Author Archives: Todd

What is a Canadian? Joy Kogawa says….

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What Is A Canadian? : Forty-Three Thought-Provoking Responses

In a year following the release of CBC TV's The Greatest Canadian” and CBC Radio's  “BC Almanac's Greatest British Columbians“
there is a book titled: “What is a Canadian? 43 Thought -Provoking
Responses.  Each of these essays begins with the words “A Canadian is .
. .”. Each one is very different, producing a fascinating book for all
thinking Canadians.

 
Here is an excerpt of Joy Kogawa's response… 

For
the other 42 responses including ones by Alan Fotheringham, Thomas
Homer-Dixon, Roch Carrier, Jake MacDonald, George Elliott Clarke,
Margaret MacMillan, Thomas Franck, Rosemarie Kuptana, Gérald A.
Beaudoin, Peter W. Hogg, George Bowering, Christian Dufour, Paul
Heinbecker, Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, John C. Crosbie, Audrey
McLaughlin, Roy MacGregor, Charlotte Gray, Hugh Segal, Janet
McNaughton, Sujit Choudhry, Aritha van Herk, L. Yves Fortier, Catherine
Ford, Mark Kingwell, Silver Donald Cameron, Guy Laforest, Maria
Tippett, E. Kent Stetson, Louis Balthazar, Joy Kogawa, Wade
MacLaughlan, Douglas Glover, Lorna Marsden, Saeed Rahnema, Denis
Stairs, Valerie Haig-Brown, Guy Saint-Pierre, William Watson, Doreen
Barrie, Jennifer Welsh, Bob Rae – you will have to go buy the book!

 
Here's a picture of Joy Kogawa with RCMP officer and “Toddish McWong” (me), at the Canadian Club Vancouver 2006 “Flag Day/Order of Canada luncheon.  photo courtesy of Todd Wong

What is a Canadian?

(excerpt)  click here for full reponse posted on www.kogawahouse.com

  Joy Kogawa

A Canadian is a transplanted snail called James who sat down on a
brick.  A Canadian is a big fat street party on the Danforth in
Toronto, 2004.  A Canadian is hockey night in Canada on a small patch
of ice created by buckets of water in the backyard.  A Canadian is a
plane full of people from Vancouver flying to Quebec with signs
saying:  “WE LOVE YOU.”  A Canadian is the wind on the prairies that
who has seen.  And a red-headed girl in a green-gabled house on an
island with red soil.  And the Mounties who always always get their
man.  A Canadian trusts the law.  And since we generally rank either
second or third or fourth or whatever, we try harder.  But weren’t we
proud when Gorbachev said, “Look at Canada. They don’t kill people
there.”  Or something like that.  That’s because a Canadian is, if
nothing else, decent.  Isn’t that the adjective that most commonly
comes to mind?  We’re as decent as the day is long, are we
not–fair-minded, peaceable, not demanding guns to defend ourselves,
abhorring and resisting the culture of violence we are virtually
force-fed by the fee-fi-fo-fuming giant close by.  My Canadian friends
who travel a lot say we don’t know how lucky we are.  I think a lot of
us do know it.  I, for one, am a Canadian who loves Canada more than
words can say.

My love is not cheap.  It’s been tested, and it
endures.  I can thank my parents for this.  And I can thank the
community from which I came, and which was destroyed by the particular
brand of racism in my childhood.  I can thank my Grade Two Highroads to
Reading that I practically memorized when we were living in that
once-upon-a-time space called Slocan (British Columbia).  Books were
precious and few.  I can thank the CBC that I listened to when we were
finally allowed to have radios again, after we were moved east of the
Rockies. That’s when a Canadian became the Green Hornet, the House on
the Hill, Share the Wealth, Terry and the Pirates and Johnny Wayne and
Frank Shuster and Rawhide, and that beautiful blonde skater, Barbara
Ann Scott.  Other Canadians from my community who were exiled missed
out on all that.  A Canadian is a group of more than four thousand
people who were exiled for no crime.  Oh sweet democratic country that
I love. Some people are tired of this drum-beat….

