Contents
- Mental Health Network’s Bulletin
- THE SHADOWS PROJECT
- Vitamins and Minerals by Prescription?
- Three cheers for Gladys Radek
- First United Church did NOT get $12 million
- Editor (Vancouver Sun):
- THOSE BLASTED BUS DRIVERS.
- First Annual Dragonfly Children's Festival
- Writer-in-Residence at Library Square
- News from the Library
- The Cost of Doing Business?!
- Great weekend
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS (Art, stories, essays)
for September’s edition of the Vancouver Richmond
Mental Health Network’s Bulletin. Its theme will be:
"Mental Health and Addictions"
Stories should be ideally 500 to 850 words in length (typed single space) but shorter or longer essays are still acceptable. We especially solicit artwork for the Bulletin, which should be adaptable to black-and-white print.
Honourariums will be offered for submissions that are accepted; .
fewer than 500 words, $25; more than 500 words, $50; poetry $15; artwork and illustrations to be negotiated; cover art $60.
Stories or articles (preferably on a computer floppy disk) should be mailed or brought to:
Editor, The Bulletin,
Vancouver Richmond Mental Health Network, #109-96 East Broadway, Vancouver, BC V5T 4N9
You can also e-mail submissions to vrmhn@vcn.bc.ca or send by fax: (604) 733-9556.
For further information call: (604) 733-5570.
Deadline is Wednesday, August 24th, 2005
THE SHADOWS PROJECTTHE SHADOWS PROJECT
Vancouver Moving Theatre is working in partnership with the Carnegie Community Centre to create a shadow play (with images and puppets, storytelling and music) for the whole family and the Downtown Eastside about addiction. Rosemary George- son, Jimmy Tait and Savannah Walling are writing the play with a large team of DTES writers. A 20 minute prototype will be presented to the community for feedback in Nov. 2005. The shadow play will premiere in Nov. 2006.
The writers need your help.
Co-writer Savannah Walling invites you to share with her your insights, images, stories and anecdotes around the experience of addiction. She will be available to listen and to answer questions about the project:
When?
Tuesday August 9 1-5 pm
Wednesday August 10 1-5 pm
Where?
3rd floor seminar room-
Carnegie Community Centre
Vitamins and Minerals by Prescription?Vitamins and Minerals by Prescription Only? Absurd!
An article in the March 2005 issue of the CCPA Monitor, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’s monthly publication, indicated that some new regulations regarding vitamin and mineral availability were about to come into force. If they did, the article (titled “Codex directive would deny us access to food supplements,” by Helke Ferrie) warned that watered-down versions, and much more expensive, would be available by doctor’s prescription only.
Ferrie advised people to show their support for private member’s bill C-420 having vitamins and minerals classified as food, therefore the Codex directive (which is enshrined, or in the process of being enshrined, in the world’s trade agreements) would have no effect on pricing and availability of food supplements, also known as natural health products (NHPs).
I am a diabetic and therefore take a full spread of vitamins and minerals to help control my illness (and it works). I was therefore personally concerned (as well as for the millions of people who take NHPs) about the implementation of the Codex directive.
I e-mailed Libby Davies, our MP in the Downtown Eastside and the health ministry of Canada expressing my concern. Before I discuss the replies, I have to digress a bit.
The Codex directive is the product of the Codex Alimentarius Committee of the United Nations. If implemented, it hands unprecedented power and profits to big pharmaceutical companies, and sacrifices many persons’ health and well-being through taking NHPs.
In the May 2005 CCPA Monitor, an article appeared by Ed Finn titled “Health
In the June 2005 CCPA Monitor, an article titled “European court strikes down Directive restricting vitamin access” appeared. Restricted access to vitamins and minerals has already taken place in some European countries which have adopted the directive, but the EU has withdrawn from it as a whole. E-mail and fax systems of the European parliament broke down for days: more than eleven million protest messages were received from the 300 million EU citizens. Imagine if we could raise a similar protest from one million citizens of
In the July 2005 issue of Common Ground, an article by Dr. Carolyn Dean titled “Kiss your vitamins goodbye” warned that the
Now to the e-mail replies: Libby Davies, NDP MP for the Downtown Eastside, assured me that the federal NDP would support Bill C-420 to fight the Codex directive.
On June 23, in reply to my e-mail of March 19, the federal ministry of health stated: “…[the Directive]…will not decrease the availability or sale of vitamins and minerals in
On January 1, 2004,
Obviously, more investigation is needed, and by someone more qualified than me, like a doctor, or a lawyer.
