Unravel July/August 2022

UNRAVELHALIFAX.CA

JUL/AUG 22

Halifax revs up for fun and sun

RECALLING THE GLORY DAYS OF HALIFAX'S LIVE ROCK SCENE P. 10

ARTIST BRIA MILLER FINDS ROOM TO BREATHE P.17

HALIGONIANS EMBRACE MIXED MARTIAL ARTS P. 37

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Lian Lem

9

the issue Features

Departments

17

5 EDITOR’S MESSAGE Summer romance

ROOM TO BREATHE Artist Bria Miller hopes to

8 THE LIST

encourage others to be

Can’t-miss events

themselves and find their space

9 THE PERSPECTIVE

22

‘I was just another immigrant’

SUMMER IN THE CITY

10 THE BACKSTORY

Halifax revs up for a return to

Home grown music

fun and sun

12 THE CONVERSATION

32

The power of the coast

THE WONDER DRUGS

14 THE HOUSING MARKET

Therapists in Halifax want

Pushed out

to offer their patients psychedelics, as healers have

15 THE VIEW

for millennia. Will the federal

Art by Kristen De Palma

government let them?

16 THE SOUND

37

The Travel Mug podcast

STANDING ALONE, TOGETHER

46 THE FLAVOUR

Building strength, clearing

Searching for the best curry

community — meet the

48 THE FLAVOUR

people embracing the city’s

The maverick chef Catherine Stockhausen

fastest-growing sport

42 ACROSS THE GREAT DIVIDE With the Cogswell interchange redevelopment, Halifax has the opportunity to literally and figuratively transform the city

SLOAN

july/august vol 2 / issue 4 On the cover Halifax is abuzz with excitement this summer, with events and activities aplenty.

50 THE STANCE Living like no one is watching

37 Bruce Murray/VisionFire

the mind, and creating a

for Nova Scotian residents

Right to your mailbox: ► Six print issues of Unravel: the magazine telling Halifax stories ► Free for Nova Scotian residents

Sign up today at unravelhalifax.ca/subscribe

Summer romance How a band called the Harbour Sharks sparked my love of Halifax

Tammy Fancy

I

By Trevor J. Adams trevoradams@unravelhalifax.ca

UnravelHalifax @UnravelHalifax unravelhalifax

recall the exact moment I fell for Halifax. It was a summer afternoon in 1999. I had recently graduated and was beginning my journalistic career.

I lived in the South End for most of the previous four years while attending university, but you don’t really experience a city while in school; you’re always in your bubble. The settings might change, but you mostly spend your time doing the same things with the same people.

That summer was like discovering a new city. On the day in question, my friend Dylan and I were aimlessly ambling around the downtown, stopping periodically for a bite or a beer.

Amid the clamour of Spring Garden Road, we heard a live band, cranking out a funk-rock sound that made us exchange delighted looks. The song eludes my aging memory, but Rick James’s “Mary Jane” seems right.

We ventured down a flight of stairs to a subterranean bar called the Tickle Trunk. A band called the Harbour Sharks was on the tiny stage, playing their guts out for a crowd of about six people.

This was the beginning of a long meandering journey through the city’s musical scene for my roommates and me, which continued for the next few years, hitting a fever pitch each summer.

The Tickle Trunk was our base, and we became big fans of the open-mic night, where a rising guitarist named Matt Mays played weekly, interspersing songs like “City of Lakes” with rambling monologues about how famous he’d be some day.

We ventured all over. Sometimes the bars were packed, sometimes they were deserted. But there was always local talent or a touring act on hand.

It seemed we could go out any time, day or night, and find a live show.

We saw the legendary Dutch Mason and Carson Downey at Bearly’s, Jimmy Swift and Dr. Yellowfever at the Attic, 54-40 and Bif Naked at the Marquee, and countless others that are now lost to the mists of time.

And it was a particularly glorious time to be a rock fan. An edgy new altrock scene had taken hold in the city, earning it a “Seattle North” nickname that some of us still aren’t letting go. Bands like Sloan and Thrush Hermit (the incubator of a young Joel Plaskett) were exploding the fiddles-and-jigs stereotype.

We were hogs at a buffet, feasting on every live show possible. We were living in a blessed city at a blessed time, and we knew it.

In her history column for this issue on page 10, Katie Ingram takes us back to those glory days of Halifax’s live rock scene. And to embark on your own summer of discovery, see Janet Whitman’s story on page 22. No matter your pandemic comfort level, she has expert advice to help you make the most of summer in the city.

Unravel HIGHLIGHTS

Unravel NEWS

Unravel ONLINE

If you’re willing to fight, there’s a place for you — meet the Haligonians embracing one of the world’s fastest growing sports. Chris Benjamin has the story on page 37.

Climate change could reshape our province — on page 12, we interview the researcher who is studying how nature can help protect us from what’s coming.

The Peggy’s Cove Area Festival of the Arts returns in July, showcasing local talents.

Learn more in Ameeta Vohra’s web-exclusive feature at unravelhalifax.ca.

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VOL 2/ ISSUE 4 • DATE OF ISSUE: JULY 2022 PUBLISHER Fred Fiander • fredfiander@unravelhalifax.ca

We want to hear from you!

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Crystal Murray • crystalmurray@unravelhalifax.ca SENIOR EDITOR Trevor J. Adams • trevoradams@unravelhalifax.ca CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Jodi DeLong • jodidelong@unravelhalifax.ca Lori McKay • lorimckay@unravelhalifax.ca Janet Whitman • janetwhitman@unravelhalifax.ca

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Scan the QR code and complete the survey, or visit unravelhalifax.ca

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PRODUCTION AND DESIGN ASSISTANT Kathleen Hoang • kathleenhoang@unravelhalifax.ca DESIGNERS Roxanna Boers • roxannaboers@unravelhalifax.ca Rachel Lloyd • rachellloyd@unravelhalifax.ca Andrezza Nascimento • andrezzanascimento@unravelhalifax.ca Unravel is published six times annually by: Metro Guide Publishing, a division of Advocate Printing & Publishing Company Ltd. 2882 Gottingen St., Halifax, N.S. B3K 3E2 Tel: (902) 464-7258, Sales Toll Free: 1-877-311-5877

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THE VOICES

PAULINE DAKIN is a journalist, professor of journalism at the University of King’s College, and the award-winning author of Run, Hide, Repeat: A Memoir of a Fugitive Childhood.

BRUCE MURRAY has been creating food and lifestyle photography for more than 20 years in the Maritimes and in his original studio in Vancouver. visionfire.ca @VisionFire.

MARIANNE SIMON is a writer and subeditor and has published many children’s stories, articles and poems in magazines and newspapers. Her interests include teaching and conducting Englishconversation classes.

ALEC BRUCE is an awardwinning journalist whose bylines regularly appear in major Canadian and American publications. He recently completed a master of fine arts in creative nonfiction at the University of King’s College in Halifax.

LORI McKAY has been working as a magazine and newspaper editor for more than 20 years.

She recently completed a master of fine arts in creative nonfiction (and an almost-finished book) at the University of King’s College.

COLLEEN THOMPSON is an award winning writer and photographer. She favours writing about food and drink and the storytelling behind it. Her first book, Monkey Weddings & Summer Sapphires: South Africa to Nova Scotia, was recently published.

Instagram: @monkeyweddings

LEM LIAN is a multi-awardwinning conceptual artist, originally from China. Now Canada-based, she’s an illustrator, art instructor, and collage maker. Her narrative art is discovering esoteric aesthetic from black and white.

Visit Unravel ONLINE

AMEETA VOHRA is a news and sports writer with work published throughout North America. Her Halifax Magazine story “Thunderstruck” was a 2020 Atlantic Journalism Awards silver medallist.

JANET WHITMAN is a city-and nature-loving journalist who divides her time between Halifax and her cottage on the Northumberland Shore. She’s happiest digging in the dirt, picking up a hammer, or messing around in the kitchen.

KATIE INGRAM is a freelance writer, author, and journalism instructor based in Halifax.

CHRIS BENJAMIN is a journalist, editor, and fiction writer. His fourth book, Boy With A Problem, was shortlisted for the Alistair MacLeod Prize for Short Fiction.

His book, Eco-Innovators: Sustainability in Atlantic Canada, won the Best Atlantic-Published Book Award and was a finalist for the Richardson Non-Fiction Prize.

Visit unravelhalifax.ca for more stories by our featured contributors and sign up for the unravel newsletter.

JULY / AUGUST 2022

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THE LIST

Top

1

6

Halifax Pride JULY 14 TO 24

Terra Ciolfe

Music, sports, festivals, and more — discover the summer’s can’t-miss events

The East Coast’s largest 2SLGBTQ+ festival returns with a full slate of events, including drag shows, live music, a youth dance, and a candlelight vigil. The marquee parade returns on July 16, with a new route, (beginning at Citadel High to avoid construction on Upper Water Street). See our web-exclusive feature at unravelhalifax.ca for more about the festival. halifaxpride.com

2 3 4 5 6

Shakespeare by the Sea

Halifax Jazz Festival

JULY 15 TO SEPT. 4, CAMBRIDGE BATTERY AT POINT PLEASANT PARK

JULY 13 TO 17, WATERFRONT STAGE ON LOWER WATER STREET

Another season of theatre al fresco kicks off with the family friendly musical Cinderelly. The Bard’s classic Hamlet opens on Aug. 5, starring Deivan Steele as the eponymous king. And on Monday nights throughout the season, look for Hello City (by the sea), a series showcasing local improv performers. shakespearebythesea.ca

Nova Scotia’s biggest musical festival is back, spotlighting local acts, and international all-stars. Highlights include Prism Prizewinning rapper and composer Aquaculture on July 13 and vocalist extraordinaire Molly Johnson with the funktastic Alex Cuba on July 16. halifaxjazzfestival.ca

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Little Women: The Broadway Musical JULY 19 TO 24, NEPTUNE THEATRE

The rising talents of Neptune’s Youth Performance Company share soaring musical numbers and scenes about relationships and sisterhood — the classic adventures of sisters, Jo, Meg, Beth, and Amy March. neptunetheatre.com

Hfx Wanderers FC

CONTINUING THROUGH OCT. 1, WANDERERS GROUNDS

Halifax’s pro soccer heroes host opponents from across the country throughout the summer, battling for the Canadian Premier League crown and a slot in the CONCACAF League, where they would battle teams from Central America and the Caribbean. hfxwanderersfc.canpl.ca

Halifax Seaport Cider & Beerfest AUG. 4 TO 6

If you’re a craft-drink aficionado, it’s the most wonderful time of the year! Sample the best local brews, plus offerings from across the country and around the world that typically aren’t available in Halifax. seaportbeerfest.com

THE PERSPECTIVE

‘I was just another immigrant’ Priced out, under-employed, and worried about health care — a Brazilian immigrant came to Halifax for a fresh start but is leaving disillusioned

BY MARIANNE SIMON

Lian Lem

W

hen Brazilian Laura Campos (not her real name) and her husband were searching for a better quality of life and a safe place to live, Canada seemed the best choice, so they immigrated in 2017.