for more click here for full reponse posted on www.kogawahouse.com

The Fountain: spiritual love odyssey through time, space and philosophy

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The Fountain: spiritual love odyssey through time, space and philosophy


November 22
Granville Cinemas
Vancouver, BC
pre-screening event

(view trailer)



Darren Aronofsky has
written and directed an incredibly beautiful movie about love, death,
spirituality, and eternal life beyond death.  This movie ties
together metaphysics, ancient Mayan beliefs and
juxtaposes them against the physicalities of life and death in the
early 21st Century.  This movie belongs to the category of spiritual drama that inclu
des What Dreams May Come, and Peaceful Warrior.  Many people will not understand this
movie, and simply shake their heads and mutter words like
“bizarre.”  But life is not linear nor a monoculture. 

Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz
star as lovers in the present time.  He is a medical research
surgeon doing brain tumor research.  Ironically, she is dying of a
brain tumor.  Ellen Burstyn plays a research colleague or senior advisor.

In a past life sequence, Rachel Weisz was Queen Isabella of Spain,
during the time of the Spanish Inquisition.  Hugh Jackman was a
conquistador who travelled to the New World of America in search of
“The Fountain of Life” or in this case… “The Tree of Life.” 
Queen Isabella says that the bible tells of two trees:  The Tree
of Knowledge from which Adam and Eve ate the apple, and the Tree of
Life.  Jackman's conquistador is sent to the Mayan jungles from
which he is discover for the glory and savior of Spain.

In a spiritual sequence, Jackman is travelling through space in a small
globe containing the Tree of Life.  He meditates
in the lotus position.  This is probably representing his “soul”or
eternal being.  Bald, Hugh Jackman looks like Ken Wilber,
the prolific transpersonal pscyhology author, whose work I have read
since 1990.  It is too much of a coincidence that Wilber's wife
Treya died of a brain tumor, documented in the book Grace and
Grit, which detailed their Buddhist spiritual beliefs.

The Fountain doesn't really go deep into explaining the ancient Mayan
beliefs of life and death.  The opening scenes are in a jungle as
conquistadors are attacked by Mayan warriors.  In present time,
Weisz's character Izzy, explains to her husband Tommy (Jackman) that
the Mayans believed a specific star constellation was home to the Mayan
underworld.  Some of the beliefs are explained when Tommy reads
Izzy's manuscript that she is writing, titled “The Fountain.”

This is definitely an art movie. The editing and sequencing between the
three time-lines flow in themes rather than linear story telling. 
The special effects are wondrous and beautiful, specifically the scenes
where the meditating Tommy and the “Tree of Life” are travelling
through space to the star constellation. The movie Brainstorm
came to mind because of the spiritual aspects of life beyond death
combined with special effects that try to translate the unknowing to
the audience. 

The Fountain is a brave movie that attempts to share spiritual wisdom
through the telling of a story. It balances three story lines that
challenge the notions of time, or the division of past, present and
future.  Everything blurs into a “now” as there are many scenes that are
repeated later in the movie which give
the viewer a more insightful understanding to the actions and context. 

While through many different cultures, there are many stories of the
after-life and of how we are actually spiritual beings having a
physical experience, rather than physical beings in quest of a
spiritual experience… it is difficult to explain to non-believers
what lies outside their belief structures.  The Dalai Lama was
once asked the question about his belief in reincarnation.  His
reply was a laugh, asking how could one not believe in
reincarnation.  It is like air.  We breathe it but we cannot
see it or touch it.  It simply is. 


Vancouver Opera: Can Cultures Merge? – Whenever did cultures stop merging?

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Vancouver Opera: Can Cultures Merge?
– Whenever did cultures stop merging?


NOVEMBER. 8, 7:30-9:30 PM
Opera Speaks @ VPL:  “Can Cultures Merge?”
Alice MacKay Room, Vancouver Public Library
A free public forum

Opera is an art form that has borrowed from many cultures near and
far.  There is a tradition of “East meets West,” demonstrated as Puccini's
Turandot is set in China, Bizet's The Pearl Fishers is set in Ceylon,
and Saint-Saens' Samson and Delilah is set in Gaza.  And even
Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado alludes to “something Japanese” but
is really a parody of English custom and pretension.

