If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
At 15, being called Fagboy on the football field happened. Ironically enough, it was a straight kid with immaculate gaydar who gave me that name in high school. I was thankful that the moniker never lasted more than that year, but those words 'Fagboy' have stuck with me ever since. It would take a few handfuls of girlfriends, over two decades of denial and seven full years of hiding on the other side of the planet -- in China -- before I learned to let go of my fear, my shame and the idea that being gay was wrong.
Random Hacks of Kindness (RHoK) is an event where technical talent and good intentions converge. It provides a chance to be part of a global movement of tech for social good. From ending poverty to connecting women peacebuilders, the Vancouver RHoK event pulls in local tech talent to donate valuable skills and time to worthy causes.
Hearing "Hey Jude" live? How can that not be on your bucket list? Is there another song anywhere in the universe that begs the same effect, or comes with the same aura, when its played to people who've paid to see and hear it? On Sunday night, Paul McCartney had his way with 60,000 Canadians.
The biggest complaint I hear from my 30-something friends is that they just want to go some place where they can dance, order from a proper wine and cocktail list (sans Jager shots) and be surrounded by people in our demographic. A seemingly tall order these days, but if you're looking for a good night out in Vancouver I recommend the following...
A stimulating evening in Vancouver recently provided an excellent snapshot of a startup community that's starting to grow up. It comes as the city improved on its ranking of the world's top startup ecosystems. This week, the Startup Genome Project updated its list, placing Vancouver ninth in the world, compared to its 16th showing on the previous list.
The digital world is being used to bring amazing art to anyone that has a computer or mobile device. Google Art Project is a platform through which the public can access high-resolution images of artworks. The platform now features more than 32,000 artworks from 46 museums. This is amazing when you consider that people can now access the world's most important visual cultural heritage from anywhere.
If voters were under the impression that it's only provincially in B.C. where corporate and union bucks talk tough, think again. Consider how much each candidate running for a mayor's chair in various Lower Mainland municipalities had to raise for their campaign in last year's local elections.
With the NHL currently locked out, there is one player that's using the off-time to make a fashion statement of sorts. Alexandre Burrows, star Left Wing for the Vancouver Canucks, is also the face of Canadian retailer RW&Co's new Perform Your Best campaign.
Vancouver's Bixi public bike-share program may sound like good public policy but in the end, it will be taxpayers who will get taken for a ride. Why are they paying for bikes when the car shares have proven transportation co-ops and businesses can be sustained without taxpayer dollars?
I sat down with Justin Hull, participating Mo Bro and founding member of the MOfficials, to discuss his team's involvement. The group is comprised of linesmen and referees from the Western Hockey League who have joined forces in an effort to raise $47,700. Their goal matches the number of Canadian men who have been diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2011 and 2012.
The City of Vancouver has plans to take down the Georgia and Dunsmuir viaducts and transform the area into more green space and housing, as well as improve traffic. It is hard not to compare similar plans in Sydney, Australia where I lived for 15 years before moving here.
I've always found the disparity of housing market articles fascinating. On any given week I will come across headlines varying from predictions about an imminent collapse to stories about how the market has never been better. Statistics can be manipulated in so many ways that realtors, journalists, economists, or whoever feels like it, can pretty much paint the market to look however it best suits them.
When Japan's government purchased some of the Diaoyu Islands from their private Japanese owners in September, Beijing sent surveillance ships to challenge the move, igniting old tensions in a long simmering dispute. The tensions that exist between the two nations are not contained to diplomats and politicians, they reverberate among people in both countries and across a 40 million-strong diaspora. Here in Canada, many Chinese-Canadians are polite and speak only among themselves about such issues.
The Calgary Board of Education has recently opened the door to the naming of classrooms to corporate sponsorship. Naming of classrooms or programs leads to some very fundamental questions about public education and has many drawbacks. One of which is if you allow Coca Cola a five year deal on a school gym, why not another school sponsored by Pepsi? If they can sponsor a high school gym, how about a junior high? A middle school? An elementary?
On top of loving to dress up each year, Halloween is my favourite holiday because it's the most dependent on how we design and build our communities. In city planning and design, there's an old saying about the "Trick-or-Treat Test." It's often brought up in the context in suburban home design: Can kids easily find the front door to your house, or must they poke behind the huge multi-car garage, past the parking asphalt, to ring your bell?
The mere fact that the media has zeroed in on Tagalog as the fastest growing immigrant language, and the public's surprise of this so-called linguistic phenomenon, is telling of the social insignificance of Canada's third largest ethnic group. Sure, Filipinos are common props in fast-food restaurants, hotels and homes, but their lack of political and economic weight renders them invisible despite their large presence and 24/7 work cycles.