They arrived first in Toronto, where money and language were the big barriers. “Immigrating to Canada was an expensive process,” she says. “Our savings depleted at an alarming rate. And I found it difficult to express myself in a language different from my mother tongue.”

After a year, they decided to move to a community where the cost of living would be lower. “Halifax seemed a suitable place at that time,” she recalls. “We believed that, although a smaller city, we should be able to find everything we needed.”

Unlike many newcomers, they faced little culture shock.

“Brazilian culture is greatly influenced by Americans and therefore it is not very different from Canadian culture,” Campos explains. “I like the fact that Canadians respect other peoples and cultures. Also, I find that they are less concerned about appearances and material things, but are more focused on enjoying life.”

But they couldn’t avoid another hurdle, which many immigrants stumble over: finding meaningful work.

“I went to law school in my country but never practised law; I worked as an administrative assistant for the government,” she says. “When I came here, I realized it could be an opportunity to experience new career possibilities. So, I worked as a cleaner, a sales associate, and a pastry cook at different times.”

White-collar work was more elusive.

“Even though I had previous experience and it was shown in my resumé, I never received any response from employers,” she says. “I got the impression that they are not open to offering jobs to new immigrants, and when they do, it is usually at the entry level. Another hurdle I had to face was getting local references.

Every employer asks for local references. As an immigrant who had just come into the country, this was a real challenge.”

The pandemic compounded the difficult job search.

“After some time, I stopped applying for jobs because

I did not feel comfortable exposing myself to the COVID-19 virus,” she says. “Now I am focusing on future possibilities. I have been studying different things at home, online, to equip myself for a new job field.”

But Campos sees no future in Halifax.

“My husband and I have decided to go back to Ontario,” she says, adding that Nova Scotia’s strained health-care system is a big part of the decision. “The endless waiting time for a family doctor makes me insecure about how our heath is being dealt with.”

She also finds it frustrating to have to hunt so hard for a job, even as employers claim there’s a labour shortage. “The job market is not newcomer friendly,” she says. “The province says it needs more workers, but has serious problems concerning the necessary infrastructure to support the new immigrants. Also, the locals see immigrants as threats to their own job opportunities.”

And thanks to soaring prices and out-of-step worker pay, Halifax has lost the advantage that lured them here.

“Halifax is not a cheap place to live in,” she says.

“This place is as expensive as any other big city in Canada. Rents have skyrocketed, the prices of food and essential commodities have been increasing steadily. And our monthly expenses have gone way beyond our budget.”

They had hoped Halifax could be a long-term home, but ultimately, they just don’t feel wanted.

“I had a few bad experiences when I needed assistance,” says Campos. “I had to deal with some people in public services who showed no patience or caring.

I was new, and I did not know how things were done here. I wanted to clarify my doubts and I wanted to be heard. But I realized that to them, I was just another immigrant who had a different looking face, and spoke broken English.”

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Remembering the glory days of Halifax’s live rock scene

Catherine Stockhausen

BY KATIE INGRAM

SLOAN, NSCAD PHOTO STUDIO, 1996

A

Catherine Stockhausen

Catherine Stockhausen

HOME GROWN

THE BACKSTORY

10

THE SUPER FRIENDZ, GOTTINGEN STREET, HALIFAX, 1995

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bout 30 years ago, the stars aligned to put Halifax on the music map.

“We just wanted to be part of what was going on and … it seemed fun, and we were creative,” says former Jale guitarist Eve Hartling.

Jale, a rock band based out of Halifax from 1992 to 1997, was one of many local groups to gain national recognition and popularity in the era. Others include Sloan, Thrush Hermit, the Super Friendz, Carson Downey Band, and Hip Club Groove.

For some, this time included major record releases, like Sloan on Geffen Records and Jale on Sub Pop, while others released music on local labels like Murderecords and Cinnamon Toast Records.

Many matches lit the fuse. Part of it, Hartling says, was schools like NSCAD churning out students of an artistic bent, who tended to remain in the more affordable and accessible downtown, creating a neighbourhood where music thrived.

“The city was different, and it (also) probably has something to do with why it happened,” she says. “It hadn’t gone through what’s happening now downtown, which is urban growth everywhere.”

There also seemed to be more of a collaborative environment, which brought people together.

For example, Jale’s Jennifer Pierce sang backing vocals on an early Sloan album, while The Super Friendz had a few drummers including Sloan’s Chris Murphy and Cliff Grubb of Thrush Hermit.

“The guys helped us out quite a bit, lending us gear and stuff like that,” says Hartling. “It was a very strong community here.”

For some bands, their sound wasn’t what executives and others in the music industry were looking for. Mostly, they wanted grunge and alternative rock.

“In Halifax there was a big movement towards that,” says Sean McKenna, former drummer for rock band Jack Butler, adding that many newly formed bands were playing shows after only being together for a few months. “(That) genre exploded and kind of pushed out a lot of the bands that actually had been together for a lot longer.”

McKenna likens his band’s sound to Aerosmith.

DEEP CUTS Greg Clark

ck ine Sto Cather

hausen

Take a visual tour through the glory days of rock in Halifax in the 1990s, and visit unravelhalifax.ca to find the answers.

“They said they couldn’t sign us. We were repeatedly told, ‘you guys can play too well for what we’re looking for. We’re looking for the more dark, kind of sloppy vibe,’ ” says McKenna.

For fans, it was all about supporting home-grown talent.

“It felt like a community, but there was a sense of healthy competition — bands were trying to outdo each other, or one band’s success would push another band and they worked harder,” says Stephen Cooke, a journalist who’s been covering the scene for about 25 years.

Venues, like the Double Deuce and Pub Flamingo, and events like Halifax Pop Explosion, helped the bands gain local followings.

“There weren’t really more (venues than there are now), but maybe they were more consistent in what they had to offer,” he says. “They were booked really smartly and consistently, and it helped form that image of like-minded bands, even if they didn’t all sound the same.”

This also brought bands to Halifax, like Newfoundland’s The Hardship Post, and individual musicians like Mike Belinsky. Belinsky drummed for Halifax band Jellyfishbabies after they moved to Toronto, and was also a drummer for Jale.

“It was super cool for me to be able to experience it by going back to Halifax and rehearsing with Jale and being a part of it,” he says.

“I was living in New York when that whole scene exploded. I was like, ‘Oh my God, why did I leave?’”

By the end of the decade, things were petering out. Mainstay acts broke up or moved away, as redevelopment claimed some of the most popular venues. Halifax still has lots of music, of course, but the industry has changed.

“Music is disseminated differently these days; I don’t even know that scenes are a thing anymore,” says Cooke. “Because so much of music is coming out of basements and home recording studios, that sort of thing, and people are making music on their laptops. There are so few bands I associate with a strong scene or geographical location compared to the way it used to be two or three decades ago.”

What former Halifax-based record label is named after a sweet-tasting breakfast food?

Mock Up, Scale Down was nominated for Alternative Album of the Year at the 1996 Juno Awards. Name the band that released it.

Name the Thrush Hermit’s album ranked 85th best Canadian album of all-time in the book The Top 100 Canadian Albums, published in 2007.

V

?

After Jale’s breakup in 1997, some of its members formed another band.

What was the name of this new band?

Due to its booming alt rock scene, Halifax was likened to what American city? (The city in which Sub Pop, the record label that signed Jale and New Brunswick’s Eric’s Trip, was based).

Submitted

This former Halifax music festival started in 1993 and was a mecca of sorts for alternative music in its early years.

JALE. 1992

JULY / AUGUST 2022

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THE CONVERSATION

The power of the coast Climate change could reshape our province — meet the researcher who is studying how nature can help protect us from what’s coming

B

orn and raised in Zimbabwe, Makadunyiswe Ngulube moved to Canada in 2016 to pursue her environmental passion, including how to adapt to and mitigate climate change, while developing sustainably.

Since completing an environmental science degree at Saint Mary’s University last autumn, Ngulube is currently pursuing a masters of science and applied science.

When she began her studies, she didn’t know how she’d specialize. After seeing an advertisement for the Intertidal Coastal Sediment Transport Research Unit at the university, she applied, and was hired for a summer job.

From that experience, the topic of coastal restoration and nature-based solutions piqued Ngulube’s interest. As a research assistant, she did more reading on these topics, studying how vegetation can combat coastal erosion.

In the following interview, she offers her perspective on the climate crisis and why you should care, her current research, the power of knowledge, and why she’s optimistic about the future.

Why should people care? “There are generations coming after us. That’s probably one of the things to think about, but people should care because with climate change, it’s not just an environmental issue. It could be an issue of injustice, inequality, social inequity, environmental racism, or so many issues that are tied to climate that people don’t realize. People should care because everything is connected.”

How coastal plants can help protect us: “I investigated the impact and interaction of vegetation on oncoming waves ... I’m trying to assess whether a created marsh is still effective or not (at reducing erosion), and to quantify the protective and ecosystem services. The area that we’re working on is actually a piping plover critical habitat.

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Submitted

BY AMEETA VOHRA

We’re restoring that because those birds rely on that environment.”

What she’s learning: “We want to find out how we can adapt to storms, what the coastline will look like in the next 10, 20, or 100 years, and whether there’s a way we can slow down the (erosion) process ... When we understand the interaction of a vegetation with waves, it’s an easy way for us to start thinking about engineering solutions … (We want to) protect our coasts using nature, and this is where nature-based solutions come up.”

Environmental racism: “Certain policies are geared to, or not favourable towards, a certain group of people because of their race ... One of the perfect examples, or maybe not perfect because there’s nothing perfect about environmental racism, is Flint, Michigan and how they didn’t have access to water because of the area they were in.

They were Black people experiencing environmental racism — policies that are set to deprive them of a certain environmental benefit they should have a right to.”

Knowledge is power: “For Nova Scotia, this is some ground-breaking work because for years and years, there’s been diking and Acadian settlers were using that as a means

of protection from flooding (in places like the Annapolis Valley, where dikes turned marsh to farmland). Now, we’re starting to see that we need those salt marshes because they can help to prevent flooding, improve water quality, sustain creatures, and provide carbon sequestration. Overall, this will be great for Nova Scotians to understand better what the coasts have to offer.”