It was only a matter of time that the Vancouver Opera should set one of
Europe's most famous operas smack dab in the middle of the Pacific
Northwest First Nations culture.

Last week, magnificently costumed opera singers performed two excerpts from Mozart's Magic Flute
opera, but they were dressed in Northwest coast First Nations
inspired designs.  The young male bird catcher character of
Papageno has now become himself a bird – a hummingbird to be
precise.  The Queen of the Night has become the mythic wild woman
of the woods – T'sonokwa.

Fantastic?  Definitely.  Absurd?  Maybe.  Cultural appropriation?  Debatable…

Chris Creighton Kelly, noted artist and cultural critic, moderated the discussion which featured panelists such as anthropologist Wade Davis, Magic Flute stage director Robert McQueen, First Nations writer and filmmaker Loretta Todd, and Marcia Crosby, professor of First Nations Studies at Malaspina University-College. 

The Vancouver Opera website states the questions:

Can artists find common ground through artistic endeavour?  When does
exploration of another culture become exploitation and appropriation?
When and how does mere ‘inclusion’ became true collaboration? This
forum will explore how creative artists and performers collaborate
across cultural lines, and what importance such collaboration may hold
for the future of humankind.

The evening began slowly as each of the panelists explored the reasons
and questions to why they were on the panel.  McQueen explained
how the Vancouver Opera set about to invite and find collaborating
First Nations artists to work with them in creating an “impossible
idea.”  By relocating the Magic Flute, which was originally set in
Egypt and full of Masonic ritual, to the Pacific Northwest – it had to
be adapted to fit First Nations culture and mythology.  First
Nations writer/filmmaker Loretta Todd and professor Marcia Crosby, felt
it was also necessary to address how culturally sensitive or
appropriate it was to adopt First Nations culture.  On the other
hand, they also pointed out that they didn't know that much about
opera, and neither admitted anthropologist Wade Davis. 

But did this matter?  If more people become interested in opera, or
become more interested in exploring First Nations culture and stories,
then this is a good thing.  Davis explained that our world is
losing cultures on an astonishing rate.  Cultural diversity is
important for us to see things and issues from different perspectives. There used to be 500 Aboriginal Nations in North America before the arrival of Europeans, many have disappeared or become assimilated.

Crosby asked the question “When did cultures stop merging, so that we
had to ask the question 'Can cultures merge?'” This raised an important
point, because I personally feel that culture is like a river.  We
don't see where it starts high in the mountains… and it never is the
same when we walk through it again (to paraphrase Plato or Heraclitus)
and it ends in the large globally shared oceans.

The evening really picked up when the audience challenged the panelists
with questions and statements.  Issues addressed were
appropriation of culture and also ethnic minority issues in a white
dominated culture.  Creighton-Kelly summed it up aptly when he
said we are just beginning to scratch the surface before he wrapped up
the evening.

I was one of the people who spoke to the panel, and I was surprised at the clapping for the recognition of the name “Gung Haggis Fat Choy” when Vancouver Opera marketing and development officer Doug Tuck introduced me to the audience as he handed me the microphone.  But then “Gung Haggis Fat Choy” is getting more well known as a blending of Scottish and Chinese traditions and cultures.

“I love what the Vancouver Opera is doing,” I stated to the audience,
and spoke of the impact that the Vancouver Opera touring production
“Naomi's Road” had on sharing the Japanese Canadian internment
experience with thousands of school children.  “It is a sharing of
Japanese Canadian culture with White mainstream culture, so yes…
cultures can merge. Author Joy Kogawa told me that in Tofino, people in
the audience were crying.  Japanese Canadians were very touched to
see their culture portrayed on stage.

“The real benefit is that we are talking together in forums like
this.  We can share and listen to each other's stories, and our
cultures are merging now.  And it will continue. 

“I really want to know how the school children across BC are receiving the touring version of Magic Flute today in the schools.”