By ROLF AUER
Three cheers for Gladys RadekThree cheers for Gladys Radek
For once the system worked. A very persistent Aboriginal woman, Gladys Radek, took International Village to the Human Rights Commission for discriminating against herself and other Aboriginal and disabled people. Four years later she won $5000 for herself, and $10,000 for Native Housing. The $15,000 award is the highest ever awarded in BC for injury to dignity.
As well,
Radek's four year odyssey for her human right to walk through a mall began on May 10, 2001. She was walking through the mall with a friend on the way to have a coffee at Starbucks. Security guards approached her and asked her to leave. Radek demanded to see the policy that allowed the guards to evict her. They didn't show it, and Radek called police on her cell phone. The police sided with the security guards. A 13 day hearing in 2004 followed, and finally the decision was made on July 13, 2005.
The 209 page Human Rights decision, by Tribunal member Lindsay M. Lyster, reprints the Mall's horrifying policy for evicting people. It was in effect from March 30, 2000 to May 6, 2002. The policy required security workers to remove people with "ripped clothing," "dirty clothing," " attitudes when approached," " talking to themselves," "open sores," " red eyes," and "having bad body odour," among other things. The decision cited one security report where the reason for eviction was "missing teeth/native male unco-operative." The Tribunal ordered
By JEAN SWANSON
First United Church did NOT get $12 million
The Vancouver Courier recently reported First United got this huge sum of money for a pilot project regarding assessment and referral for people with a substance abuse problem.
We wish!
We actually got $12 thousand from the Vancouver Foundation. This was very helpful, and generous of the Foundation, but it is nowhere near the sum reported in the paper. The Vancouver Courier made an innocent mistake. Just so you know.
Susan Henry
Editor (Vancouver Sun):Editor (Vancouver Sun): 25 July ‘05
In response to the story about the cold or unconcerned actions of a bus driver and passengers towards a man who suffered a heart attack on the bus:
My wife read this story out to me as a shocking example of some people’s behaviour. What came to mind was that on that very afternoon – Saturday the 23rd – I was on a Victoria bus that pulled up to a stop just south of Hastings on Commercial. Three people got on but a fourth, whom I couldn’t see, didn’t. The driver got off and asked the person if they needed an ambulance. The person answered and the driver immediately called 911, giving location and observable details about the person, who I saw then was lying on the grass strip closest to the street. Two other people who had just gotten on disembarked and got down to comfort the person, one young girl saying, “She lives in our building!”
The driver got what critical information he could, apparently requested by the operator to give to the ambulance attendants: age, serious or critical conditions they might need to prepare for en route, etc. He then turned to the other passengers and said, “We’re going to be here for a while.” No apology or denigration of the sick person; i.e. if anyone had a problem with his actions they were welcome to walk.
This entire scenario struck me as decent and what almost anyone would expect: doing for a person what you could and doing it right. After hearing the end of the newspaper story, I felt somewhat sad that the actions taken by ‘my’ driver, while happening likely 10 times for every time a driver or passenger did something like that described in the press, would not be reported on at all. In my experience, well over 90% of all drivers are decent people doing good, even exemplary work, while the actions of just a few make them all look bad.
Respectfully submitted,
PaulR Taylor,
THOSE BLASTED BUS DRIVERS.THOSE BLASTED BUS DRIVERS.
It is just too much. I have seen those #3, #8, #19 and #20 buses that pass through the downtown eastside at Main & Hastings and at
The drivers don't seem to like crowds. They act as if they are perpetually late and must get to their turn around station before another minute has passed. I'd like to see action taken toward those drivers. I am sure many bus riders are very fed up with those drivers. If the working passengers are late at the job sites they could be fired, especially it being late happens often.
Not everybody starts work at 9am. And when it is time to go home they’re not picked up, and after waiting ages for a bus that will pick them up it means the time it takes to get home is worse than normal which can be problematic.
Single mothers have to pay day care centers up to $5.for every minute they’re late picking up their child, or children. I know because I used to have to pick up a child at a day care. Old persons get frantic if they are out late; family dinners are delayed and possibly ruined. There are numerous other things that can go wrong for passengers who are forced to wait for the next bus, such as missed connections at the next bus stop. That can mean up to a one hour wait for buses in some areas of the lower mainland Those careless, thoughtless bus drivers should be fired. Yes, fired. Fricking fired. Enough is enough.
The bus riders union have a worthy cause, which is to tell the truth about the bus system. It is lousy.