What can regular people do? “We are dependent on nature and need to view ourselves as a part of it rather than apart. We should do it from a perspective of caring, nurturing, and giving rather than what can we get from it. The best we can give is our care for the planet.”

Optimism: “We hear the stories of gloom and doom, but I value opportunities like this because we can share our work and also share that there’s hope. I’m wary of also going into it with scare tactics ... People should act from a place of knowledge and genuine interest. My encouragement to people is to read. There’s so much literature out there. You can find peer-reviewed articles, verified work, and you can learn more about how you can contribute.”

This interview is edited for concision and clarity.

Danika Van Proosdij, SM U

Guided tours available!

Walk on the ocean floor where the highest tides in the world happen 627 Burntcoat Head Rd, Noel, NS 902-369-2529 • burntcoatheadpark.ca

Makadunyiswe Ngulube at Clifton Marsh, studying how plant life can protect coastal Nova Scotia.

Visitor Information Centre

SHUBENACADIE RIVER Tidal Bore Viewing!

Danika Van Proosdij, SMU

9865 Hwy 236, South Maitland, NS easthants.ca/fundy

902-499-1323 Jarrett@reddoorrealty.ca reddoorrealty.ca JULY / AUGUST 2022

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THE HOUSING MARKET

Pushed out As the housing crunch worsens, some landlords are turfing tenants in the pursuit of higher rents

BY JANET WHITMAN

FOLLOW THE MONEY

F

THE CRUNCH number of people

$100,000: the jump in price since last year to construct a 48-unit, purpose-built apartment rental building in Halifax $1,621: average rent for a one-bedroom; an 11 per cent jump from last year

9,000: the ourteen years after pro$25 – $50: amount a landlord can bump g the who moved here durin fessional opera singer x up monthly rent by installing a dishwasher lifa Ha , making mic de pan and housing advocate city ing row t-g Canada’s fastes Heather Pawsey coined y rate for the term “renoviction” in Van1: the current vacanc ntage, rce pe a as couver, the craze seems all the ts en apartm are rage in Halifax. meaning 99 per cent hit in A portmanteau of “renovaHouston added some protections occupied, a level first tightest the and 21 tion” and “eviction,” the practice for renters, such as requirements October 20 involves ejecting a tenant to do renfor a three-month notice, mutual availability on record ovations, with the upgrades enabling agreements in writing, and comthe landlord to hike the rent. Renovicpensation. But, with few affordable tions are sometimes legit (apartments rentals available and an overheated home-buying mardo need upgrades over time), but the situation often ket, renovictions, both legal and not, remain a problem. leaves people ripe for exploitation.

Some landlords argue a ban on renovictions could “There are a variety of ways in which landlords lead to subpar and even unsafe housing. The problem pressure tenants to vacate in order to recapitalize or now, however, is that rents on many renovated apartredevelop a property,” says local housing expert Neil ments are skyrocketing beyond the reach of many Lovitt of Turner & Drake Partners. “It can include filing tenants, even those making more than a living wage. legitimate applications to the tenancies board, frauduAn increasing number of renovictions are “demovlent applications — such as an eviction due to a ‘family ictions,” when tenants are evicted so a landlord can member’ needing to move into the unit, which never demolish a building. The new apartments going up comes to pass after the tenant leaves — and a variety of on the properties take time and charge substantially more underhanded pressure tactics.” higher rents.

Little data is available to show how extensive the Nova Scotia didn’t start tracking renovictions until trend is. the ban was lifted. Around 30 applications have been But it was a problem bad enough for then-premier filed by landlords after they failed to reach an agreement Stephen McNeil to impose a renoviction ban in Novemwith their tenants. Six of them came in anticipation ber 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic raged, the housing of the ban being lifted and 13 are in Halifax Regional market sizzled, and a shortage of affordable housing Municipality. In the early weeks, four hearings sided became a crisis. New Progressive Conservative Premier with tenants and one was in favour of a landlord. The Tim Houston lifted the restriction in March, despite a province tells Unravel Halifax it will no longer provide worsening housing crunch that’s creating the perfect information on hearing outcomes. conditions to turf tenants and jack up rents, in some The obvious solution is more housing, but a sufficases by double or more. cient supply is years away.

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THE VIEW

The View: We Love Nova Scotia

Submitted

Artist Kristen De Palma celebrates a thriving wine scene

Title: We Love Nova Scotia Location: 1549 Lower Water St.

M

idway through the pandemic, Kristen De Palma left her corporate career to pursue her design business full-time. Marrying marketing strategy and design, she’s created works around the city, including at the Halifax Central Library, the Canteen, Granville Hall, and the Waterfront Warehouse.

“I had the opportunity to collaborate with Benjamin Bridge winery to create a unique mural that celebrates 15 years of Nova 7 wine, sort of a ‘thank you’ back to the province,” she says. “This mural features over a dozen of the beautiful botanicals that grow in our province, like the Mayflower, thistle, lupins, horsetail, and more.”

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THE SOUND

The Travel Mug podcast Rediscovering Nova Scotia and travelling in a COVID world

BY TREVOR J. ADAMS

A

Submitted

lthough they’re both from the South Shore, hosts Meggan and Jenn didn’t know each other until they met in a Facebook travel group in 2020. They discovered a shared love of travel and chatting over coffee. That friendship quickly blossomed into the Travel Mug Podcast, where they offer travel advice and chat with others who share their passion.

Based in Nova Scotia, they provide tips for staycationers rediscovering their province, plus firsthand advice for people venturing further afield to Europe, the U.S., and the Caribbean. Recent episodes include advice on COVID-safe travel, a primer on Bar Harbor, Maine, and a guide to the Fundy and Northumberland shores.

Travel Mug hosts Meggan (left) and Jenn.

travelmugpodcast.com

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BY AMEETA VOHRA PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE MURRAY/VISIONFIRE

Room to Y breathe Artist Bria Miller hopes to encourage others to be themselves and find their space

armouth native Bria Miller left for Halifax after high school to escape racism and homophobia, and create space for themself.

Now, as a Black, Indigenous, queer artist, they want to do the same for other marginalized and racialized people.

“Creating those spaces is so important to invade that reality of discrimination and surveillance everywhere we go, but also because we’re treated as suspicious when we gather,” says Miller. “The benefits of that remind us of our vitality, and everything doesn’t have to be about getting away from white people. It’s about being together.”

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THE NOTE

Miller says many spaces where marginalized people gather are based around sharing skills or holding space for each other, encouraging opportunities for people to be themselves and not be surveyed or feel minimized by the white gaze. “It can be draining, especially to be in public as a Black or Indigenous person,” they say.

After moving to Halifax in 2011, Miller started a teaching degree at Mount Saint Vincent University, a welcome move after growing up in Yarmouth.

“That is a big reason (for leaving): being Black, Indigenous, and queer,” they say. “It’s very white in Yarmouth and can be very racist … Segregation is still blatant in Halifax; it’s even more so home.”

After a year and a half of studies, Miller realized they needed an outlet for “cathartic” healing.

They dropped out of university and started experimenting with art, recalling the encouragement of junior-high art teachers who introduced them to different media.

“I started with watercolour, ink illustrations, and painting acrylics,” they say. “That changed over time as I realized the work I liked to do more.

It happened through a lot of experimentation and collaboration with other artists; living in the city and working with people who do all different art has taught me many skills. I am communitytaught, in a way.”

Creativity runs in Miller’s family. Their uncle

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Michael “Metal Mike” Miller made posters for the Khyber Centre of Arts and continues to make patches and elaborately painted denim jackets for metal bands. Miller’s grandmother creates ceramics and cards. Meanwhile, partner Tino has provided support, encouragement, and honesty.

Miller has had many opportunities to showcase their work, including an artist residency at Wonder’neath, a co-director job with the Khyber Centre, selling stickers, and hosting an art show at Alteregos café, a place where they worked and had a supportive boss in owner Michelle Strum.

“I first met Bria with their partner 10 years ago, and they did some help facilitating some things at the café for me,” says Strum. “We became close friends, and they started doing art shows there.

Their art shows inspired the future of art ... in Alter Ego’s space. Many other Black women from the community are putting their art on the walls.”

One of Miller’s first exhibitions was 4th Wall at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia. It featured a painting, “Resilience in Brown, Queer and Woman,” which reflects their journey.

“It’s essentially a self-portrait of me, and to the left of the image, it’s a lot of little visual representation of my story and pain,” they say. “There’s little alcohol bottles and eyeballs entangled throughout my hair and stuff. As it moves towards the right of the photo, it’s different healing methods I found like a paintbrush tangled in my hair and little music notes. It feels representative of the beginning of a journey in a way.”

Another personal journey came to life in the digital portrait “Welcome to My Nest.”

“It’s from the perspective of above my head,

THE NOTE

Caption

IEverything would hope that (myhave art) to doesn’t encourages be about getting people to speak away from white their truth tell people.

It’sand about their beingstory together.

— Bria Miller

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THE NOTE

and it’s my legs and my forearm,” Miller says. “You see a lot of clutter in the background; there’s my iPad, a rolling tray, and chips. It represents this time in the pandemic and has my new tech.”

When it comes to their vision and concepts, Miller talks through ideas with their partner and friends. Then, they draw or write it into a Google document accompanied by a to-do list of steps to make that vision come to life.

Miller found a platform in the annual Nocturne art festival in Kjipuktuk/Halifax. For the 2018 event, they collaborated with Liliona Quarmyne, Catherine Martin, Cynthia Martin, Sarah Brooks, and Tayla Fern Paul to create Mi’kma’ki 2030, an art performance highlighting environmental racism.

“That project was responding to the report put out by scientists, letting everybody know that if fossil fuels and fracking don’t stop, we will have little to no clean air or water on our planet by 2030,” Miller says. “That is an active report that’s out, saying our windows are closing to fix our planet.

So that’s scary. People need to think about the relationship to the land.

The fact that it’s been unsurrendered. They need to learn about the treaty and how that government has not honoured that at all.”

The outgoing executive director of Nocture, Lindsay Cory, recalls how the collaboration had a significant impact on the art community and the city as a whole with a perspective from BIPOC artists.

“It was really important, as it is every year, but, particularly in that theme, that we prioritize conversations and art pieces being led by BIPOC artists,” she says. “It just became this amazing project with all of these Indigenous and Black artists working together. But there were also many storytelling elements to it. It felt like a great opportunity for Nocturne to highlight that work.”