Vancouver Opera general director James Wright responded by saying that
while it is still early, the students at the schools are responding well, and are
interested in learning about First Nations culture – some are not.  I expect that
many First Nations students will take pride in seeing their culture and traditions represented.  At the same time, I expect there to be critics
of cultural mis-appropriation.  In the end… discussion is
good.  Sharing is good.  More people witnessing and
experiencing these events and issues is good. And in the end, First Nations culture is recognized as an integral part of Vancouver and BC culture and history.

Next Opera Speaks is Wednesday Night at Vancouver Public Library.
 
Opera Speaks @ VPL: “Power and its Abuses”
A free public forum about Verdi's “McBeth”

CBC Radio’s Mark Forsythe
as he moderates a discussion about the nature of political power and
its abuse, in both Shakespeare’s day and in our contemporary society. 
Panelists include UBC global issues expert Michael Byers, SFU criminologist Ehor Boyanowski and SFU Shakespeare scholar Paul Budra.

November 15, 2006 7:30pm
Alice Mackay Room
Vancouver Public Library, Central Branch

Alliance Française de Vancouver brings Kiran Ahluwalia and Pandit Vithal Rao to Vancouver

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Alliance Française de Vancouver brings Kiran Ahluwalia and Pandit Vithal Rao to Vancouver


I have learned that the ancestry of bagpipes goes back to India… but
I haven't quite learned the cross-over history of the French and
Indians yet.

This announcement was sent to me from Alliance Française.  I think
they heard that I speak better french than I speak
Chinese….  

Kiran Ahluwalia is great! 
While she specializes in traditional ghazal and Pujabie folksongs, she
has also done a world music cross-over album titled “Beyond Boundaries.”

I first saw her in the jazz opera Quebecite, written by George Elliot
Clarke (Afro-American-MicMac First Nations Canadian) and D.D. Jackson
(Afro-American-Chinese-Canadian).  Incidentally, George and D.D. are writing a new jazz opera about Pierre Trudeau!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Alliance
de Vancouver is proud to announce the first
Vancouver appearance of one
of the grand masters of Indian vocal tradition


Pandit
Vithal Rao

presented
by Juno Award-winning singer Kiran Ahluwalia,

8
p.m. Thursday, November 16, at the Roundhouse Community Centre
181
Roundhouse Mews, Yaletown, Vancouver .

Juno
Award-winning singer Kiran
Ahluwalia presents an evening of
exquisite Indian vocal music, featuring her guru Pandit Vithal Rao, a grand master of the ghazal, romantic poems set to
music.

Born in 1930, Vithal Rao spent his early years as a
court musician in the palace of the last prince of
Hyderabad . Kiran will act as host ,
sing a duet or two with her teacher, and lead a Q &A session after the
performance. She will also tell stories from the extraordinary and colourful
life of Vithal Rao, one of the jewels in the crown of Indian culture, who is
visiting Canada
for the first time in 32 years.

At the
Roundhouse Community Centre, Yaletown,

Thursday, November 16.       8 p.m.

Tickets $22 in advance ($25 at door)

Banyen Books, Sophia Books, Zulu, Highlife, and
Alliance Française.

Also by phone at 604 231 7535 or online at  www.ticketstonight.ca.

More info at www.kiranmusic.com

image

 

Epoch Times: No Luck Club on the Road to Prosperity – Interview with Trevor Chan of No Luck Club

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Epoch Times: 

No Luck Club on the Road to Prosperity 
- Interview with Trevor Chan of No Luck Club

http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/6-11-9/47998.html

No Luck Club on the Road to Prosperity
Hip-Hop artists tour Canada
By Ben Taylor
Epoch Times Vancouver Staff Nov 09, 2006


PHOTO: Vancouver based Chinese Canadian Hip Hop instrumental group No
Luck Club (From R to L) Trevor Chan, his brother Matt Chan, and Paul
Besen AKA Pluskratch. (Rebecca Blissett)

Vancouver-based Chinese Canadian hip-hop instrumental trio No Luck
Club are setting out for the far east - of Canada that is, sharing
"Prosperity" with the people. Consisting of brothers Trevor and Matt
Chan and master turntablist Paul Belan (a.k.a. DJ Pluskratch), the
group's super-fresh album, Prosperity, which just hit the stores, has
already caught the attention of the most unlikely of listeners.
Ninety-something surviving head tax payers have been tweaking their
hearing aids to tune in to NLC's "Our Story," a powerful track which
was in part inspired by the experiences of the Chan family; the
brothers' great- grandparents were separated for decades by the
discriminatory 1923-1947 Exclusion Act.