By Dora Sanders
First Annual Dragonfly Children's FestivalFirst Annual Dragonfly Children's Festival
August 7, 12-6pm,
Cates Park/Whey-ah-Wichen,
The First Annual Dragonfly will inspire young people to change the world. We are not a high-priced
children's event, but a festival designed "by and for"
young people. We launch the participatory fun with a summer camp, we set-up and decorate the Festival,
and explode on Sunday, Aug 7!
Dragonfly Stage
International and local artists, big and little musicians, and you try your hands at an electric guitar or drum kit between sets! Hear some young people grab the mike to talk about child and youth rights.
Sponsors: Deep Cove Music, Musart,
12:00 Young Musicians' Showcase Deep Cove Music
1:00 Improv Theatre Games
1:15 Hip Hop in the House
1:45 Drums! Drums! Drums! Our guests slam it!
2:15 Improv Theatre Games
2:30 What if young people could vote:
Children & Youth Rights. Add your voice!
3:00 First Nations' Songs + Storytelling
3:30 I grew up a Punk!
4:00 School, School, School! Speak out!
4:30 Guitars! Guitars! Guitars! Under the Volcano
musicians from around the world join the stage!
5:00 Tsleil-Waututh Storytelling Damian George
5:30 Young Musicians' Showcase Deep Cove Music
That 70's Midway!
Tightrope Walking, Whacky Clown and Balloon Animals, Face Painting, Stilt-Walking, Soccer juggling, Bowling...
Dragonfly Printmaking
Drop in and create a block print on paper and fabric,
and take home your own dragonfly!
Superhero Costumes
You know your own power, so make a costume that
matches your style! Capes, cuffs, colouring, stamping. All materials supplied.
Improv Theatre Games
Young people lead off hilarious and participatory
theatre sports. Join in or watch the fun!
Sponsor:
Take A Walk in the
Join Damian George of the Tsleil-Waututh Nation to
learn about the uses of local plants. Gather at Tsleil-Waututh Nation/Takaya Tours display at 3:30pm.
Sponsor: Whey-ah-Wichen/Facing the Wind
Speakers Corner
Be on video; share ideas about changing the world. Sponsor:
Takaya Tours Canoe Rides
Bring your parents for a traditional canoe ride and
storytelling about local history with Tsleil-Waututh
Nation's Takaya Tours! This exciting one-hour group paddles in Indian Arm and is offered by special arrangement and a special price-just for Dragonfly! Departing at 1:30pm, 3pm, 5pm. Gather 15 minutes in advance for orientation. You can reserve your spots in advance: Email info@whey-ah-wichen.org. Donations welcome but not required (suggested is $18/person, $9 low income).
Sponsors: Takaya Tours, Whey-ah-Wichen/Facing the Wind
Used Toys + Clothing Swap
Bring toys or (washed) clothes for other families, and exchange for something else.
Swimming and a Beach!
Supervision: No childcare provided. Children must be supervised by a parent or guardian at all times. Lifeguard may be on duty for swimming. Bring your parent/guardian, hat, and sunscreen! Healthy food vendors on site.
Dragonfly Volunteer Orientation Sessions
Help make Dragonfly a reality. It's a great way to work with your daughter, son, niece, nephew on a child-focused empowerment project. Show up at a session, or contact: info@whey-ah-wichen.org or 604.644.4349. Volunteers are needed for postering, set-up, take-down, operating arts stations, midway Festival Tickets
Suggested entry donation $5/child, $10-20/adult
includes:entry to the adjacent Under the Volcano Festival; complimentary pass to Maplewood Farm; organic fruits; art supplies; your chance to win children's books; plenty more! No one will be turned away for lack of money.
Transportation
Translink 604.953.3333 for bus info routes #211, #212 from Phibbs Exchange. Free Festival shuttle bus leaves Broadway Station Safeway parking lot starting at 11am.
Writer-in-Residence at Library SquareWriter-in-Residence at
Maggie de Vries will start work as the
Many people there want to write, she says, “but they have no idea how to get started.”
De Vries, 43, is the author of Missing Sarah, a 2003 memoir about her sister, a drug-addicted prostitute with whose murder the notorious Robert (Willy) Pickton has been charged.
The book movingly shows how Sarah de Vries came from a loving home but was snagged by the lure of the street and was unable to extricate herself. As one of Sarah’s friends has since said, “It portrays Sarah and the other girls and me as people, not just street scum.”
Missing Sarah was the first book to be read by Beyond Words, a book club for Downtown Eastside sex-trade workers formed in the spring of 2004.
“I was wanting to get that book into the hands of Downtown Eastside women,” recalls de Vries. “They were the people that I most wanted to read it, and they were the most interested in it.” But because of poverty, “they had the least access.”