In 2020, Nocturne’s theme was “Echolocation,” which pondered the question: “Considering all of the ecological and social injustices at present, what is the role of art in transmitting our impact and collective responsibility as stewards of this land?”

Miller was hired to create a visual storytelling of “Meeting Waters,” a discussion series curated by Lindsay Dobbin and created by Ingrid Waldron, a social scientist and associate professor at Dalhousie University. It connected artists with wisdom holders from different communities in Mi’kma’ki that experienced environmental racism. Miller created a poster and materials highlighting the speakers.

Bria is pretty unstoppable. I’m pretty excited about the kinds of things they will be able to change — Michelle Strum

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THE NOTE

Cory says the two Nocturne events spotlight Miller’s impact on the greater community.

“Bria is really listening to what is going on, creating work in response to that, and they deeply feel what’s going on,” she says. “That resonated with many people in the city and province — how they feel, what they want to see happen, and they have a really beautiful way of telling that story through their art. It’s more exciting for us to engage with artists that do that; artists who are really speaking truth within their art, but also connecting with other people with other experiences to grow their practice as well.”

Miller has made an impact on their community with Taking BLK Gottingen, an event they collaborated on with African Nova Scotian queer visual artist Kordeena Clayton and the North End Business Association’s Marika Paris.

“We had conversations about how there used to be Black-owned businesses on Gottingen and how visible the changes have become, especially over COVID with a lot of development happening,” Miller says. “We were talking about how it would be awesome if Black businesses could line Gottingen Street and essentially take over, in a way.”

Strum says all this hard work comes from Miller’s passion for their art. That includes a burgeoning business side: selling jewelry they make with clay, resin, and wire, plus creating tote bags.

“There’s so much love; it breeds work, and at the same time, there is so much politics, so it’s like this combination of love and politics that really pushes the envelope,” Strum says. “It is like their integrity is always to be who they are and bring that to the community, selling that and showing that off.”

Art that makes a difference

Correction and apology: The version of this story published in the July 2022 print edition of Unravel Halifax contained errors. On page 18, Michelle Strum’s first name was incorrect, as was the name of Bria Miller’s “Welcome to My Nest” artwork. On page 20, Bria was misquoted as describing the land as “surrendered,” which gives an inaccurate picture of her views. She actually said “unsurrendered.”

On page 21, we inaccurately described the origins of the Taking BLK Gottingen event. Unravel Halifax apologizes to Bria, Michelle, and all readers for these errors. We’re reviewing our editing, fact-checking, and transcription processes to try to prevent their recurrence.

“Bria is pretty unstoppable,” says Strum. “I’m pretty excited about the kinds of things they will be able to change from a system perspective and have that level of autonomy to bring their creativity to the next level. Go out and find yourself an original Bria Miller.”

Miller continues making digital art, ink illustrations, graphic designs, stickers, art prints, and paintings through their business, Bria Makes Things, with one goal in mind.

“I would hope that it encourages people to speak their truth and tell their story,” they say.

“Many people struggle with that, especially if they haven’t been given the space to speak.”

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Summer in the city Halifax revs up for a return to fun and sun

Eriana Willis

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Jeremy Brake

BY JANET WHITMAN

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our central fort on the hill, harbourside, islands,” says MacNutt. “They are all accessible, unique to Halifax, cherished by most, and relatively unchanged over generations.”

Rhys Waters, a podcast pro who immigrated to Nova Scotia from Wales with his family four years ago, is happy to see Halifax coming back to life.

“I saw the city go from a deserted, zombie apocalypse to gradually everything starting to feel like normal again,” says Waters, whose podcast studio is across from rejuvenated summertime hotspot DeeDee’s Ice Cream near the Halifax Common. “The turnaround’s been amazing.”

His family is adopting a 12-year-old girl and he, along with his wife and three sons (aged 10, seven, and five), are excited to show her all the fun stuff they’ve discovered around the city.

“With the kids, we love going to the beaches and lakes,” Waters says. “They love Fort Needham Park. It’s a nice place to go with a bit of a breeze on a really hot day.”

The Dingle is another favourite, with its mix of beach and play area. “My kids call it the ‘Tower Park.’ As soon as they see sand, they rip their shoes off and run wild.”

If Waters and his wife manage to score a babysitter, they like an evening summer stroll on the waterfront.

When the couple first moved here, the city had no shortage of places to eat or get a fancy cocktail, but the options have exploded, he says. “I don’t think I’m going to be around to try all the places we’d like to.”

Wondering what to do this summer? Read on.

Bruce Murray/VisionFire

fter two-plus years of lockdowns, bubbling, and keeping a distance of nine donairs apart, government has rolled back most COVID-19 public health rules and most Nova Scotians are vaccinated.

The pandemic isn’t behind us — top public health doc Robert Strang is still (as of press time) encouraging people to mask — but Halifax has no shortage of fun and safe things to put on a city staycation agenda.

“It’s funny because so many of us are reacquainting ourselves with the city,” says Laura MacNutt, owner of KingsPier Vintage in Historic Properties. “And it’s also transformed over the past couple of years with the new waterfront development … Getting to know the city again, and with a fresh perspective, is really quite remarkable.”

Besides exploring the “new” all along the Halifax waterfront, MacNutt is looking forward to the old. “We’re all wanting to get back to the days where there was a nice, intimate Busker Festival and all that,” she says.

Her daughter Emma Bent and workers at her luxury vintage shop agree that the essentials for a perfect Halifax summer day include the age-old picnic at Public Gardens, a stroll through Point Pleasant Park or along the waterfront to browse kiosks, a stop at a beer garden, lounging in an Adirondack or flopping in a hammock overlooking the water, then taking a trip across to Dartmouth to do more of the same.

“What is pleasantly surprising is that the really meaningful things that Haligonians of all ages love are the things that are a result of geography and topography:

Laura MacNutt and daughter Emma.

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Feeling crafty?

Try your hand at making something at the Art Cart, a fully stocked, mobile art class on wheels in front of the Craig Gallery in Alderney Landing on the Dartmouth waterfront.

“Folks just have to sign up and show up,” says Ryan Fraser, who heads up marketing for Alderney Landing. “All of the materials are taken care of.”

Over the summer, the Art Cart will be open for three or four sessions a month. Classes include screen-printed patch making, cardmaking, and rug hooking among others. While its main target is the seven-to-16 age bracket, the cart has an option for those 19 and up and feeling crafty: Tuesday evening “Drink and Draw” classes in collaboration with the Brightwood Brewery Beer Garden. Enjoy a beverage or two while sketching uniquely curated still lives.

Cinema under the stars For two decades, Fin Atlantic International Film Festival has delivered epic outdoor film experiences with a giant inflatable screen. After a two-year pandemic-inspired hiatus, Fin Outdoor is back. This year’s theme is the “Summer of Sarah Polley” featuring the talents of the Canadian actor and director. Weather permitting, the four-flick Friday eve series starts July 8 with My Life Without Me, followed by Away from Her, Take this Waltz, and Stories We Tell. Showtime starts at dusk in downtown Halifax’s iconic Public Gardens. Benches between the café and gazebo fill up fast, so bring a blanket or folding chair. Admission is free but capacity will likely max out at 500 and advance tickets are required.

Looking for more outdoor movie options? Out by the Halifax international airport, Speedway Drive-in has room for 600 cars, making the new venture at Scotia Speedworld the largest drive-in east of Montreal. No wheels? Stay put with a projector and host a backyard or street-side movie night of your own.

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Hot ticket

Micou’s Island attracts a mere 2,000 visitors a year. Tucked away near the eastern shore of St. Margarets Bay, the nine-hectare tidal island at the tip of Indian Point is accessible on foot over a sandbar at low tide. While open to everyone, the ecological oasis feels almost undiscovered. There’s plenty to explore with a mix of rocky and white sandy beaches, grassy fields, and rugged forest.

Georges Island and its maze of cold, brick tunnels only became a tourist destination for the first time in summer 2020, when Parks Canada opened the National Historic Site to the public. The small Halifax Harbour island is open only on weekends and some Fridays.

Parks Canada admission is necessary, whether doing a tour or travelling solo. Tickets, which usually sell out fast, are available from Ambassatours Gray Line. Admission is free for people 17 and under.

To get there, take a 10-minute ferry operated by Ambassatours or go by private boat, canoe, or kayak.

Bruce Murray/VisionFire

Hidden gem

On the water Dartmouth’s Lake Banook is hosting the most powerful paddlers on the planet for the International Canoe Federation (ICF) Canoe Sprint and Paracanoe World Championships from Aug. 3 to 7. Want to paddle for yourself? Head to Shubie Park and tour the historic Shubenacadie Canal and beautiful Lake Charles by canoe, kayak, or paddle board. Family-owned Wildwood Water Sports has rentals near the Fairbanks Centre. Or catch an ocean wave with a surf at Lawrencetown Beach. East Coast Surf School offers daily surfing lessons with certified instructors.

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Dig in the dirt

Enjoy a picnic spread in one of the city’s parks, the waterfront, or catch a boat to McNabs Island, a hot spot for picnickers since the 1800s. Pick up supplies at one of the city’s farmers markets. No time or inclination to make sandwiches? Takeout is always an option.

Or kick it up a notch with a picnic box from Rudy’s Catering on Granville Street in downtown Halifax. Looking for something extra special? Book a luxury feast online with Picnic with Love Hfx, which sets up a waterproof picnic blanket and a fully decked out miniature picnic table setup with comfy pillows to relax and hang out with family and friends.

Give your mental and physical health a boost by hanging out or helping out at one of Halifax’s many community gardens, or even get a plot of your own to putter in and grow some veggies. Most of the city’s community gardens have common areas, where everyone is welcome to visit.

Common Roots Urban Farm has two locations: one on the grounds of the Nova Scotia Hospital in Dartmouth and another off the “Bi-Hi” (Bicentennial Drive) at the bottom of Bayers Road. “Both sites currently have waiting lists for plots,” says Hillary Lindsay, who coordinates the Dartmouth operation. “If people are interested, they can email to be notified of upcoming volunteering training.”

Bruce Murray/VisionFire

Pack a picnic

Months of music After taking in Halifax Jazz Festival (July 13 to 17), hit the road for other multi-day music fests around the province. Canso’s Stan Rogers Folk Festival, AKA Stanfest, runs from July 22 to 24 with a 2022 lineup true to its grassroots roots with George Canyon, Catherine MacLellan, Madison Violet, Reeny Smith, and more.