NLCs busy Trevor Chan made time for a chat with The Epoch Times ,
covering everything from racial discrimination to the future
probability of turntable battles between DJ robots and humans.

ET - The name No Luck Club was formed partly because of the lack of
luck in the industry, true?

TC - That wasn't the intention but unfortunately it's turned into a
self-fulfilling prophecy! The NLC name was a spur of the moment
decision - we needed to call our project something when we sent out
our demo. I guess it was an ironic, pseudo-hipster take on the Joy
Luck Club. A regrettable decision, but what can you do?

ET - So do the titles of your albums reflect where you are at
artistically and/or in the industry?

TC - The album titles simply refer to the Chinese gods of good
fortune: Happiness, Prosperity & Longevity. We had a 3-album recording
deal so we decided to make a trilogy. This was more of a writing tool
to help us structure the themes and organize the sound bites we use in
our songs.

ET - How has the track "Our story" been received so far?

TC - The reaction has been great. CBC Radio 3 got behind it really
early when we played them a draft version of the song right before the
federal election. But things really picked up right before we
performed at the Vancouver Folk Festival this summer. I believe Sid
Tan (Vancouver head tax redress activist) told a bunch of people in
the Chinese language media about our song - next thing you know we're
being interviewed by all the Chinese dailies and appearing in Ming
Pao's weekend magazine.

Our album comes out Nov 7 and early reviews from Eye Weekly & the
Globe and Mail have all mentioned the song. G&M in particular seemed
to focus in on the head tax issue which is great because the article
appeared in the entertainment section - not the usual stomping ground
for redress discussions. It'll be interesting to see how people react
to the song with the latest round of media attention.

ET - What do you make of the Chinese Canadian Community groups, like
the Chinese Canadian National Council (CCNC) winning the battle
against the Chinese Communist affiliated groups in Canada such as the
National Congress of Chinese Canadians (NCCC)?

TC - I'll be honest - I don't keep up to date with the politics
involved in CCC groups. However, I did manage to wander into the NCCC
redress event when they were in Vancouver last November, 2005. I
needed a break from working on our record so I thought I'd see what
was going on with the redress movement since we were making a song
about it. I wasn't too impressed when I found out that the people
holding this meeting was in favour of pooling all the redress money
into an "education" program. My . radar was on high alert when I
noticed that more than half the meeting was wasted on photo ops and
people patting each other on the back. It definitely had an air of
cronyism. No wonder the Liberals lost the election-who in their right
mind would form an alliance with these clowns from the NCCC? I read
about their fishy background later on but at the time I just brushed
it off as the usual Chinatown political tomfoolery.

ET - The Epoch Times is banned in China and its editorial series Nine
Commentaries on the Communist Party has sparked over 14 million
members to quit the Party. What are your thoughts on the state of
Chinese communism today and the Chinese people living in Mainland
China now?



NLC's Brand new albulm "Prosperity" (David Order Wong)TC - I wouldn't
know, I haven't been to China in over 10 years and I'm sure much has
changed. I don't go out of my way to seek indie Chinese news sources
and I certainly don't trust the "mainstream" press coverage. Seems
like most of the news you hear about China relates to its economy.
It's like the rest of the world views China in one of two ways: either
as a mass consumer market to which to sell goods or a cheap labour
market that will take away manufacturing jobs everywhere else. I don't
think Mainland Chinese are really viewed as individuals - they're just
this abstract concept of 1 billion persons.

As for the communist government, I figure they finally got a clue over
the years. They probably realized that they should follow America's
example: by bringing economic prosperity to the masses, those at the
top will have that much more to skim.