De Vries remains active in the club, which last read Rohinton Mistry’s A Fine Balance. The core group of 15 or 20 women, who meet to discuss books seven times a year, “started bringing their writing to share,” says de Vries. She hopes to start a separate VPL workshop to help them work on it.
The publication of Missing Sarah turned Maggie de Vries into an advocate for prostitutes and a speaker who regularly enthralls high-school students by “channelling Sarah.
Rebecca
News from the LibraryNews from the Library
The library is thrilled to announce that we now have videos available for loan. They can be borrowed for one week. There’s a sample of what we have in the Level 3 display cabinet, and the videos are on the low shelves outside the librarian’s door. How about Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven or Kurosawa’s Rashomon? Maybe you’re a fan of classics like The Manchurian Candidate, Five Easy Pieces and Rear Window. Or you’re an armchair traveller who wants to check out Touring Ireland, Fodor’s
We’re losing our Provinces! We get 4 copies of The Province every day. One copy is kept behind the desk, and we ask for ID if you want to take a look at it. The other copies are left in the library, and we rely on people to return them to us so that everyone can read the papers. So come down to the library and read The Province. But please give it back to us before you leave the library. Thank you!
Remember that you can put a hold on any of the items in the display cabinet on the third floor. If you don’t pick up your hold within two weeks, we’ll pass the item on to the next person on the list.
The library now has two copies of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. If you’d like to add your name to our waiting list, please come down to the library.
Main & Hastings Book Club
We’re reading No Crystal Stair, by Mairuth Sarsfield, an absorbing novel that explores an increasingly difficult contemporary reality: functioning as though White while surviving as Black. We meet every Tuesday at noon in the Learning Centre, but this summer we’re heading outside to read in local parks and gardens. Please come and join us!
New books for August:
Happiness: The Science Behind Your Smile by Daniel Nettle. (152.4 NET). What is happiness? What makes us happy? And if happiness is good in itself, why haven’t we simply evolved to be happier? Daniel Nettle, a psychology professor from the
Philip Larkin: Early Poems and Juvenilia edited by A. T. Tolley. (821 LAR). A new collection of the English poet’s earliest work, from the age of about sixteen until 1946, by which time he had become a librarian. Everyone has to start somewhere, and this is a fascinating look at a developing poet’s processes and changing style.
No Lights, No Sirens: The Corruption and Redemption of an Inner City Cop by Robert Cea. (363.2 CEA). Robert Cea was an idealistic cop when he started working for the NYPD. But just a few years later, he had spiralled into the depths of the criminal underworld; he had become a criminal, not a cop. It’s not the best-written book you’ll read this year, and Cea is a bit self-centred, but it’s still a fascinating look at the seedy side of law enforcement.
Beth, your (new) librarian
The Cost of Doing Business?!The Cost of Doing Business?!
This is an open letter to the Police and the Mayor. The greatest and best plans for our neighbourhood seem, in the eyes of City Planners at least, to start with the set-in-stone axiom that re-locating wealthy middle-class yuppies and businesspeople throughout the downtown eastside is the beginning and end of revitalizing this section of
Our contention, which is based on common sense without the bias of developers wanting this geographic area to pioneer, is that giving the purchasing power lost through cutbacks and the voracious greed of the wealthy and powerful back to poor residents will revitalize everything.
Jean Swanson makes an excellent case for just this approach. Jean’s book, Poor-Bashing:The Politics of Exclusion gives wise insight into the attitudes and biases of those who ‘have’. The glib phrase “All they need there are good, honest people.” whitewashes the more subtle but malignant outlook that the vast majority of DE residents (and poor people in general) are “bad & dishonest”. Dan Feeney threw it in their faces when he had one Newsletter issue with the cover declaring: Carnegie Newsletter. By, For & About the Bad and Dishonest people of the Downtown Eastside.”
So far, all of the above has been raised many, many times. We get nothing without fighting hard for it.