If country’s your jam, head to Aylesford for the Fox Mountain Country Music Festival from Aug. 5 to 7. Or rock out at the Jubilee in New Glasgow from July 29 to 31 at the town’s outdoor amphitheatre on the East River. This year’s roster includes Serena Ryder, Glass Tiger, Sloan, and T. Thomason.

Nova Scotia Summerfest, a two-day shindig starting Aug. 19 on Columbus Field in downtown Antigonish, has Jimmy Rankin, Walk off the Earth, the Trews, and Neon Dreams among others on the bill.

Back in Halifax, from Sept. 2 to 5, is the Halifax Urban Folk Festival. Touted as a celebration of songs, the people who write and sing ‘em, and the stories surrounding them, the festival takes place in venues around the city. This year’s acts include Christina Martin, Zamani, Erin Costello, Matt Mays, and Carleton Stone.

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Bruce Murray/VisionFire

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The wonder drugs Therapists in Halifax want to offer their patients psychedelics, as healers have for millennia. Will the federal government let them?

BY PHILIP MOSCOVITCH

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F

or years, Dr. Grayson Lloyd has used ketamine to help put people under for surgery. Then, he realized maybe it could do more.

An anesthesiologist at the Valley Regional Hospital in Kentville, Lloyd is also co-owner of NovaKet, a ketamine infusion clinic in Halifax, where patients receive the drug intravenously at sub-anaesthetic doses to treat depression and PTSD. “It's a marvellous drug,” he says. “I still find amazing things about that drug every time I use it.”

Developed in the early 1960s, ketamine became well-known as a party drug with dissociative effects. “It's structurally similar to psilocybin and LSD, so it has some similar psychotropic effects,” Lloyd explains. “What we’re looking for is patients being in this fairly narrow band of disassociation where they're feeling kind of floaty, a little bit off into space, a little bit separated from themselves and their body.”

For decades, psychedelics have had a reputation for, at best, sending people on hallucinogenic trips, or at worst, being downright dangerous. But the use of psychedelics is “a tradition that’s been within human cultures for thousands of years,” says Jeff Toth, a psychiatric nurse.

He works at a public clinic for veterans and is president of the Halifax Psychedelic Society: a group of health-care workers advocating for access to psychedelicassisted therapy. “There's a long tradition of using these medicines to access healing states.”

Now, after decades of prohibition, interest in psychedelics is booming.

In May, the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction, and the Mental Health Commission of Canada co-hosted a global summit on psychedelic-assisted therapies and medicine, in Toronto. Next year’s Psychedelic Science conference in Denver is already being billed by organizers (the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies) as “the largest psychedelic gathering in history.”

“Maybe this whole psychedelics renaissance is my fault,” jokes Halifax-based filmmaker Connie Littlefield.

Twenty years ago, the National Film Board released Littlefield’s now-classic documentary Hofmann’s Potion, about LSD and the extensive research during the 1950s and ’60s into its effectiveness as a treatment for addictions and mental illness. That research — some of which took place in Saskatchewan, under Tommy Douglas’s reformist government — came crashing to a halt with the war on drugs and fears about psychedelics. (She has continued to chronicle the world of psychedelics, and her latest film, Better Living Through Chemistry, premiered last year at the Fin: Atlantic International Film Festival.)

Littlefield says after the release of Hofmann’s Potion people would regularly tell her how LSD had changed their lives for the better. “That’s something a lot of people didn’t think about,” she says. “They would mainly think of these things as escape routes, checking out of reality, and not as having anything to bring back to our daily lives.”

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Legal limbo

While ketamine is legal in Canada, it's only authorized for anaesthetic use.

Using it to treat depression and PTSD is off-label, but still legal if done by a qualified physician. In contrast, access to substances like psilocybin (found in so-called magic mushrooms), MDMA (AKA Ecstasy), and LSD remains extremely limited.

There are only three ways to receive them for psychedelic-assisted therapy: as part of a clinical trial, under Health Canada’s Special Access Program (which allows doctors to request drugs “for treating a patient with a serious or life-threatening condition, where conventional treatments have failed, are unsuitable, or are not available in Canada”), or through a direct appeal to the federal health minister.

This state of affairs is “wrong. It’s completely wrong,” says Spencer Hawkswell, a Dalhousie alumnus and CEO of TheraPsil, a Vancouver-based non-profit that provides training for health-care professionals, and advocates for patients to receive psilocybin for end-of-life care, in particular to reduce anxiety and distress.

“Why are we making something that grows on Citadel Hill illegal?” says Hawkswell, referring to mushrooms. “It's nonsense. We should educate people on its use instead.”

TheraPsil plans to file a class-action lawsuit against the federal government in July, arguing that the decision to prescribe psilocybin should be between doctor and patient, and that preventing patients from getting safe and legal access is unconstitutional.

“An amazing gift”

Psilocybin shows promise for treating a range of psychiatric conditions, including anxiety and “existential distress” among patients with terminal illnesses, Toth says, because it fosters “deep connection, a deep sense of peace, love, and a sense of wholeness.”

After experiencing psychedelic therapy and “integrating” it through discussion with a qualified therapist, many people feel “more connected and at ease,” he says. “I thought that this is an amazing gift, not just to the patient but to the patients’ families as well.”

Toth and Halifax-based registered counselling therapist Nathan Torti are part of a group trained through TheraPsil. (Other health-care workers in Nova Scotia have received training through Atma, a Calgary-based psychedelic clinic.) While they have completed what Toth called the “didactic” part of the training, they haven’t been able to do the retreat portion, which involves using psychedelics themselves and taking turns role-playing as therapists and clients. That’s because the government has made the necessary substances harder to access.

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The “assisted” part of psychedelic-assisted therapy refers to having a qualified professional help people make sense of, or integrate, their experiences.

Understanding the effects of psychedelics is an important part of the training, Torti says, because psychedelic experiences can be so unlike everyday life, and because patients need to be able to discuss them with knowledgeable people.

“Having an altered state of being can be hard to integrate because there's no language for it, or there's no context for how to even bring that balloon down to earth,” he says. “Having the framework to be able to speak the different languages of spiritual psychology and understand how the psyche can integrate that... that’s really a skill set.”

Or, as one Halifax-based psychologist who asked to remain anonymous says, “If you are a therapist who is super uncomfortable with any spiritual talk, this is probably not for you.”

The therapeutic process

NovaKet does not have therapists on-site, but Lloyd says that’s because the clinic’s patients (90 per cent veterans) come from health-care professionals with whom they already have relationships.

“They are comfortable with the person they've been seeing for years and years and years,” Lloyd says. “We're trying to keep in touch with the patient's psychiatrist or psychologist to make sure they get seen fairly soon after their treatments, while the drug still has an effect and allows them to be a little bit more open.”

“It’s not like you take a psychedelic and have a ball,” Torti says. “The integration of an experience is absolutely vital for it to last. Otherwise it becomes a stale postcard, just some sort of cocktail party story of some crazy experience you had. If people actually want it to ... make change in their life, they have to have a therapeutic process alongside of the medicine. I don't think that can be understated.”

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"If people actually want it to ... make change in their life, they have to have a therapeutic process alongside of the medicine" — Nathan Torti

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With growing interest in psychedelics, there is a danger in keeping them in a grey zone legally. Littlefield says if the field is not regulated, “anyone can hang up their shingle and call themselves a psychedelic therapist, when they may or may not have the training.” And in the absence of qualified therapists, people are accessing psychedelics for therapeutic purposes on their own, which can be risky.

“It can go wrong, and you have to have a skilled leader,” Littlefield adds. For that reason, she’s skeptical of apps like The Trip, which claims to “help you prepare for, deepen, and integrate these consciousness-expanding experiences and self-discoveries.”

Business case

The current psychedelics explosion doesn't surprise Littlefield.

“I think everybody working in the psychedelic field knew it would become mainstream at some point,” she says. “But,” she adds, “I don’t think anyone really anticipated the huge influx of venture capital that has soaked the scene in the past few years.”

Mushrooms may grow wild in Nova Scotia, but that doesn’t make them accessible to everyone, and companies are rushing to fill the gap.

“There's the inevitability of corporate capitalism coming in to profit, commercialize, and to generate revenue from (psychedelics).

It's just the reality that we're in,” Toth says. “There are some benefits to that in terms of being able to change the regulatory framework, for insurance and governments to be able to offer these type of medicines to a wider audience. But I think one of the dangers is when it becomes overly commercialized and people develop intellectual property and proprietary rights over particular substances, and there's the ability to increase the cost. So that's a concern.”

Lloyd notes, “There are dozens and dozens of companies that are trying to put together a proprietary compound based on psilocybin that they can market for patients with mental health issues. That is a business model. And I don't begrudge those companies from, you know, trying to find new therapies that are profitable.”

But he also worries about cost to patients. He notes that ketamine’s patent has expired, “so no drug company is going to market ketamine as a therapy, because it's a generic drug and you can't make any money off it.”

Health Canada’s clinical trials database shows eight pending or ongoing psilocybin trials for alcohol-use disorder, depression, PTSD, and bipolar depression. Windsor, N.S.-based firm Halucenex launched one of those studies, investigating the therapeutic effects of psilocybin in treatment-resistant PTSD. Brenda Perks, a registered nurse with Halucenex, says in an email that the study would include over 20 people and would focus primarily on veterans.

The company’s goals, according to its website, include “researching novel psychedelic compounds, developing and licensing psychedelic compounds for the pharmaceutical and nutraceutical markets, and conducting clinical trials on the medical benefits of psychedelic medicine.”

Toth says the current “gold standard treatments” for PTSD are only about 50-per-cent effective. So if psychedelics show promise, it makes sense to thoroughly investigate them.

“The need is massive,” Lloyd says. “There are going to be other clinics that open in Halifax. It's only a matter of time, and I think that's a win for everybody, really — more patients get this kind of therapy and are supported in their health goals. I think that’s really, really important.”

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Mixed martial arts builds strength, clears the mind, and creates community — meet the people embracing the city’s fastest-growing sport

BY CHRIS BENJAMIN PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE MURRAY/VISIONFIRE

he entrance to Titans Martial Arts and Fitness on Horseshoe Lake Drive offers little clue what’s going on inside.

It’s at the side of a building that looks like a warehouse, and houses the Nothin’ Fancy outlet in front. Inside is a long strip of gym, carpeted with bare walls, industrial LED lights, and white pipes overhead. To the left are weights, and a boxing-style ring next to another fighting area without ropes.

To the right is a hallway, change areas, several heavy bags and men paired off, sparring.