ET - Is there a Chinese hip-hop scene in Canada/ North America/
globally and have you connected with some of them?

TC - There are artists of Chinese descent creating hip hop but I'm not
sure if there's necessarily a "scene". Even if there was one we'd
probably stay away from it. It's the Groucho Marx philosophy: we
wouldn't want to be a part of any group that would have us as members!
We've always wanted to work with the best people possible, regardless
of race. However, it's always great to hang out with other Asians who
create music - there's this unspoken "knowing" of the struggles
involved in convincing our families that we're not going to ruin the
lineage with our "career choice".

ET - Are you guys known in China? What do you think of the hip-hop
scene in China?

TC - No... but we'd very much like to play there one day and then
hopefully we will be known in certain places. However, I'm not too
familiar with China's hip hop scene. The only people I've heard of are
from Hong Kong: LMF and DJ Tommy the turntablist. But I've always been
curious about the underground music scene. I just want to know what
the kids are into - irrespective of genre. Although I've heard for
years that there's a big punk rock scene in Beijing and that's where
we should go to discover the more edgier arts & indie scenes.

ET - What do you think of turntablism and sample-based music? Has it
peaked? Where is it going? Do you think it will lead to computers
winning most of the Grammys in 2010?

TC - Sample-based music isn't going anywhere. It's getting much easier
to create and the tools are widely available. If anything, I figure it
will become more ingrained in the creative process. As for
turntablism, it has nowhere to go but up! After all, it is a pretty
marginal art form to begin with. Turntablism has always been more of a
performance art and there really aren't that many artist records when
you compare it to other sub-genres of music.

Besides, the music business is undergoing an unprecedented seismic
change and only a fool would predict what the future sound will be.
However, I seriously doubt a computer will produce the hits of the
future - I've got more faith in humanity and the listening audience.
The only thing I'm willing to say is that the Grammys will probably be
even less relevant in 2010 than they are today because music audiences
will have fractured that much. There are already enough artists and
good music outside the established system; what is changing is the
ability to help people find that music.

ET - Will Human DJs have to battle robot DJs in the future? Have you
ever had to battle Robo-DJs yet? Are you training for this now? What
is the training like? Gong-Fu? Chin-ups? Special Diets? Secret
weapons?

TC - Probably not and I'll tell you why. No robot could have
envisioned the use of a record player as a musical instrument in the
first place - it's too impractical and illogical! Does not compute.
Only crazy humans could come up with something so wacky. I'll place my
bets on the human spirit any day of the week.

For tour dates and other NLC info visit: www.noluckclub.com


--

Vincent Lam wins $40,o00 Giller Prize for best Canadian fiction

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Vincent Lam wins $40,000 Giller Prize for best Canadian fiction

The top prize for English fiction goes to Vincent Lam, claiming the 2006 Scotiabank Giller Prize for his novel Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures by, published
by Doubleday Canada.  It was announced on November 7th.

The
$40,000 Giller Prize is the largest annual prize for the fiction in the
country, novel or short story collection published in English. $2,500
goes to each of the finalists.  In 2004. Wayson Choy was a
finalist for his novel All That Matters, a sequel to his celebrated first novel “Jade Peony.” 

Hmmm…. I wonder if Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop or explorASIAN
will be bringing Vincent to Vancouver for a reading.  Lam is one of the
non-struggling writers who is keeping his day job – as a surgeon!  ACWW
and explorASIAN have presented great Asian Canadian writers such as Judy Fong
Bates and Paul Yee in Vancouver.  Wayson Choy's Jade Peony was the 2002 inaugural One Book One Vancouver choice for the Vancouver Public Library program.

The other 2006 finalists were:

  • Rawi Hage for his novel De Niro’s
    Game, published by House of Anansi Press
  • Pascale Quiviger for her novel The Perfect
    Circle, translation by Sheila Fischman, published by Cormorant
    Books
  • Gaétan Soucy for his novel The
    Immaculate Conception, translation by Lazer Lederhendler, published
    by House of Anansi Press
  • Carol Windley for her short story collection,
    Home Schooling, published by Cormorant Books

Read Crawford Kilian's review of Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures