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life arts

Exploring the cons of palm oil P. 8

ConU grad tops dance contest short-list P. 10

Sweet victory:

Stingers beat NYIT Bears 93-92

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Tournament win P. 18

music Bruce Peninsula makes new waves in Canadian blues P. 15

life Val’s Bites takes a crunch out of Bernand Street P. 6-7

editorial Province needs to rethink policy of isolationism P. 20

Volume 28 Issue 7

Photos by Cindy Lopez

Suspended Concordia professor alleges academic mobbing Dr. Vasselin Petkov suspended for what President Woodsworth called “serious threats” Evan LePage News editor A philosophy professor at Concordia is alleging that academic mobbing is what ultimately led President Judith Woodsworth to suspend him, despite her statements saying he posed a potential threat to persons at the university.

Dr. Vesselin Petkov, who also teaches in the science college and liberal arts college, sent an email to the media last week which included an excerpt of an

email he received from Woodsworth in which she wrote that her decision to suspend him was based “on the fact that (Petkov’s) behaviour constitutes gross misconduct arising from serious threats to persons at the university as well as actions that seriously undermine the reputation of the university.”

Petkov responded to her comments in his email, writing that the president based her decision purely on fabricated claims, without evidence of any real threatening statements or action. He continued to state that what Woodsworth actually has “are claims by several mobbers, who started to feel threatened only after they were caught publicly denying documented facts.”

According to an article in the journal Chronicle of Higher Education, academic mobbing is “a form

See “‘Mention of...” on p.3

“It does get better”

Vigil for queer youth pushes message of better prevention Brennan Neill Managing editor As the rain fell on Parc de L’Espoir this past Wednesday, Montreal’s gay and lesbian community came together for a candlelight vigil in memory of teens who committed suicide after being bullied for their sexual orientation.

About 50 people, including representatives

See “‘Candlelight...” on p.2

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Tuesday, October 12, 2010

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City in brief Evan LePage

Port stowaways speak out

The nine foreign nationals detained after being found in a ship at the Port of Montreal last week finally got a chance to spread their version of events over the weekend. Many of the people have already applied for refugee status and some told an Immigration and Refugee Board on Friday that they didn’t even know where they were going. According to reports, many of the stowaways snuck onto the boat while it was docked in Morocco on the assumption they would be transported somewhere in Europe, an assumption that became problematic when they were forced to spend nearly a week hidden in a shipping container. Customs officials raided the boat with police on arrival last Friday, but the group had already been found on the ship earlier in the week.

Boroughs may take control of parking meters

Come January it seems Montreal boroughs will likely be carrying a little extra change in their pockets: over $50 million combined thanks to you and your car. The city of Montreal is considering handing over control of parking meters to the boroughs starting in January, according to a La Presse report. The boroughs would apparently not actually collect that cash, but the amount would be considered in the endowment awarded to them by the city every year. Also starting in January, the boroughs will recoup the fees of all towing taking place during snow removal activities next year. The decision has already drawn criticism from Louise Harel’s opposition party, which voiced concerns about allowing boroughs to have a say in how much parking fees will be, noting that the prices could technically vary from corner to corner if a borough so chooses.

UQAM students, grilled cheese visit Charest’s office

A few dozen students parked themselves outside Quebec Premier Jean Charest’s office to protest the tuition de-freeze in 2012 which will likely see a large hike in tuition costs. The group of mostly UQAM students were adorned with signs, ponchos for the rain, and grilled cheese sandwiches, the latter a symbol of what the students receiving the $7-a-day food stipend while on financial aid can afford to eat, the McGill Daily reported.

Burglar sleeps in Pointe-Claire attic

Another burglar was caught napping on the job last weekend, this time in a Pointe-Claire home in the West Island of Montreal. A resident called police at around 6 a.m. when he heard noises, leading to a stand-off between armed police and the suspect, the Gazette reported. After blocking off the area, police entered the home only to find that the stand-off was sort of a one-sided affair. The suspect was found sleeping soundly in the attic. In response to this news and hearing about similar sleeping thieves in various parts of the world, we suggest that you secure your homes by placing bedding and warm milk near all valuables.

Continued from cover ...

Candlelight vigil addresses homophobic bullying and teen suicide of local gay rights groups, attended the vigil held in the Gay Village despite the cold and wet weather. It was only one of dozens held across North America in response to the suicide of Tyler Clementi and a number of other teens.

Clementi, an 18-year-old student studying at Rutgers, committed suicide by jumping off of the George Washington Bridge after he was unknowingly filmed engaging in a gay sexual encounter, which was then posted and streamed on the Internet by his roommate.

Jean-Pierre Roussain, the Montreal vigil organizer, reminded the crowd that Clementi wasn’t the only one to take his life this past September. Roussain read from a list of names, all of whom had committed suicide after being bullied. Some were as young as 13. Roussain then asked for a moment of silence to honour the memories and lives of the victims.

Roussain was inspired to organize the vigil after he saw the number of cities planning to hold a similar event and felt that Montreal should be represented. After reading some of the stories of teens being bullied, Roussain was reminded of his own experience growing up.

While the night was in memory of the victims of bullying, there was a clear message that there was not

enough being done to support gay and lesbian teens.

“It shouldn’t be like this. As a society we are supposed to be more evolved. We have the Charter of Rights in Canada and the Constitution in America,” said Roussain.

“But we still permit this to happen in our schools.”

Steve Foster, president of the Quebec Council of Gays and Lesbians, explained that teens aren’t aware of the support that is offered to them since almost 50 per cent of schools do not print helpline phone numbers in agendas. Foster also knows firsthand how damaging bullying can be.

“We need to be together to remember that suicide affects everyone in society. What makes me angry is that 25 years ago I attempted suicide,” Foster said. “Now 25 years later it’s still the same problem.”

The vigil also was a show of community for Montreal’s Gay Village. “It’s important to show people that we do care that these events happen, to remind people what can be done to help prevent these sad events, and to show that there is a sense of community,” said PierreOlivier Laliberté, a volunteer for GRIS-Montreal, an organization that raises awareness and promotes the integration of the gay community.

“There is support, it can get better.”

Partakers light candles in memory of affected youth. Photo by Michel Boyer

CITY

Bombardier to get metro deal after four years of negotiations Government bypasses tendering process, angering some international companies Jordan Namur Contributor An agreement was finally reached between Bombardier-Alstom and the Quebec government on the replacement of Montreal’s outdated metro cars, according to a Ministry of Transportation spokesperson.

“The government has informed Bombardier that it will sign the deal within the next 30 days with the right to extend it by another 30,” said Caroline Larose, spokesperson for the Ministry of Transportation.

According to a recent report on the Société de transport de Montreal’s website, Michel Labrecque, president of the STM council, visited the Bombardier factory in La Pocatière upon invitation from Minister of Transport Sam Hamad along with Quebec Premier Jean Charest.

This new deal, when signed, would

give Bombardier the green light to build 342 cars with the possibility of up to 126 additional ones.

However, there have been some concerns and complaints that the Charest government gave the job to Bombardier too quickly, without opening a call to tenders.

Quebec’s national assembly actually passed a bill on the matter, Bill 116, which will allow the STM to buy metro cars from BombardierAlstom without any judiciary issues.

“Normally, any company that falls in the World Trade Organization would have to follow this procedure,” Larose said, referring to a proper call to tenders. “But the STM isn’t part of this organization and therefore it is in the government’s hands. They are free to chose who they think is best for the project.”

According to Spanish railway firm Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles and Chinese firm Zhuzhou, the suspension of the call to tenders as a result of the province’s clear interest in Bombardier affected their own opportunity to present their proposals. They claim that when it came time for submission of their bids, there had been a sudden halt implemented.

“It is since May of 2006 that the government started the bidding for the project” Larose explained,

justifying the decision. “After four years of negotiations, the government decided that Bombardier was the right choice for the project” she added.

There have also been mixed reactions within the provincial government. Montreal Mayor Gérald Tremblay said that Charest’s announcement was “good news” and that it was urgent to replace the ag-

ing cars. However, Vision Montréal leader Louise Harel has predicted a rather grim outlook, arguing that taxpayers should be concerned about the way the contracts are being handled to make sure there wouldn’t be any tax-hikes. There has been a request by opposition councillors to hand in an outline of these expenditures.

Montreal’s metro system was first inaugurated Oct. 14, 1966 a year before the city hosted Expo ‘67. At the time, Montreal was only the eighth city in North America to have an underground commute system. Since then, the STM has only used two models of cars, the MR-63, built by Canadian Vickers, and Bombardier’s MR-73.

Charest claims that the new Bombardier project will provide 775 jobs for Quebecers and will benefit

Graphic by Katie Brioux

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

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Poor turnout at president s press conference

Woodsworth addressed tuition, student involvement Sarah Deshaies Editor-in-chief

Two out of five student media outlets attended a first-ever university news conference with Concordia president Judith Woodsworth. CUTV and the Concordian attended the media conference, which lasted about 30 minutes last Tuesday afternoon at Woodsworth’s office in the GM building.

Also present were university chief financial officer Patrick Kelley, director of media relations Chris Mota and Woodsworth’s chief of staff Jonathan Levinson.

Topics discussed included tuition and student participation.

Woodsworth, along with heads of other Quebec universities, has come out in favour of unfreezing tuition caps. When asked about how she would personally address a student who could no longer afford to attend school because of tuition increases, Woodsworth at first skirted around the question, offering what sounded like a prepared statement. She discussed needing to increase tuition in order to close a $500 million funding gap. A gap which is partly attributed to Quebec’s low tuition in comparison to the rest of Canada. Though she initially came to Concordia in favour of lowered tuition, Woodsworth now said that “all of us are agreed that you can’t improve the education in Quebec without some form of tuition increase.”

When prompted on how she

would answer a student on the verge of quitting school, Woodsworth responded: “I would take the student, and I would have the student go to our financial aid office, and look at what’s available in terms of funding. We’ve got scholarship programs, bursary programs, we’ve got work available on campus.”

“Usually we can support people and they shouldn’t have to drop out,” Woodsworth added. “We can give them financial counselling, too.”

Financial aid, in her view, should be limited to deserving students however. “I think we can support students who really need the money,” she said, “and there are some students who don’t need the money as much because the either have money themselves or their parents can help them.”

Mota added that there did not seem to be a “direct correlation between tuition levels and enrolment,” noting higher enrolment in Ontario.

Responding to her comments at the Sept. 24 Shuffle bursary fundraiser that it would have been nice to see more students, Woodsworth said she understands students are busy. But, the president also said “I just came from the gym downstairs. The gym was full of people busy exercising and that’s great; they should be on their treadmills. [...] If they’re on a treadmill in the gym, that’s wonderful, they could get off the treadmill and spend an hour and 15 minutes doing the shuffle.”

“It would send a good message if we had that unified campus,” she continued, noting that Concordia staff have great spirit. “It would be nice if the students also felt that Concordia was a place they could participate [in].” She compared Concordia’s urban campus, where students go home at the end of the day, to a rural

Judith Woodsworth sat down with student media. Photo by writer campus where there is not much else to do, except get involved.

Woodsworth also said she liked going out and talking to students, though most students who approach her on the street do not usually raise “big issues.” As part of her campaign to make herself more available to students, Woodsworth has initiated the Open to Question series, sends an email newsletter to all students, and addresses new students at orientation sessions.

As for the $1 campaign, where students were encouraged to send emails and make a $1 transaction on their tuition payments before paying them in full, “seven people paid $1,” Kelley said.

“I don’t think it’s been a huge success,” said Woodsworth, acknowledging that students have a right to protest.

Kelley also attempted to explain the $41 million loan approved at the last Board of Governors meeting. “It’s a very complicated financial process

called grant bonds,” said Kelley, elaborating that the university must first borrow money to cover projects supported by the provincial government, which would afterward be fully reimbursed by the government. It’s a common practice, he said, among universities and hospitals, and must be approved by the board.

Media outlets were asked to submit their questions a few days before the event. Concordia’s director for media relations Chris Mota explained that this was to prepare the president to answer the questions, not to censor.

Regarding the low turnout by campus media, Mota said: “I don’t think it’s disappointing. I think it’s something new.” Woodsworth echoed the same sentiments.

The event was modelled on a weekly sit-down at Ryerson University in Toronto by the president with student media. A tentative date for another press conference has been set for November, with plans to make it a regular feature, said Mota.

Mention of Valery Fabrikant perceived as threatening by admin Continued from cover ... of bullying in which members of a department gang up to isolate or humiliate a colleague.”

Petkov believes that he was undeniably the victim of academic mobbing at the hands of a group within the philosophy department, whom he is confident also received the support of others at the university. Part of his reasoning revolves around a redesign of the philosophy department’s course calendar, which essentially eliminated the two courses that Petkov would have taught.

Judging by documents compiled on Petkov’s website, however, one factor that seems to have had a large motivating role in his suspension are comments he made relating to Valery Fabrikant, the Concordia professor who opened fire in the Hall building in August 1992, killing four professors and wounding one staff member.

Petkov brought up Fabrikant, as well as Justine and Yves Sergent, a McGill professor and her husband who committed suicide in 1994 after she was harshly reprimanded for perceived academic misconduct in some of her research, in various letters to the administration as he feels they represent the dangerous consequences of academic mobbing.

In an early Sept. 2010 letter to Petkov, provost David Graham wrote “I must advise you that the tone and

content of your recent communications have been construed as seriously threatening.”

“In particular,” the provost wrote, “you have continued to make references to Valery Fabrikant and to compare your case to his, notwithstanding the fact that you have previously been formally notified that the use of the name of an individual convicted of murdering four Concordia faculty members was unacceptable and was deemed to be threatening.”

“Your use of terms such as ‘intellectual murder’ may also reasonably be construed as threatening,” the paragraph concluded.

Petkov sent a letter to Concordia’s lawyer Bram Freedman, as well as the Concordia university Faculty Association’s lawyer Harold Lehrer, where he questioned the legality of Woodsworth’s decision to suspend, noting that in barring him from being on campus and preventing him from accessing his email prevents him from “performing (his) other professional duties which, for example, require using the library and receiving and sending mail.”

Within that letter he also included part of a message that academic mobbing researcher Kenneth Westhues sent to Woodsworth, among others, which states “I have read the references to Fabrikant in Petkov’s open letter. The

references strike me as thoughtful, reasonable, unthreatening, intelligent.”

“It is beyond me,” Westhues continued, “how making this kind of reference to Fabrikant can be a ground for suspension or dismissal.”

Despite the recency of Petkov’s suspension, the whole ordeal has been going on for quite some time. On his website, he writes that he has been subject to academic mobbing for a “number of years.” The interdepartmental conflict became increasingly evident in a Nov. 2009 department meeting, after which Petkov alleges philosophy professor Christopher Gray referred to him as a “potential murderer.”

During the first four months of 2010, a panel for the philosophy department, organized by Graham, deliberated on Petkov’s situation. The panel, in Petkov’s eyes, only represented a continuation of the academic mobbing, and he believes that “all statements in the panel report regarding (himself) are deliberately untrue.”

In a letter to the dean of the faculty of arts and science, Brian Lewis, Petkov wrote that the panel only “confirmed (his) suspicion that the university itself had been involved in the escalating campaign of intellectual destruction.”

The university has been far more close-lipped on the situation. Concordia media representative Chris Mota

confirmed that Petkov had in fact been suspended under article 29.17 of the CUFA agreement, which states that the president can suspend a member for a stated cause “involving gross misconduct,” such as serious threats or physical acts to person or property at the university, or actions that undermine its reputation.

Mota could not offer additional details on the situation, however, writing that the university “will respect confidentiality and legal obligations in this matter, which prevent (them) from commenting further on the grounds for the suspension.”

This week, Petkov sent President Woodsworth a message, calling for her to resign. In the letter, he offered three main reasons why he felt she should step down: Simply, she made her decision to suspend a faculty member on the basis of claims by those involved in academic mobbing; she has lost the confidence of an increasing number of students and faculty; and her decision affected 100 students taking Petkov’s courses this semester, which he can no longer teach.

He has also filed a grievance with the university, which will now go to arbitration. “And if justice (based on facts, not mobbing) is not done, the matter will head to court and will be widely internationalized,” Petkov wrote.

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Nation in brief Evan LePage

Loss of 6, 600 jobs shows Canadian economy slowing

The first half of 2010 saw Canada’s economy make substantial gains, but in September things seriously slowed down according to a recent StatsCan report. The Canadian economy lost a total of 6,600 jobs last month, the majority coming from the part-time employment where 44,000 jobs were lost in comparison to the 37,000 fulltime jobs gained. The numbers may be a result of students heading back to school, the report said, which would also explain the unemployment rate decreasing by 0.1 per cent as less young people were looking for work. Prince Edward Island took over the highest unemployment rate from Newfoundland in September, with 13.6 per cent.

Gambler has bad luck in court

Nova Scotia’s Supreme Court shut down a gambling addict’s attempt to hold the provincial government, and Sydney Casino responsible for his hefty losses of approximately $500,000. Gambler Paul Burrell’s lawsuit was dismissed with the judge citing a lack of legal basis to hold the two parties responsible for his own actions, the CBC reported.

Burrell reportedly claimed casino staff, knowing he had a gambling problem, should have intervened as he amounted losses which eventually cost him his house and family.

Black widows making home in Toronto area

A man from Mississauga became the latest Ontario resident to come face to face with North America’s most venomous spider. This week, Antonio Nicoletti spotted a black widow spider in his garage, making him the fourth winemaker in the greater Toronto area to encounter the potentially deadly arachnid since September. Nicoletti believes the spider probably came in a crate of grapes he purchased which was imported from California. Despite the four incidents in the last five weeks, authorities said that there is no infestation and people should rest easy. As for Nicoletti’s spider, the Mississaugan chose to keep it in a jar instead of killing it, which sounds like the perfect start to a sequel of Arachnophobia.

Red Bull and Phaneuf close Confederation bridge

The longest bridge in Canada apparently wasn’t long enough for energy drink makers Red Bull, who felt the need to completely shut down Confederation Bridge for a few minutes so that they could film an ad with Toronto Maple Leafs captain Dion Phaneuf. “Neon” Dion had all 12.9 kilometres of road to himself as he ran along being filmed by a low flying helicopter, CBC News reported.

The premise of the commercial was that Phaneuf was working out in P.E.I. and decided to make his way to Toronto... on foot. Red Bull reportedly only asked to have the bridge closed the day before the shoot which, since they were successful, begs the question as to whether those in charge of the landmark should maybe reconsider their screening process. Or perhaps they just took pity on Phaneuf since it was around Confederation when the Leafs last won the Stanley Cup.

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Tuesday, October 12, 2010

World in brief Evan LePage

Peace Prize selection angers China

Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo was likely sitting in his jail cell as he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last Friday for his non-violent struggle promoting human rights in the nation. The decision has drawn very mixed reactions across the globe, including much anger from the country that imprisoned him. The Nobel committee became the target of the Beijing government, who called Xiaobo, an important figure in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, a criminal and said the award could damage relations with Norway. The prize may also damage relations between China and the U.S. after President Barack Obama praised Xiaobo following the announcement, calling for his immediate release and questioning the nation’s commitment to political reform. Fifty-four-year-old Xiaobo is currently serving an 11year sentence for “inciting subversion,” after he released a human rights manifesto dubbed Charter 08.

Two calendars, one bear-fighting PM

Few political figures have attained as manly a status comparable to that of Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, and for his 58th birthday a few female journalism students only upped this image by posing seminude in a calendar for him. Twelve female students from the journalism department at Moscow State University stripped down for the calendar, which featured captions like “You put out the forest fires, but I’m still burning.” The project reportedly pleased Putin, but angered groups within the faculty. In response to the first calendar, a second group of female journalism students released their own calendar, fully clothed with their mouths covered, with captions asking Putin serious questions about issues like terrorism and the unsolved murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Putin reportedly liked this calendar less.

Pants on the ground, bullet in the bum

A man in Memphis, Tenn. was tired of seeing kids wear their pants so low and decided to take matters into his own hands last week... by shooting an offending teenager in the buttocks. Kenneth Bonds, 45, saw two teenagers walking down his street with pants very low and began to yell at them to pull them up. The 16- and 17-year-old teens didn’t take too kindly to the order, and an argument followed. Bonds proceeded to pull his semi-automatic gun and fire repeatedly at the fleeing teens, catching the older of the two in his rear end. Bonds has been charged with two counts of aggravated assault in the incident, but no word on how bummed out the victim is, or as to whether he’s ready to leave put this behind him.

Students play with Sparrow

Johnny Depp might actually read his fan mail. The 47-year-old film icon visited an elementary school in Greenwich, London last week after a nine-year-old fan wrote him a letter asking him to come help, as the young students were “having a bit of trouble mutinying against the teachers.” Depp, who was filming the next Pirates of the Caribbean film in London, showed up at the school in full jack Sparrow regalia to the delight of the letter-writer Beatrice Delap and her classmates. In a clear break of character, however, Sparrow apparently told Delap not to mutiny, as police were stationed outside.

PHOTO CAP Last week, Concordia held its annual Leadership and Volunteer Fair, showcasing the various volunteer opportunities open to students within, and outside of the university. The event, which began in 2004, was well-attended by students as well as organizations. Over 40 kiosks were set up in the atrium of the Library building to inform students about their work and possibly recruit future volunteers. Some of the organizations in attendance included the David Suzuki Foundation, the Alzheimer Society, and the Native Women Shelter of Montreal.

FUNDRAISER

Used book fair raises money to benefit students

14th year of fair pulls total above $100, 000 Sarah Deshaies Editor-in-chief

The annual used book fair pulled in less money than last year, but the amount is enough to bring the total collected amount over the last 14 years to $100,000.

Co-ordinator Susan Hawke estimated this year’s amount at $8,500, significantly less than last year’s $10,300.

With a few minutes left before 7 p.m., Hawke had to sternly clear the Library atrium of straggling book buyers before the annual used book fair closed up. She made sure that students rummaging through the leftover books didn’t make a huge mess, which has caused problems in the past.

It’s a “stressful” job, said Clarke, who does it on her vacation time.

The counselling and development librarian, who has been with the university for 31 years, has also worked the fair for 12. The initiative began

14 years ago under Barbara Barkley, “the grandmother of the fair.”

The work is done by a core group of 12 volunteers who are mostly Concordia employees, explained Hawke.

“We think it’s a good idea. We don’t report to anybody. We’re not a part of any department. We just do it on our own time.”

The group meets once a month during the year to plan the fair, and then they hold it for two days during the fall semester, with one day to set-up, and another to tidy up. The Concordia bookstore lends the volunteers old cash registers, and they set up rent-free.

As for the books, most come from employees, alumni, and people who are moving, while the money collected goes back to students through the multi-faith chaplaincy and a scholarship.

“It’s actually a three-way win situation in the sense that people find a place to give books that they want to get rid of, it’s a worthwhile cause, and students find a really cheap places to find books,” said Clarke.

Rows of books were still left over at the end of the two-day fair. “We don’t really dumpster it any longer.

We’ll give it away free,” said Clarke,

Hundreds of books filled the library atrium last week. Photo by writer which has added up to a couple of thousand of books over the years.

“It may sound kind of corny, but it’s almost like I think of them as little people or orphans and I want them all to go to a good home.” Some are saved for next year, and others go to Books to Prisoners, another campus group that redistributes books to penal institutions. Children’s books and resources on parenting will go the the new Student Parents Centre.

One satisfied shopper was fourthyear film student Christine Deita, who needed fellow students to help her carry out four boxes of books out of the building. She was not just picking up books for class, but to add to her growing book collection. “I like the fact that it’s helping other students, I like the fact that I find books that are interesting. It’s a shame that there’s too many. I let myself leave a few.”

ENVIRONMENT

Shale gas concerns bring citizens to Concordia Risk of contaminated drinking water worries residents of potential industy zones Emily Brass Contributor Several weeks ago, Sharron Cimon gave little thought to the shale gas industry.

This quickly changed when a neighbour asked if she’d seen the local newspaper. In it was a photo of Cimon’s property in the Eastern

Townships, where her land borders her neighbour’s. The caption described it as the latest site being explored for natural gas.

“I got really nervous,” said Cimon. After doing a little research, she began to worry that nearby drilling would affect her water, which comes from an underground stream.

She started asking around the community, and attended a town meeting. “Nobody knew anything about it,” said Cimon.

Last week she made the trip from Saint-Herménégilde to Concordia, where the Council of Canadians held a meeting on shale gas extraction in Quebec. The industry is quickly emerging throughout the province, as potential sites are being widely explored.

Featured was speaker Kim

Cornelissen, vice-president of the Association québécoise de lutte contre la pollution atmosphérique. A former politician, Cornelissen took up issue with the gas industry when it landed in her village of Saint-Marc sur Richelieu on the south shore.

Like most critics, Cornelissen is worried about the industry practice of hydraulic fracturing, or ‘fracking.’

She says this technique for creating gas wells threatens polluting underground water pockets. High volumes of water and sand are blasted into the earth along with chemical additives, the identity of which Cornelissen says are closely guarded as trade secrets.

Facing the potential contamination of drinking water in her community, she demanded information.

“If you don’t ask questions you don’t get any answers with this

industry,” said Cornelissen. “At first they said they weren’t going to use any chemicals [to extract the gas].

Then they said, ‘we’re going to use chemicals, but only things you’d find under your sink.’ Well, you don’t drink Javel water, do you?”

During the World Energy Council conference in Montreal last month, Royal Dutch Shell CEO Peter Voser addressed the environmental risks surrounding the natural gas industry.

“We take that concern seriously,” Voser said. “Whether we like it or not, producing energy and delivering it to billions of customers around the world comes with certain risks. Rather than closing our eyes to that reality, we must confront risks and manage them as effectively as we can.”

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

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FINANCE

Government help would go a long way in alleviating universities financial struggles: CFO Patrick Kelley calls university financing network not sustainable, posits potential solutions Evan LePage News editor Concordia’s chief financial officer Patrick Kelley presented many different methods for addressing the financial difficulties faced by universities in Quebec at the latest Open to Question discussion last week, but would not directly state which method Concordia would be implementing in the coming years.

“The era of being able to live beyond your means is over with, it’s tighter and tighter and tighter controls,” Kelley said, before listing the five main ways universities can modify how they are funded.

According to Kelley, if they are looking to address their financial difficulties, universities can increase student enrolment or make changes in the areas of tuition, teaching grants, support and special grants, and donations.

Of these, he did not offer his opinion on which was the best

method, but did imply that changing tuition was perhaps the most feasible, noting that since the tuition arrangement currently in place will expire in “about a year,” it will soon become a topic of discussion.

“It’s not something that’s just going to float by,” he said.

After kicking off his lecture, titled “Financing Quebec universities: the basics and more,” with a presentation on full-time equivalence and weighted FTE’s, a part of the financing mechanism which helps determine how much funding a school will receive, Kelley took on the different financial challenges faced by the independent universities in Quebec, in comparison to what he called the “university of Quebec network.”

“For the independent universities on the left, we have to carry on our balance sheet a whole series of items that are related to our fundamental financial health. How much we have in the way of pension liabilities, what are we doing with postretirement health care benefits, and all of this has been brought about by the imposition of new generally accepted accounting principles rules they’ve begun to apply this year,” Kelley explained. “‘University of Quebec’ schools do not have to do that.”

According to Kelley, the university is working to manage its budget as best as it can, but faces a few

factors which are making things increasingly difficult. He noted that the school’s teaching grant decreased a bit, and that this year, the support grant for buildings and grounds did not increase at all, which became problematic when the school’s electricity and gas bills both increased.

“

The era of being able to live beyond your means is over with; it’s tighter and tighter and tighter controls.