Why, then, is this letter going to the Police as well? Because of their apparent neglect or dismissal of various activities in this community, based again on this bias of disrespect for all the non-criminal people living and having their daily lives here. That’s pretty broad and vague. A few specifics:
-a Community Relations committee meeting was delayed and disrupted because the head of Security turning to other staff to assist in some way to deal with a dealer named Tai or Ty, who was about 10-12 metres from Carnegie’s entrance at 4 o’clock in the afternoon. He had a plastic bag in his lap that had two cakes of crack cocaine, each one seen as the size of half a deck of cards. Given that a ‘rock’ selling for $10 is about the size of a matchhead, the street value of his load was in the thousands. He had a little razor and was openly cutting off bits from this giant ‘rock’ and selling them to the many people gathered around him and coming up steadily, and money was changing hands constantly. The mentioned head of Security, seeing this from across the street, knew exactly what was going on – it happens all the time with this Tai or Ty: he’s called the hero of the corner by regular users. After hurrying back from the work-errand, the Security person called 911 but no officers came. The result was expected; the frustration mounted. He’s said that the Police have the attitude that this kind of activity at the entrance of the community centre is our own fault. Security staff are expected to somehow force everyone hanging around outside to move away; the staff at the Health Contact Centre next door report that they, also, are expected to keep people moving through the alley outside their door if there is any problem related to dealers and users congregating.
The attitude is the same or based on the same idea as the Planners et al work from: poor and marginalised people are uniformly bad and dishonest… do not need adequate law and order… can just live with blatant disrespect while ‘we just contain it… until the juggernaut of development gets rolling and all these slobs and crooks are forced out.’
It might be very helpful if all officers and City Planners and developers read the Newsletter regularly. The first thing noticed might be the plethora of people/groups/events and more that live and make interesting – even exciting – lives in this community. They might notice how thoughtful and experienced many of the articles and poetry and artwork penned by the same people are. Also (but not likely) noticed might be the way almost every need and service all neighbourhoods/communities have is addressed here and the local residents so easily dismissed or disrespected are integral parts of those efforts.
The unspoken but adhered-to policy of doing cosmetic policing and holding empty consultations with local groups representing the majority of the current “bad & dishonest” crowd is both childish and unacceptable. We live here. This is our home. We are not going anywhere. The discriminating fact of exposure i.e. public awareness and visual confirmation of the social ills of our community allows just that: these ills are present in your communities, your neighborhoods, your recreational facilities and places of education and work. Treat us as you’d be treated; no more, no less.
By PAULR
Great weekend
It was a pretty good weekend. Now I am sitting at home all tired out from the sun and the millions of people. Well maybe there weren't millions of people but there were 2 or 3 anyway.
Last Thursday I went on my 2nd Bob Sarti walk. This time we went to
First we pulled off
Bob informed us of something or other. I wasn't close enough to hear all his words and that's too bad because this guy is full of info about wherever he takes us on his walks.
We walked along the shore, around a building and down onto a dock or a pier as some would say. I guess I shouldn't have said we went to Eagle Island because this was as close as we were going to get, a good 100 feet or so away across a little stretch of water. Then Bob said we were going up the trail a bit and eat lunch in the shade.
About an hour or so later we were up about 2 or 3 hundred feet, maybe more. I don't know because I was too damn tired to care. I guess you could say it was a bit of a climb, but the view was very nice and we passed a lot of people with dogs on the way.
Everyone was very friendly and we had taken it very slow so no one except me would get tired… We ate lunch and started back down, which was a bit of challenge - try and stop from running down these steep roads. We had crossed some gated area to get to a street and damn if that wasn't one of the steepest roads I’ve had to walk down. I don't think I would want to drive up there in some of the cars I’ve owned thru-out my life.
The rest of the trip wasn't that eventful and some people even fell asleep on the way back to Carnegie. It was a nice way to start off the weekend.
After getting back I had to go to
In between I could listen to all the music I wanted and I was to be given lunch & supper each day. I was happy with this arrangement since I love most kinds of music. I was kind of scared to be a sales person but I figured that I’d get all the help I needed from all the friendly people at the meeting. Besides, there were going to be 4 of us in the one tent and there were going to be overlaps with people starting and stopping their shifts at different times. As it turned out, I didn't need any help because people seemed to enjoy coming in to buy something and all the other volunteers were very helpful.
I had such a great time that I told them that I’d be back next year and they seemed to like that idea. And the music was fantastic. It didn't matter where I went because I didn't know any of the bands or artists playing the festival.
There were 7 stages and I visited them all; each one was unique and special. These people are all pros and they sure know how to entertain. The day time hours were filled with the different artists putting on workshops-different artists jamming.
I guess I heard most of the musicians but I doubt if I heard them all.
I made a few friends and I had a great time. The food was pretty good too. I'm glad a couple of my Carnegie friends told me about this FANtastic event. I was tired because after my last shift on Sunday. Each evening they had a concert but as I worked the first 2 evenings I didn't get a chance to go and by the 3rd evening I was too tired.
Anyway I had a great time and volunteering allowed me to make some friends and listen to some great music for free while the fans were paying quite a bit for the privilege of being there. Maybe next year you'll join me and we can listen to beautiful music together......
Hal