There is one young woman roundhousing a heavy bag and a middle-aged woman lifting weights while chatting with a toddler.

Overseeing the action is Peter Martell, coowner and, according to one of his proteges, “the best coach in Canada.” He has worked with Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) luminaries like superstar Gavin “Guv’nor” Tucker and the late Ryan “Big Deal” Jimmo.

The brutally physical sport of mixed martial arts is equally a mental game, Martell explains, offering Tucker as an example.

“Gavin is a special athlete,” he says. “Gifted, able to put things in perspective. When he loses, he’s able to say no excuses, identify what went wrong and fix it.”

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“Nova Scotia produces a lot of high-level fighters per capita” — Peter Martell

Martell is readying these men for a big card at month’s end. For many, this will be their first real fight, after two years sidelined by the pandemic. He lists several exciting up-and-comers, including Jake Kelly, a 4-1 bantamweight from Corner Brook, N.L. trained in Japanese Jiu-Jitsu and wrestling.

Martell usually focuses more on the whole group, but with the big event just around the corner, he needs to ready the combatants, leaving others to spar on their own. They feel each other out, strike, and check in on one another, “You good?”

Always the grunted answer is, “Let’s go!” One fighter receives advice on how to work through his bloody nose if it happens in a match.

Mixed martial arts has become one of North America’s fastest growing competitive sports.

“At one point it was the second fastest growing sport in the world behind soccer,” Martell says, describing it as “pretty accessible” in Canada because little equipment is necessary. “Nova Scotia produces a lot of highlevel MMA fighters per capita, from different walks of life. They come from east, west, Newfoundland and Labrador to Dartmouth.”

The sport is global, inexpensive to learn, and accessible for men and women. All you need to compete is toughness, fearlessness, an obsessive level of commitment, and a willingness to fight anyone in your class.

“I first became interested back in 1993,” Martell says, “when I first saw in UFC a 175-pound fighter beating much bigger guys.”

He realized that not only could small beat big, but that his ideas of one fighting style being unbeatable were off

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base. First, karate and kickboxing were dominant, then grappling. But all bets were off when grapplers learned to strike — in other words, when fighters trained in different styles they reaped the benefits of diverse skills.

No one could win with mastery of just one style. At that point, fighting became a chess match. “We saw that evolution locally,” Martell says. “You fight in the area where you’re better than your opponent. I don’t think people realize how big the mental game is.”

The combination of the mental and physical is a big reason so many get hooked. They may start simply to get in shape, but the sport requires they consistently push themselves beyond what they thought was possible.

“You kind of get more mentally prepared every day just training and doing the grind,” says Simon Plummer, a 26-year-old carpenter with kickboxing matches under his belt, who is training with Martell. “Then there’s sessions like they are doing over there right now.”

Plummer motions toward an Airdyne stationary bike by the ring, where someone is engaged in a full sprint and screaming in either agony or mania. “That shows you what you’re made of — pushing that threshold time and time again. I think my work ethic is better from this. I try harder at everything in life, relationships and work.”

Every Titans fighter I speak with emphasizes how this intensive training has built their confidence and made them better at every part of their lives. Plummer says the work ethic involved has made him a better carpenter, something he’s been working at just as long.

“If I can perform here, I can perform in the real world too,” adds Ryan Martin, an employee of Halifax

Water and a volunteer firefighter. “I don’t shy away from challenges now.”

Sam Reyno, who Martell calls “incredibly skilled,” has been training since he was 14, almost six years.

“My mom made me do it,” he says. “I was sitting at home playing video games and I never did a sport.”

His family expected him to quit within a week, but he was instantly hooked. “I started off boxing for about a year and I’ve been doing MMA for about five,” he recalls. “I came in here, and ever since I haven’t been able to stop.”

He has yet to have an MMA fight, in part because COVID makes it that much harder to find the right matchup in terms of size and experience. But he trains daily, at home or at Titans, learning strategies and techniques and building strength. He is determined to get in the cage, but not for any hope of making a career of it.

He wants to test himself.

“I’ve been training for so long,” he says. “I’m not going to be able to train forever in MMA, but it’s something I want to do while I can.”

He’s one of the smallest in the gym, some of them look straight from the set of an action blockbuster, but he says he holds his own against men who have won their bouts. “Peter’s a great coach. If he tells me I’m ready, I know I’m ready.”

Confidence is not a problem here. It was for Reyno, at first. “I was shy.” Now he’s not afraid to speak up. He lost the couch potato shape and has gotten much stronger, discovering athletic ability he didn’t dream possible.

“At first I was jumping rope and I almost passed out in under a minute,” he says. “In time you realize you can

Haligonians from all walks of life, like Jake Kelly (left) and Simon Plummer are embracing mixed martial arts.

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“Your natural instincts are all wrong ... It’s scary. You realize ‘I don’t really know anything’ ” — Christine Fader

be athletic; you are in good shape. It makes you start to believe in yourself, helps you find out who you are.”

He has more clarity of thought, too, and better performance in school. “And it’s given me more drive.”

He doesn’t think about the risk because the bigger guys are aware of their advantage. They look out for him. “It’s a violent sport but nobody wants to hurt each other. We’re like family,” he says. “It’s a solo sport, yet it’s a team.”

For Christine Fader, an instructor at Halifax Brazilian Jiu Jitsu on Kempt Road and an International Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Federation gold medallist, that sense of team and community is what the sport is about. She started nine years ago, after a breakup at the age of 32.

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Trained in several styles, including boxing, Muay Thai (kickboxing), and wrestling, Fader says the sport has changed her life. “I’ve travelled all over North America, competed, and met people who are close friends now.”

Fader knew she was in love with the sport the first time she fought, having trained in Muay Thai almost exclusively with men in their early 20s. Abhaya Mixed Martial Arts hosted the fight card in the Annapolis Valley. It was the first time she’d seen so many women fighting, and they were using jujitsu.

“The jujitsu people had really close friendships, and seemed to have more fun.” With more grappling technique, she feels more trust is built in sparring, so that when a fighter taps it’s over, and they don’t get hurt.

What she loves most about jujitsu is that it’s so technical. When you first start out, “your natural instincts are all wrong.”

The novice will be physically dominated and for most it will be a first. Fader says it’s an incredibly emotional experience. “It’s scary. You realize, ‘I don’t really know anything.’ ” Every mistake becomes a crucial lesson.

Like the fighters at Titans, she loves the mental game at least as much as the physical. “It looks like brute strength, but there’s so much strategy,” she explains.

“You need to be three or four steps ahead.”

She always comes back to the community aspect; on the mat it seems solitary, but no one gets there alone.

“The No. 1 thing you have to be is a good partner,” she says. “Learn to communicate. You have to be able to give and take feedback. Life skills.

“I love getting to teach, impacting young people’s lives, showing them they can do things they didn’t know were possible — that when you do something physically hard, it translates in other areas.”

Although men still dominate combat sports, she is amazed at the progress of women. “When I started, the few women fighting were considered off-hand matches, always exhibition, never taken seriously,” she says.

“Now there’s tournaments every month, opportunities to compete. Now women headline fights.”

Much of that change comes from determined women like Fader. She also credits male allies. “Men had to make space for women who wanted to try it,” she says. “I had some of the best male training partners when I was the only female.”

While machismo still exists in the sport, there are “a good 10 gyms” in town, three on Kempt Road alone — which Fader calls “jujitsu-MMA row” — that prospective fighters can explore options and find a comfortable environment.

Fader is excited about what’s coming next, noting a couple local talents with promising futures: “Jericho MacPhee with our gym, who also put in time at Tristar Gym in Montreal and at Breakthrough in Amherst, is a

great prospect. Luc de Ste Croix is 3-0, from Dartmouth — a very exciting fighter.”

Most important are the ones no one has heard of yet. The people of all backgrounds, ages, and genders coming out to try something new.

“You don’t have to be in shape, you’ll get in shape doing it,” Fader says. “You can be a 65-year-old grandmother looking for exercise or someone hoping to be world champion. The hardest thing you’ll ever do is walk through the gym door. You’ll feel awkward, weird, and sore; it’s very hard, but very rewarding.”

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ACROSS THE With the Cogswell interchange redevelopment, Halifax has the opportunity to literally and figuratively transform the city.

BY ALEC BRUCE

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Bruce Murray/VisionFire

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t does not help Waye Mason sleep at night knowing that Halifax’s biggest public works project in recent times — involving some of the most exquisitely complicated engineering and public consultation the capital has ever witnessed — could be delayed by someone’s ill-timed trip to the toilet.

“Those damned blue ceramic pipes,” says the councillor for Halifax South Downtown, one of HRM Council’s advocates of the $123-million Cogswell interchange redevelopment. “They’re, like, 175-year-old sewers you have to get a robot to crawl up and down to make sure nobody’s still discharging into them before you start tearing them out. It’s such a pain in the ass.”

Not that he or any number of city councillors, planners, and community leaders are getting much sleep since the four-year project to remove the pedestrian-frustrating, brutalist blob (and replace it with parks, housing, bike lanes, and trails) officially broke ground in November. The long-awaited, muchdiscussed, intensively debated endeavour now loftily and literally promises to reinvent the way people think about the downtown and each other.

Or, perhaps more precisely, restore the better angels of their civic characters. “It’s going to be transformational,” says Mason.

The project aims to reunify the connections Halifax had before the interchange opened in 1972. “My mom used to shop on Gottingen Street, where there were great dress shops, and you could easily walk from there to Barrington Street,” says project manager Donna Davis. “We’re going to put that brick street system back in place; you’re going to be able to do that again.”

GREAT DIVIDE

Bruce Murray/VisionFire

More than that, she says, the project is setting the stage for citizen involvement, especially from traditionally marginalized Black and First Nations communities.

“This is the first municipal initiative of its kind where we are (directly) incorporating social benefits,” Davis says. “There are requirements in the contract with Dexter, for example, to develop workforce and supplier diversity plans aimed at ensuring that we have inclusion … of African Nova Scotian and the Mi’kmaw communities. There are others, such as women in construction, newcomers, people with intellectual disabilities, and LGBTQ+. We are working with representatives of all of these communities … You know, we haven’t done this before.”

Some Black and Mi’kmaw leaders see the opportunity.

“We’ve been here for over 400 years, and we want to be the voice of our own story for a change,” says Marcus James, co-founder of 902 Man Up, a non-profit group addressing community violence. “That’s the purpose of our involvement now as one of the seat holders at the table on this: making sure this happens, and that this sort of (engagement) becomes a part of the process in the long run, and not just a one-off.”