Patrick Kelley, Concordia s chief financial officer

He also pointed to the bigger problem of a university financing gap within the province somewhere in the area of $500 million, possibly even approaching a billion, which is actually hurt by the growth of institutions like Concordia.

“The university network is underfinanced by something in that type of range and somehow in some manner those gaps have got to be

bridged because the spiral we’re in of constant growth is just not sustainable,” he explained.

Kelley briefly addressed international tuition, a hot issue on campus, saying that the university did not even receive much of those funds, and was actually acting almost as a “tax collector for the government of Quebec and Ministry of Education.”

Associate professor of biology Christine Dewolf noted during question period that the university is trying to strengthen its PhD programs, but the new billing structure for international students and the lack of international student fee remissions are preventing them from accomplishing it.

“To strengthen our programs we need to be able attract top international talent to Concordia,” she said, “something certainly in the sciences which we are not currently able to do, since we are not competitive with other Canadian universities, most of whom offer all PhD students international fee remissions.”

Kelley responded by saying they know how serious the problem is, but that Concordia does “not have the base funding or endowments that allow us right at this point to be able to be as generous and as forthcoming in terms of financial aid as we would like to be.”

In light of the presentation, which showed that both students

and administration were interested in proper government funding for education, grad student and cofounder of Free Tuition Montreal Erik Chevrier posited an alternative option for the fight for financing.

“This is more of an invitation than a question,” Chevrier said, “but I would like the university administration and the different bodies involved to work with the students to maybe pressure the government so it doesn’t have to be an in-battle in some extent, but more looking for the real source of funding.”

Kelley sort of sidestepped the invitation, but acknowledged that not one group will be able to tackle the problem alone.

“It’s going to take a myriad of bodies working in some fashion,” he said. “Whether it be students or universities or colleges or the business community, working together to find out how that big gap, whatever that number is, is closed.”

Ultimately, Kelley said that the important positive to take out of these financial troubles is that people are finally talking about it, which he hopes will lead to an eventual resolution to the spiralling, inadequate system.

“I think that when people are forced to engage in discussion, some form of solution has got to come out of this thing. It can’t continue the way it is.”

HEALTH

Hepatitis breakthrough at U of A

Hepatitis C affects brain as well as liver, say researchers

Tannara Yelland CUP Prairies & Northern Bureau Chief SASKATOON (CUP) — University of Alberta researchers have pioneered a breakthrough in the fight against hepatitis C. It has long been known that the disease attacks the liver, causing insulation and cirrhosis of the liver, and eventually liver cancer if left long enough. However, after just under two years of research, Christopher Power’s team of researchers have discovered that hepatitis C is also a disease of the brain.

“We’ve known for a long time patients who have hepatitis C have symptoms of poor concentration, poor memory, sense of apathy, fatigue — pointing to problems with the brain as well,” said Power.

This discovery could lead to new forms of treatment and, possibly, to the development of a vaccine or even a cure, said Power.

Studies done on groups of hepatitis C sufferers have shown that 15 per cent of people infected with the virus show qualitative levels of difficulty with concentration and memory, according to Power. For a symptom to reach a qualitative level it must be measurable by those observing a study group member rather than being self-reported.

Qualitative results are more scientifically rigorous than quantitative findings.

Power said the two questions he

and his team set out to answer were: Does hepatitis C affect the brain, and if so, what are the consequences?

The group succeeded in infecting human brain cells with hepatitis C in experiments, which had never been done before. The cells in questions are glia cells, which Power called the “maintenance cells” of the brain.

“

We’ve known for a long time patients who have hepatitis C have symptoms of poor concentration, poor memory, sense of apathy, fatigue — pointing to problems with the brain as well.

The team discovered that viral proteins, like those the hepatitis C virus is composed of, are toxic to neurons. They are the brain cells responsible for thinking, emotion and many other integral human behaviours. “That has never been shown before,” Power said.

Viral proteins attack neurons’ ability to destroy unwanted molecules, a process known autophagy.

This process is essential to neuronal operation.

“When they can’t perform that,” Power explained, “they’re in trouble.

They can’t get rid of excess debris.”

This debris makes it difficult for neurons to function properly and eventually kills the cells, which

causes the memory and concentration problems present in many hepatitis C patients.

Power said the importance of his team’s research is “two-fold: It raises awareness of brain problems in people with hep C infection.

Neurological problems are often ignored in people with other medical problems. “It also provides some understanding for moving forward to develop new treatments to stop the virus getting into the brain, or maybe even to develop a vaccine — a vaccine would be great.”

Power added that his research is a small step on the road to developing a vaccine, and that he can’t say how long that will take because his focus is not on that area of research.

“There are many groups actively looking into that; it’s a very hot area of research,” he said.

Hepatitis C, which infects 170 million people globally and at least 250,000 people in Canada, is spread through blood-to-blood contact with infected blood. It is not found in water or food. The virus is commonly spread through drug paraphernalia such as needles and straws, as well as through the sharing of items such as razors with an infected person.

“Although the risk of [hepatitis C] transmission sexually is very low, it is not absent,” the Public Health Agency of Canada explained. It is not listed as a sexually transmitted infection.

Christopher Power, U of A researcher

Glia cells are similar to blood cells. Because Hep C is spread through infected blood, Power said this is “not a big conceptual jump” biologically.

After discovering that the virus can take up residence in the brain, Power’s team set out to ascertain the significance of this. Specifically, they wanted to find out how the presence of the hepatitis C virus in the brain would affect memory, concentration and even motor skills.

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life

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

6

Write to the editor: life@theconcordian.com FOOD

Val s Bites

Tasty trip to Bernard St. Val’s Bites returns with a look at three Mile End restaurants Valeria Nekhim Contributor For those of you who don’t know me, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Valeria (Val for short, hence Val’s Bites) and I am a journalism student by day, neophyte food critic by night. I come to you in peace – pretension-free. My mission is simple: highlight what I deem to be the best this city has to offer in terms of affordable dining. See, I am of the view that scrumptious dishes shouldn’t be kept secret, and lucky for you – Montreal is a foodie nirvana. As soon as I get that ‘been there, eaten that’ feeling, a string of new eateries pop up and the face stuffing starts anew. This month, my dice landed on Bernard Street in Montreal’s storied Mile End, an area immortalized by the venerable Mordecai Richler. Frequented by neighbouring Outremont socialists, Plateau scensters, Hassidic Jews and everyone in between, Bernard is equal parts posh, hip and old world. And keeping in line with its eccentric character, the restaurants on this street are quite diverse and better yet – quite delectable.

Le Petit Italien 1265 Bernard St. W., 514-278-0888, major cards accepted.

You say ‘brunch’- I say ‘how soon can I get there?’ You say ‘Italian dim sum’, I say ‘excuse me?’ But this was no figment of my hunger; the three words I never expected to hear together came straight from my coworker’s mouth. I was intrigued. Driving down to Le Petit Italien on a dreary Sunday, I felt like the culinary equivalent of Christopher Columbus – invigorated by thoughts of discovering potentially uncharted brunch territory. While there were no kimono-

Photo: Camille Nerant

Fettuccine with clams, shrimps, mussels in a white wine sauce at Le Petit Italien. Photo by writer clad Asian women with pushcarts in sight, and with its rustic-chic trattoria decor, Le Petit Italien was no Chinese dining hall – I was in for a treat.

