned only to rubble. They looked for oil to light the menorah, but found only enough for one night. Miraculously the oil lasted for eight nights, a "Chanukah miracle." This is why we now light a Chanukiah (an eight-armed candelabra, essentially, with an extra spot in the middle for the "helper candle") for eight nights in a row, adding an additional candle on each night. Hence the term for Chanukah is "The Festival of Lights."

Israelis celebrated the Festival of Lights in a tragic way this year. On Thursday, technically the first "day" of Chanukah as it began on sundown Wednesday, a huge forest fire erupted in the Northern tip of the country. While Israel is obviously a dry area, being in the Middle East and all, forest fires of this magnitude are not typical. The fire was not natural, and is thought to have arisen from foul-play of some sort, perhaps involving two teenage boys (although this is far from confirmed). It was finally put out today, four days later. A total of 41 people lost their lives, and others are in critical condition.

What struck me as amazing was the ability of Israel's neighbours to put aside their political tensions and join together for a humane cause. Israel is a small country. They did not have the resources to fight such a large-scale and unexpected fire on their own. As the North exploded into flames, Israel found itself fighting an internal fire with some external help: namely, Palestinian firefighters, Turkish fire-fighting planes and equipment, and help from Jordan and Egypt. While it is not a new nor unheard of thing for these countries to be interacting in a positive way, it is often pushed aside by the media in favour of more polarizing stories claiming that Jews and Arabs all hate each other and revel in the deaths of one another. While things in the middle east have been rocky, particularly in the last four years or so, this polarizing view is far from the truth. Yes, there are many people who are strongly on one side or the other, but there are also many in the middle who strongly believe in the concept of peace and coexistance. While it is true that the forest fire brought out delight in some, such as the leader of Hamas, this was certainly not the sentiment of all, as seen obviously by the physical support sent in from Palestine, Turkey, Jordan, and Egypt.

With the continuous failure of peace negotiations comes more and more polarizing sentiment, making it easy to overlook the very real ability for peace. For one reason or another, it is particularly hard outside of Israel to convince people that Arabs and Jews are not arch-nemeses. I have found myself to be stereotyped as a Right-Wing anti-Arab, either as soon as someone knows I am Jewish or that I support the state of Israel. This could be no farther from the truth! The majority of those that I know who are in support of Israel are also vehement supporters of a future Palestinian state. Being a supporter of Israel merely means being in support of the country's right to exist: no more, no less. After that, there is no agreement on anything. Literally. As the saying goes: 2 Jews, 3 opinions. In Israel, I have been able to have wonderful conversations and debates with Jews, Christians, Muslims, and non-religious people on the situation in the Middle East. In Israel, some of my favourite cafes, markets, and neighbourhoods are run by Arab-Israelis. I have been to Jordan and to Turkey, and loved both countries and the people that I met there. So I guess what I'm saying is that the firefighting help from surrounding countries did not particularly surprise me, but did reinforce some of the hopes that I have for the future State of Israel and its neighbours. On a ground-level, it is very common to see inhabitants getting along and living side-by-side. On a national and visible level, this is a whole different story, which really makes the help from Jordan, Turkey, Palestine and Egypt add that much more to the story of the Chanukah blaze.

Now, enough procrastinating....back to the books...