Alex Paul, executive director of Mi’kmaw Economic Benefits Office, concurs.

“I think about all those (Mi’kmaw) communities that have existed in and around HRM that have contributed

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toL its 21 development, and have gone essentially unacW knowledged, unrecognized,” he says. “Not everything is RO T RD RS DFO TE BE going to be WA solved by the time this project is over. But R E W LO my hope is we will find ways to constantly improve our representation.”

The Cogswell redevelopment is a poignantly resonant start. In his 2010 update of Thomas Raddall’s Warden of the North (1948), Halifax author Stephen Kimber aptly described the monstrosity as “a strangely orphaned massive concrete from-nowhere-to-nowhere downtown interchange to posterity.” It was built in 1969 as an on-ramp to an urban turnpike (think Toronto’s Gardiner Expressway, but stupider) that was never built.

Since then, the only purpose it has served has been to bifurcate the south and north ends as separate precincts, blocking commercial opportunities and exacerbating long-standing social and economic inequalities along racial and ethnic lines.

“I was thinking about the idea of changing that whole district when I was running for office in 2012,” says HRM Mayor Mike Savage, who notes that public consultations began in 2018.

He notes that development is changing the face of Halifax. “Look at the number of new people who are coming from around the world,” he adds. “I would also point out our recognition of First Nations … and the fact that the city has not been kind to the African Nova Scotian population, that we have had systemic racism.

I think all of these are realizations that make you see things differently and say, ‘Maybe it’s time to change some of these things.’”

They’ll change in three phases between now and 2025, according to the city’s official planning document: “The Cogswell District project will convert 16 acres (6.5 hectares) of road infrastructure into a mixed-use neighbourhood, extending the entrance of the downtown northwards and reuniting communities separated by the interchange lands.”

The plan notes, among other improvements, reinstating the “urban street grid” to “create development HO

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blocks capable of supporting new residential and commercial environments for 2,500 people” as “high-quality, dedicated cycling lanes, multi-use trails, new parks and open spaces, a reimagined transit hub, and a significant central urban square … transform this traffic-centric area into a livable pedestrian-friendly area for people to live, work, and play.”

It’s pricey, but not extravagant by public works standards (the 2011 Harbour Solutions sewage treatment project cost $333 million). What’s more, says the document, “the project has the potential to be primarily self-funded in the long term once construction is over and the redevelopment of the area is completed. The sale of land, utility cost sharing, and the subsequent property taxes will help off-set the front-end investment and generate long-term recurring revenue for the municipality.”

A district energy system will deploy ambient heat recovered from the Halifax Wastewater Treatment Plant.

Meanwhile, accessibility will meet the gold level standard under the Rick Hansen Certification program. That’s something Halifax accessibility advocate Gerry Post, who consulted directly with city planners, is happy about.

“I used to sit on the city’s accessibility advisory committee,” he says. “I approached them about the certification, and they accepted. It’s the first project (here) that will be designated a Rick Hansen gold zone before it’s developed. And when you do that, the cost is minimal.”

Robust planning, inclusion, diversity, livability, cost effectiveness: What could go wrong? Not even those who are intimately tied to the redevelopment ask that question with a straight face. But those on the outside

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On that, everyone agrees.

“Of course, there are barriers,” James says. “But those barriers have been in place for years. You look at the North End in Halifax, and we look at the lack of space, at the lack of job opportunities for the African Nova Scotian community. The Cogswell project is going to take place whether we are in agreement with it or not.

That’s why it’s important for us to make sure we are at the table in a community partnership with HRM having those conversations, and raising those key points.”

What could go wrong? Mason chortles. Apart from finding some Victorian sewer pipes that drive the project sideways the way they did to the Alexander apartment complex on Bishop Street as it was going up in 2017, only just about everything. Then again, it could all go very right.

“This is where we live,” he says. “We live in a place where when you dig down you never know what you’re going to find.”

Planners aim for the Cogswell project to meet the gold level standard under the Rick Hansen Certification program.

Province of Nova Scotia

WSP Bruce Murray/VisionFire

looking in are happy to oblige with a few choice answers just the same.

In 2011, Jenn Powely (an urban planner and former HRM coordinator for the Ecology Action Centre) wrote a blog post observing how the interchange isolated Gottingen Street. “Haligonians recognize the importance of getting this development right,” she wrote.

Today, we’re still not getting it right, she says in an email to Unravel Halifax: “I think the redevelopment of Cogswell does have the opportunity to transform Halifax, but I do not think the current plan will do that. I think the current plan is really divisive. I do not think it pays attention to the working class. It wants to build grand homes and apartments but if you look at the average income of Nova Scotians (that) is very out of touch with reality. We have a housing/homelessness crisis. We should be building affordable, subsidized units not expensive homes.”

The project needs to do more to address Halifax’s historic ills, she adds. “It should look at Indigenous claims and the damage done to the African Nova Scotian community. These ought to be the priorities of the redevelopment.”

Access to affordable housing, especially for Black Nova Scotians and the Mi’kmaq, may be the real “blue ceramic pipe” that threatens to steal sleep from the project’s well-intentioned politicians, planners, and other advocates. If it is, it wouldn’t be the first time in Halifax’s uncomfortably recent experience.

In a 2021 piece for the Kroeger Policy Review Carleton University, public policy student Annabelle Linders cited a chorus of local sources (including Waye Mason’s housing update blog and the Affordable Housing Association of Nova Scotia’s HRM Homelessness Statistics study) when she reported: “In the last year alone, the average home in Halifax increased by over $114,000. This has pushed many families who would have previously bought homes to rent, and supply shortages have led to increased rent rates.”

She cites estimates that Halifax would need to build 20,000 to 25,000 new rental units in the next five years to decrease rents.

What’s more, her sources told her: “Chronic homelessness has also increased in recent years. In April 2019, there were 106 recorded residents of Halifax experiencing chronic homelessness. That number has risen to 309 as of October 12, 2021, and peaked at 401 in August 2020.” And that number is likely to increase as the housing crisis continues.

Kortney Dunsby, Ecology Action Centre’s sustainable cities coordinator, is concerned that the Cogswell redevelopment doesn’t expressly dedicate space to help fill this need. “I do think there is a missing commitment to affordable housing,” she says. “Elements of a complete community would be a mix of housing options. That’s something that we’ll have to see shakeout in the long run: whether or not that includes affordable housing.”

Still, she adds, “Not everyone is going to be happy.

I do think that the design is a huge improvement on what is currently exists. ‘Opportunity’ is the best way to describe this project.”

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THE FLAVOUR Dan Houmann, Dave Michelson, Jamie Goddard, Mike Whyatt, and Andrew Frazer, with a cook at the Famous Curry Garden restaurant.

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curry A club of international aficionados comes to North America with a new Nova Scotian chapter

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efore 2016, Dan Houmann had never tried curry.

He grew up in a small city in Denmark that had traditional pizzerias and Chinese restaurants, but no curries. Then he moved to Hong Kong and a friend introduced him to the bold flavours.

“I loved it right from the start,” laughs Houmann. “If I could, I would live on curry alone.”

As it turned out, Houmann’s friend’s brother had started a club in the U.K. called the Oakham Curry Club (OCC), which has become one of the world’s most respected reviewers of Indian cuisine.

Members meet once a month to “relentlessly scour the globe in pursuit of the

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crispiest poppadoms, the tastiest sauces, and spiciest curries” (according to their website), critiquing and rating curry restaurants. They publish their findings online, and have chapters in the U.K., China, Australia, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore.

“I was quite intrigued to learn more,” says Houmann. “So we set up a meeting at a local curry house.”

Soon after, Houmann was one of the founders of an OCC chapter in Hong Kong.

“We started out with four people in Hong Kong and by the time I left in 2019, we had 30 members in that branch,” he recalls. “Then, when I moved to Paris, I planned to set up an OCC there as well, but COVID happened.

BY LORI McKAY PHOTOS BY BRUCE MURRAY/ VISIONFIRE

And now I’m in Canada. It was only fitting that we start a local branch here.”

Houmann’s wife is from Nova Scotia.

They met in Hollywood 12 years ago and spent several years travelling around the world. They now have a three-year-old and were ready to give up apartment living and decided to move back to Canada last summer.

“I love Halifax,” says Houmann. “We’ve been here on and off the last few years and have family and friends here, so it was always in the cards for us once our big city adventures were over.”

The Nova Scotia OCC had its first meeting in January. Houmann says it took some time to get things up and running, as there

is an approval process they go through with the OCC board, explaining why a location is a good place for a club.

“Halifax is a great community in terms of diversity,” says Houmann. “Not only with culture, but with food, sports, arts, and music. It’s only fitting that you have a local guide to follow when it comes to great food, whether it’s for people coming from out-ofprovince or locals looking for a good curry.”

At the monthly meetings, club members vote and grade restaurants in several categories, including service, food quality, customer care, atmosphere, and value. When a restaurant averages a score of above seven out of 10, it receives the official OCC mark of approval, and a sticker to display.

The Nova Scotia chapter currently has five members and another two pending.

Houmann says they hope to have another 15 to 20 members by year’s end, and although this is the first in North America, they already have plans to set up local branches in other provinces.

“It will be great to have clubs across the country so we can make it a true nationwide curriculum,” Houmann says.

And what’s best about curries? “I love the flavours,” he says.

“I love the process. It’s obviously not as easy to make as a pizza or a loaf of bread; there’s much more involved.

But it’s worth it.

I love the combination of spices and the different meats.

Whether you’re eating vegan curry or gluten free or chicken or lamb … There are just endless possibilities with what you can do in a curry dish.”

Houmann says if he had to pick a favourite — which isn’t easy — he would have to go with butter chicken and homemade garlic naan bread.

New OCC Nova Scotia member Andrew Frazer shares his passion.

“I’ve always had an appreciation for the cuisine,” says Frazer. “I love rich, buttery sauces and Indian spices. My wife makes fun of me all the time and would be able to verify just how much I love sauces. I’m a sauce guy.”

Like Houmann, Frazer is new to the area, having recently moved to Halifax from Toronto.

He had completed undergrad and grad school in Halifax and his wife is from Moncton, so they were drawn to the area and moved back in the fall. The club offered Frazer the opportunity to meet new people with similar interests.

“Plus, it was about food,” he says. “It was a perfect blend of everything.”

Frazer met Houmann through his wife, as the two are friends. “We were sitting around talking one time and then suddenly Dan starts telling me about this curry club and I’m like, ‘Wait. What? This exists?’ As soon as he said he was going to start up a chapter here I was the first person to put my hand up.”