To be completely frank, I am not entirely sure why “dim sum” is affixed to the resto’s brunch title. True, there was one dumpling dish with Italian sausage served in a bamboo box, but few other items bore semblance to the Cantonese communal meal. A more fitting title would be along the lines of Italian tapas brunch, since classic breakfast foods are prepared with an Italian twist and served on small plates to facilitate

the sharing and sampling of myriad items. My friend and I ordered the sunny-side up egg with vegetables and pecorino cheese, a mushroom frittata, a grilled cheese with pork shoulder, green apples, caramelized pine nuts and roasted potatoes with homemade ketchup. There were no bells and whistles, but everything tasted fresh, delicious and the icing on the frittata was being able to try it all. To finish the meal, we selected the Italian waffle. Resembling and tasting more like a lightweight cookie, the waffle was topped with a strawberry mousse, fresh strawberries

and pistachios. The melange of flavours was outstanding and left me feeling refreshed. Le Petit Italien also serves dinner daily and, not straying from their small-portion concept, they offer half orders of pasta and risotto (genius!). I recommend the seafood fettuccini in a white wine sauce. Despite the bland clams, the shrimps, mussels and pasta were perfection. Fan favourite salmon tartar also soared.

Dim sum brunch: $3-6.75 per small plate; Dinner mains: $7-24 (plus tax).

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Tuesday, October 12, 2010

La Moulerie 1249 Bernard St. W., 514-273-8132, major cards accepted.

It’s safe to assume that any discussion about eating on Bernard is bound to include at least a mention of La Moulerie. A fixture on the scene for over 20 years, the perennial favourite is famous for two things: one of the best terraces in the city and, duh, one of the largest and finest selections of mussels and fries or les moules frites as we locals like to say. Much to my dismay, the normally jammed terrace was virtually dead on a cold Wednesday night in September and the dining room, although spotless, was not exactly what I would describe as “inspiring.” It was also freakishly empty. I certainly picked the wrong month to spotlight La Moulerie and I beg you to write yourself a reminder to come here in July, when for a brief moment, you can pretend you’re feasting on a marina in the South of France. Fortunately, the menu remains the same year-round and as per usual, I couldn’t decide what mussels to order. Should I step outside my comfort zone and opt for les Gaspésiennes in a cream and white wine sauce with smoked salmon?

Or, was I more in the mood for the cheesy Roquefort variety? Les Moules à la Catalane with red and green peppers, black olives, onions, saffron and white wine got the nod, and I kid you not when I say I savoured every last bite; literally soaking up all the sauce with the winning baguette. My friend enjoyed les Italiennes mussels in a tomato, garlic, herb and white wine sauce. I tried hers and, wow.

But someone tell me what was up with the fries? Did we come on an off night or are they always so lacklustre? I don’t recall that being the case when I first ate here several years ago. In any case, I hope La Moulerie steps up their game, because serving excellent mussels is only one half of the moules frites equation.

Much more crunch and pizzazz is needed if they expect to get the terrace groupies to step inside come winter. Bonne chance.

Bernard street fixture La Moulerie offers mussels and fries in ten different flavours seven days a week. Photo by Camille Nerant

Mussels: $15-16 (appetizer size); $22-23 for main course with fries (plus tax).

Restaurant Thaïlande 88 Bernard St. W., 514-271-6733, major cards accepted.

Since we’re being honest here, I’ll admit that Thai food has never been my favourite.

For some reason, the prevalent flavours of lemongrass, peanut sauce, coconut milk and curry have failed to enthuse my palete. I would even go so far as to call them unnecessary distractions that take away from otherwise excellent ingredients. Yet, when my good friend and self-proclaimed Thai expert (she spent a summer in Thailand) suggested I try Restaurant Thaïlande for the Bernard edition of my column, I figured I had little to lose. Is it just me or do Montreal Thai restaurants tend to fall into either the ultra-trendy supper club category, or the kitschy, mini Buddha-filled variety? This place was the latter. To start, we shared the silver noodle salad tossed with mushrooms, onions, hot chilies, mint leaves, coriander and grounded peanuts; vegetarian spring rolls; and a green mango salad with shrimp, onions, peppers, peanuts and coriander. The first word that popped into my mind was fresh. Thanks to the absence of the four common Thai flavours, the appetizers were light and toothsome. I adored the slippery sensation of the airy silver noodles and much praise goes out to the crunchy mango and the straight-out-of-water tasting-shrimp. In terms of main courses, Restaurant Thaïlande lets customers create their own meal by choosing from a bevy of meats, seafood or tofu, and then deciding on the accompanying vegetables and seasoning.

I settled on the duck with ginger, black mushrooms and onions, while my friend tried the tofu with eggplant, hot chili and basil. The duck was slightly overcooked and too finely chopped for my liking, making it harder to savour, but like the appetizers, the dish was yummy and not at all cloying. My friend’s tofu was even better due to the spiciness and the terrific eggplant that added much to the sauce. Invigorated by my newfound feelings for Thai food and leftovers in hand, I went home happy.

Mains: $11.95-26.95 (plus tax).

At Thaïlande, customers create their own meals by choosing their own protein, vegetables & seasoning. Photos by writer

7

theconcordian

8 GLOBAL

Palm oil: cheap, easy... dangerous?

A look at the consequences of this widely used ingredient

people there are happy for the creation of jobs because of the pressure to modernize and adapt to globalization, but the problems lie in the fact that the plantation jobs are unspecified, labour-intensive, and low paid.

“It’s a problem because they need money so much and there is no alternative. Somehow they are trapped into being happy with that,” she says. According to Jourdan, the average oil palm plantation worker is earning $300 per month Solomon, which equates to about $42 CDN. “It brings a salary to people who finally want to leave subsistence agriculture and move into a waged labour force,” explains Jourdan. “So that creates that opportunity, but there are so many social costs attached to that because its not enough money to live properly.”

Traditional societies soon become dependent on the industry. Subsistence agriculture is replaced by store-bought foods and traditional land is bought up by the company and covered with the cash crop. She also explained that the men may have to leave the community for periods of time to go work on the plantations, changing the family dynamic and interfering with tradition and custom.

Katelyn Spidle Staff writer If you ever read the labels on packaged food boxes or hygiene products, chances are you will see palm oil listed in the ingredients. It is an ingredient that looks innocent enough, because it’s name is a plant we all know and is not some chemical we can’t pronounce or that has more letters than we can count.

An oil made from the fruit of palm trees, palm oil is used in a wide range of products.

Everything from processed foods to toothpaste to biodiesel fuel uses the saturated vegetable fat. It is cheap and easy to grow and that, mixed with it’s range of uses, keeps palm oil in high demand.

Today, palm oil is grown in tropical areas such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Guatemala and Colombia. But, the plant is native to West Africa, where in countries such as Benin, Kenya and Ghana it is still produced.