Frazer says the club has introduced him to new dishes he wouldn’t normally have tried. He also notes they take their curry very seriously. They have badges, ties, and even their own rule book.

“After you become a member, you must state your case before the group as to why you should be allowed entry to the club,” he laughs. “It’s a two- to five-minute speech about why you love curries. It’s all fun.

We really just want to raise the profile of the cuisine as a whole and setting that standard is important.”

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THE FLAVOUR

The maverick chef Adventures out West and a long culinary journey equip Jamie MacAulay to celebrate Nova Scotia’s culinary heritage

BY COLLEEN THOMPSON PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE MURRAY/VISIONFIRE

S

igns of the Nuevo Scotia are impossible to miss at Drift. The restaurant, part of the Muir Hotel in downtown Halifax, boasts a menu reinventing classic Nova Scotian fare. Chef de cuisine Jamie MacAulay brings elegance and refinement to staples like hodge podge and rappie pie.

But tucked into the corner of Drift restaurant on a Monday afternoon, MacAulay and I are talking about the cuisine of the American South. Chefs have transformed once-maligned dishes, like okra soup and shrimp and grits, with vision and a strong sense of place.

The Drift menu reminds me of a recent trip to Dixie. It’s a menu upending the status quo but remaining true to its heritage. If you want the world to know you exist in the culinary world, you have to look at where you come from and what you have. Then, you have to strip it back, refine it, and present it in a contemporary way. Unapologetically.

“We have everything we need right here,” says MacAulay. “The dishes, culinary traditions, ingredients, terroir. The saltwater bounty. We need to stand proudly and shout about it.”

It’s hard to imagine the soft-spoken, calm MacAulay raising his voice, but his food is making plenty of noise.

Drift is feeding a story, and there are elements of this beautiful, wild place peppered throughout. From the rugged coastline sculpture hanging over the chic bar, the curved shiplap ceiling giving the appearance of a ship’s hull, raw elements of fluted

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granite, wood, and leather juxtapose the muted tones of the seascape palette.

When developing the menu alongside Anthony Walsh (corporate executive chef of Oliver & Bonacini Hospitality), MacAulay turned to recipes inherently familiar from childhood.

“Like many Nova Scotians, I grew up eating boiled dinners — still the ultimate comfort food for me,” MacAulay says.

“Mom is from Cape Breton, Dad is from Shelbourne, and they met in Dartmouth, so it’s this kind of weird collision and melding of recipes from coast to coast.”

He’s spent hours discussing regional food with his parents. “It’s been this incredible experience delving into food memories,” he adds. “When I said I was putting hodge podge on the menu, they looked at me appalled and said, ‘You’re not going to make it with Carnation milk, are you?’”

Hodge podge did make it onto the menu, made with cream, haddock, scallops, mussels, wax beans, leeks, and potatoes with a light aromatic celeriac broth. Rappie pie received the nod, too, with its slow-simmered chicken served alongside chow-chow and root slaw.

There’s also tuna sashimi with pops of bright orange sea buckthorn and a mushroom tart with dulse yogurt. And seared

MacAulay marries his classical French training with local flavours and global influences.

Sustainable Blue salmon with Nova Scotia oyster dressing.

Every dish feels like the collective elements are hand-picked to showcase growers, farmers, fishers, and wild edibles.

Persistence and dedication are what first caught Walsh’s attention when looking for a chef who could delve into Nova Scotia’s heritage and take it to a new level. “I think his 36-hour eggs are a great example of how he pushes his new Nova Scotia cuisine,” says Walsh.

MacAulay marinates the soft-boiled eggs in soy and mirin, curing the yolk to a jelly centre, and serves them on the lobster fish cake.

Sustainable Blue salmon and bacon dashi is another flavour bomb. “It features identifiable ingredients that are being given new personalities,” Walsh explains. “And, while engineering the classic rappie, he drilled down with his team to get that quintessential, cozy eating experience, now a cornerstone on the Drift menu.”

Coordinating a locally focused menu is a logistical challenge. “I have Fred (FD Wildfoods) standing at my backdoor at 8 a.m. with two boxes of wild mushrooms,” MacAulay says. “Then, at 10, I will have my Hakurei turnips arriving from Abundant Acres or the Blue salmon delivered from Afishiando. It all takes coordination to get things running smoothly, but it’s all worth it.”

Twenty years ago, MacAulay was set to become a graphic designer, skills he still thinks serve him well as a chef. But in 1999, he decided it was time to seek a different path out west, chase the snow, find a mentor, and buy a motorcycle. Whistler, Alberta checked all the boxes.

“I had cooked my whole life, and I think I always knew it was something I would do,” he recalls. “So, when I arrived in Whistler, I asked friends who the best chef was, and it was a resounding, Bernard Cassavant.”

Cassavant had turned the resort town into a culinary destination, first as executive chef at Chateau Whistler and later Chef Bernard’s Bistro. “I walked into his restaurant one day and asked him for a job, and astoundingly, he said yes,” laughs MacAulay.

And so began his culinary education and apprenticeship. He soaked up the recipes like a sponge, watched and listened to the cooks, learned French techniques, and found a mentor who would affirm his passion.

But a severe motorcycle accident cut his adventure short. With two broken arms and a slew of serious injuries, he headed home to Halifax. “It became a defining moment in my life,” says MacAulay. “A chef with two broken arms is useless, and I was in and out of the hospital. So, while I was waiting to heal, I enrolled in Culinary School at NSCC and basically started over.”

He spent the next several years immersed in the Halifax culinary scene. He worked as a sous chef for Chef Dennis Johnson at Fid, he ran the Learning Kitchen for Feed Nova Scotia (a few of the students are now in the Drift kitchen), and opened two restaurants, Water & Bone, and later Coda Ramen.

“Jamie’s a bit of a maverick,” Walsh says.

“He pivots from more traditional European kitchens to the very specific Japanese discipline of ramen. That spirit, combined with the opportunity to dive deep into his heritage, made him seem like a no-brainer to me for this role at Drift.”

MacAulay’s collective experiences have meshed at Drift.

“I trained in French culinary style, where we have these big, bold flavours, and we roast bones to create dark, rich stocks that underlie so many dishes,” he says. “But when I opened Coda Ramen, and I started to delve into the art of Japanese broths, it taught me that stocks shouldn’t mask other flavours. And because they’re mostly vegetable-based, they’re much lighter and brighter and add nuances and depth to a dish.”

As MacAulay and his team seek new ways to incorporate Nova Scotia onto the plate, experimentation in the Drift kitchen never stops.

“Not everything works out. I’ve been trying to re-create Lunenburg pudding (blood sausage),” laughs MacAulay. “It was meant to have the texture of haggis, to incorporate into a cassoulet. But I haven’t been able to get the texture right, so it’s a work in progress.” There is also a clam fricot in the works, sea truffles in sauces, beach peas in salads, and that classic boiled dinner from childhood might appear.

Our conversation ends the way it so often does with chefs: talking about music and what’s for dinner. “I have a two- and four-year-old, and I’m just trying to get them to eat real food, so roast chicken and green beans is supper tonight,” he says. He holds up his Spotify playlist for me. The song on rotation is “Gunslinger” by Tommy Guerrero — perfectly fitting for this maverick chef.

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THE STANCE

Living like no one is watching Or why some Haligonians would benefit from a little more self-consciousness

BY PAULINE DAKIN

W

hen I was in my teens and 20s, I spent a lot of time combing my hair. I cared a great deal about how I looked to others.

But it wasn’t just about physical appearance. It was more about how I came across as a person. I thought it was important to be perceived as “together” — reasonably smart, organized, and emotionally contained.

Crying or raging in front of strangers was not a good look. Anytime the proverbial excrement was hitting the fan I was inscrutable, poker face firmly in place.

I wasn’t alone in believing people would notice and judge. A psychologist friend tells me research shows 11-year-old girls think everyone is looking at them pretty much all the time.

But there’s been a radical societal shift. People aren’t as worried about how they’re seen in public any more.

The first time I witnessed this was on a train in France just over a decade ago. A 20-something girl sat down across from us and proceeded to take selfies.

She vamped and vogued for her phone, lips pursing, breasts pushed out, apparently unaware that my children and I were watching her, mouths open in complete astonishment.

She didn’t give us a second thought, and clearly couldn’t care less about what we were thinking.

That kind of oblivion about who might be around and witnessing your behaviour is now widespread.

When I see someone walking down the street alone in full conversation, sometimes gesturing dramatically, I’ve stopped thinking they’re suffering from auditory delusions.

They’re just talking to someone on their phone. And they don’t care who’s watching.

Maybe this freedom from concerns about the appraisal of others is a good thing. Part of me kind of admires it. But I’m not sure it’s healthy. It looks more like self-absorption and disregard for others than throwing off the burden of social constraint.

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A friend told me about sitting in the Halifax Public Gardens while a woman on the bench next to him had a heated phone argument with someone. When he got up to move to a quieter spot, she noticed him for the first time, blurting “It’s not like I’m on speaker,” as if he was the one being rude!

She truly didn’t see or care that she was making him uncomfortable.

I had a similar experience at the gym the other morning. A young woman was stretching, while having a loud and emotional conversation through her ear buds. Her back was to me but she was facing a large mirror so I could see her expressions, which became increasingly tortured. She was wiping away tears, oblivious to the unwilling witnesses in the room.

We were all increasingly uncomfortable, and feeling bad for her. But is the gym the right place to passionately discuss your breakup?

It’s interesting how technology has changed our self-perception and reduced our self-consciousness in public spaces, even as social media has made us more self-aware. It’s a global phenomenon, particularly noticable in a place like Halifax, a community historically seen as more staid than flamboyant.

In our online lives, people curate and groom their feeds to look happy and successful; to look “together,” as I used to try to do by keeping my hair combed.

People who are impervious to how they are perceived in public spend hours curating social media feeds, artistically photographing themselves, their food and fancy cocktails, their vacations, their fabulous lives.

Because on Instagram it counts. That’s the gaze and the audience that matters.

Our personas have become virtual, and what’s important is how we appear in our virtual worlds.

Maybe keeping a poker face in at all times isn’t a healthy thing. But neither is a complete lack of concern about everyone around you.

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See Owner’s Manual for complete details on system operation and limitations. †Ratings are awarded by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). Please visit www.iihs.org for testing methods. Vehicle(s) shown solely for purposes of illustration, and may not be equipped exactly as shown. Crosstrek, Impreza, Outback, Legacy, Ascent and Subaru are registered trademarks.