While production of the oil is said to have helped millions escape poverty in countries such as Malaysia and Indonesia, in the past decade there have been growing concerns that cultivating palm oil comes at a great cost to the environment, to traditional societies and to human health.

As society becomes more conscious of environmental sustainability, global poverty and what is in our food, it is important to take a closer look at palm oil for the many unsuspecting ways in which it touches us all.

Palm oil and its effects on the environment In 2009, Indonesia was the world’s largest producer and exporter of palm oil. One of the major companies operating in Indonesia is Sinar Mas Agro Resources and Technology.

SMART manages plantations which cover a total area of about 135,500 hectares in Indonesia. The trees on these plantations yield 20.9 tonnes of fruit per hectare, which is a lot of palm oil. In a report released at the end of September, Greenpeace International accused SMART of destroying primary rainforest, a rainforest which was previously untouched by humanity, by slash and burn methods.

This is done by first cutting down large areas of trees, which are hundreds of years old and then setting deliberate fires to clear the land.

“Deforestation globally contributes to 20 per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions,” says senior forest campaigner for Greenpeace Canada, Stephanie Goodwin. She also alleges that not only is SMART clearing primary rainforest, they are also clearing peatland, a carbon-rich soil made up of dead plants, which takes decades to form.

“You’re not just cutting down trees and having those carbon emissions, you’re also getting carbon emissions from burning off a bunch of the carbon in the peat itself,” Goodwin explaines. CO2 is a greenhouse gas which environmentalists say contribute to global warming. “The Indonesian government has a law saying they cannot do any land conversion on peatland and that is what they’re doing right now,” explains Goodwin.

Concordia’s department of geography, Planning and Environment professor David Oswald also warns that rainforest depletion is putting stress on the diversity of species in the Borneo rainforest. It is especially pressing for the orangutan, which is already endangered. The World Wildlife Fund website states that, “Habitat destruction and fragmentation is by far the greatest threat to this species. This problem is caused by commercial logging, and forest clearance for oil palm plantations and agriculture.”

The social side of things The palm oil industry has created many jobs in developing countries but there are concerns that the costs to traditional societies, such as those in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, outweigh the economic benefits that the industry brings. In Papua

Palm plantation owned by Olmeca in Peten, Guatemala. Photos by Kevin Gould

The fruit of the palm tree that is used to make the sought-after oil.

Acres of palm oil trees create jobs but challenge the local way of life.

New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, traditional economies do not function in the same way as waged societies do in the West.

People practice subsistence agriculture and exchange is a custom based on reciprocity.

Introducing these traditional societies to jobs and money changes the whole social fabric of a community.

“It really affects [their] traditional economies,” says Christine Jourdan, a professor in Concordia’s department of sociology and anthropology. “It offers different types of opportunities for employment that did not exist before and which local people are very happy to have access to.”

Jourdan explains that the indigenous

A threat to human health “[Palm oil] is very bad for the health because it’s full of saturated fats,” says Jourdan.

“In places like the Solomons or Papua New Guinea, the only oil thats available in small shops, in canteens around villages is palm oil and they have no choice [but to use it].”

She explaines that the fact that people in developing countries have no choice is precisely what puts their health at risk “In Canada, first we have alternative choices, and we are constantly being bombarded by information from the government that tells us not to eat that or not to eat that,” says Jourdan.

This health risk is confirmed by the World Health Organization, who in 2003 reported that palm oil raises overall blood cholesterol levels. Palm oil, which is made up of saturated fats, raises the low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels in the blood. LDL, which is known as the ‘bad’ cholesterol, can slowly build up in the inner walls of one’s arteries.

This buildup is a risk factor for heart disease and stroke.

Progress seen in sustainable production of palm oil Environmental risks mixed with a global call by environmental groups led to the creation of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil. The RSPO was formed in 2004 with the goal of creating a sustainable way to grow and use oil palm products. The organization gives certification to those companies who comply with RSPO standards of company transparency, environmental sustainability, protection of wildlife, and health and safety precautions for their employees.

Late last month, the RSPO’s Grievance Panel addressed claims that SMART, which is owned by Golden Agri Resources, had allegedly breached the RSPO’s Code of Conduct.

This came weeks after U.S. fast food chain Burger King announced that it would stop buying palm oil from the company. Other corporations that have dropped SMART are British-Dutch food and hygiene product corporation Unilever, U.S. food and beverage corporation Kraft, and Swiss food corporation Nestlé. The four companies stated their reason for discontinuing business with SMART is due to alleged environmental damage to the Borneo rainforest caused by the cultivation of oil palm in Indonesia.

Of course, not everyone would agree that palm oil is a threat. Especially not SMART, who have posted numerous press releases to their website in recent weeks which deny the concerns brought up by Greenpeace and Burger King. Still, it is important to delve deeper into topics which often go unnoticed, such as palm oil.

“You need to follow it all the way through the supply chain,” said Oswald. “It’s a value.

If we value these things then we should be aware of them.”

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

9

HEALTH

Shedding the pounds by leaving the treadmill behind Three alternatives workout routines to keep you active this fall

calming. “I didn’t know which yoga to get into because there are so many, but a friend told me she had tried hot yoga and that it was really invigorating, so I gave it a shot and loved it.”

Zumba Marissa Miller Contributor Marie Berkovich put on her tightest outfit before walking into her weekly belly dancing class. That way, she could watch the outline of her slender silhouette as it flowed against the grand mirrors. Her beaded skirt jingled to the beat of the Middle Eastern melodies.

Her red tank top was tight enough to reveal her abs. One hour later, the same shirt had turned a deep shade of crimson. A testament to how much one sweats in this seductive and effective workout.

As we begin to replace our bikinis for Grandma’s knitted sweaters and our tube tops for tuques, we start to fall off the bandwagon that once drove our butts into shape. Staying fit is easier said than done, and often all those woolly layers can be a big hindrance to ones fitness goals. Rather than letting the monotony of treadmills and stationary bikes turn you off the idea of fitness, here are three dynamic workout classes that will reduce those autumn blues and help you stay in shape all year long.

Belly dancing Berkovich, an accounting student at Concordia University, got into belly dancing because she was inspired by her gymnastics teacher, also a belly dancing professional.

“I find it sexy,” Berkovich says. “It also gives you a sick stomach, and I feel energized the next day.”

Though belly dancing does not require that you get down on the ground and slave over sit-ups, it is a great abdominal workout.

“All of the hip gyrations force you to maintain a straight posture while engaging your abdominals,” explains Mikhail Sigal, a personal fitness trainer at the YM-YWHA on Westbury Avenue. “This workout is targeted for women, because let’s be honest here, can you really see a man doing this?” he jokes as he shakes his hips seductively.

Regardless of whether belly dancing is your thing or not, Sigal has one simple mantra: “Do what you love. Do anything that will prevent you from falling asleep when you come home from school.”

Bikram Yoga Opt to ditch that six-pack of Budweiser for a six-pack you’re proud to show off. Spend the extra $15 on a hot yoga session. Breathe in and breathe out to a taller, calmer body in a room that is 38 to 41C and mimics a tropical beach when you close your eyes. The heat takes a few minutes to get used to, but once you are flowing gracefully in and out of those downward dogs, you will feel way too accomplished to roll up your mat and leave.

“Hot yoga, also known as Bikram yoga, is particularly great for improving flexibility and keeping your mind focused,” says Sigal. “[Hot yoga] is also great for any season. The calming atmosphere keeps clients coming back multiple times a week.” But he warns beginners to take classes in order to learn the specific approach.

Chugging water is crucial during this workout. Concordia fine arts student Elyse Jacobson reported feeling dehydrated and tired after a hot yoga session. “I was spent for the day. I enjoyed it once it was happening, but I was sick for two days after,” says Jacobson.

McGill management student Liya Adessky displayed a more positive attitude towards the practice. “I got into it mostly because I switched over to a healthier lifestyle in terms of nutrition and stuff,” she explains. “I was looking for workouts that would compliment my new outlook on the mind/body connection.”

Adessky was told hot yoga is great because it is an incredible workout, relaxing and

Ever wanted to be Shakira’s backup dancer, but felt like you didn’t have the glutes or the moves? After you’ve tried a hot yoga class (and loved it), hit up a zumba class offered at most local gyms and sweat your way through a high-energy, high-intensity dance workout.

The combination of aerobics and African/ Salsa/Latin dance moves has turned faithful runners and spinners into zumba addicts.

Concordia English literature student Allie McDonald explains that zumba is great because you’re burning calories while having fun and following the music.

“It is like a dance class, but way more cardio,” she says. “You don’t have to be a good dancer to enjoy zumba.”

McDonald has participated in many other cardio-targeted aerobic workouts but she describes zumba as the most fun and interactive.

Sigal states that one hour of zumba a week would provide great cardiovascular benefits, but “it should never replace weight training. Combining toning and cardio exercises provides maximal benefits.”

If you’re trying to score biceps through endless rounds of hazy beer pong, there are better alternatives out there. “Do what you love,” Sigal reinforces. Allot two to three hours per week to that amazing activity, and voilà – a body and mind you can actually feel proud of.

Photo from flickr

Classes nearby For drop in belly dancing classes head to Studio Sharqui, which has a beginner class Friday nights for $20. For more information visit www.studiosharqui.com.

Private belly dancing lessons are available for booking at www.elizabethbellydance. com. It is $35 an hour or $25 if you add a few friends.

Bikram Yoga Montreal has a student rate that drops the price of classes by $5. A single class will cost $15 but you can buy an un-

limited three-month pass for $360. For more information visit www.bikramyogamtl.com.

Moksha Yoga NDG also offers a student rate at $15 for a drop in class or buy a card with five, 10 or 20 classes. Visit www. mokshayogandg.com for class schedules and more information.

With zumba gaining popularity, classes have began to pop up in nearly every gym in the city. Registration for the class at Concordia has already passed so in te mean time head over to Bamboofit at 3451 St-Laurent where first-timers only pay $5 and score free passes for friends.

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arts 10

Write to the editor: arts@theconcordian.com DANCE

Dancing on the online world stage ConU grad’s dance video makes top 10 in global contest Jacob Roberts Contributor Concordia graduate Gabrielle Martin’s dance, The Box, has made the shortlist of an international dance competition. The Sadler’s Wells Global Dance Competition, organized by the London dance house of the same name with an international focus, is open to choreographers from around the world, who need only to submit a video of their work.

Years before this project garnered attention, Martin’s passion for performance art began in the circus at the age of 16. She started as a stilt walker and fire dancer, performing at festivals in Canada, China and for the 2006 Torino Winter Olympics. Martin branched into character animation, but the genre that stuck with her was contemporary dance.

“It’s very open, where the most experimental stuff can happen,” explained Martin, who says she started late as a contemporary dance choreographer at the age of 22.

Martin chose Concordia because of the creativity of the dance program, and because the city’s great appeal for blossoming choreographers. “Montreal is such a mecca for contemporary dance in Canada. There are a lot of opportunities for choreographers here.”

After she graduated in 2009, Martin began looking to showcase her work in order to establish herself as a choreographer first, and then a dancer. “I was newly out of school and trying every avenue to get my work seen. I found Sadler’s Wells Global Dance Competition through a Google search.”

Martin originally choreographed The Box while at Concordia for her and another dancer, Rebecca Halls. The dance is a duet that explores involuntary confinement. Two dancers, who represent two sides of the same being, are both fighting and aiding each other through the progression of the piece.

“The timing is absolutely crucial in this piece.

A still from The Box (above) choreographed by ConU grad Gabrielle Martin (below).

It’s very technical,” said Martin. Because of this, she decided to remount the dance with two new dancers, which gave her an objective look at the dance, which she feels she could not have gotten as a dancer performing it herself.

The remounted version, which took 150 hours to produce, now features dancers Andrea Legg and Melina Stinson. They were chosen because of their physical similarities; both are around the same height, weight and shape and are dressed

in identical costumes.

Sadler’s Wells is an annual competition anyone in the world can compete in, and anyone can be a judge and vote on the dances, which are all posted on the dance house’s website.

The entire contest takes place online through video submissions, and the impersonal nature of competing online changes the game for the choreographers. “It’s certainly less nerve wracking than performing in front of a panel of judges,”

said Martin.

Even 10 years ago, technology wasn’t advanced enough for this to happen. Everyone is allowed to see the other dance submissions.

This gives competitors a new perspective: being able to see the other dances and learn from them couldn’t usually happen in live competitions. And not to mention that competitors get to see work from around the world. The other submissions on the shortlist come from a variety of countries like U.S., the Netherlands, New Zealand, and South Korea. Martin is the only Canadian competitor.

The competition started with around 200 choreographers. Through online voting, they were narrowed down to 10 finalists. The winners of the competition will be invited on a paid trip to perform their dance live at Sadler’s Wells in London, plus prize money.

Ivan Rubio, a Concordia student in film production, is Martin’s boyfriend and director of The Box film. They started working together when Rubio started filming her dances three years ago.

He finds her choreography inspiring. “Gabrielle’s work compels me as a filmmaker. She has a natural talent working with movement,” said Rubio.

Rubio described The Box as two animals fighting, and wanted to show that in his film. He used lighting and shots that go from a wide angle to intimate shots of the dancers.

Rubio wanted each moment of the film to look like an animated picture and give the feeling of going through photographs in a magazine.

Rubio said his director of photography, Emile Arragon, was invaluable on this project. “I think The Box is an achievement in production,” Rubio said.

For Martin, a trip to London would certainly be welcome, as well as networking with a prestigious theatre. But most importantly, winning would be an affirmation of this humble choreographer’s work. “You have to believe in your work if you’re going to do anything. But I’m surprised I made it this far,” Martin said, laughing.

To watch and vote for submissions in the Saddler’s Wells competition, visit www.globaldancecontest.com. Voting ends Nov. 3. You can also see Gabrielle Martin and Ivan Rubio’s other dance films at www.youtube.com/user/ gmart14.

EXHIBIT

Failure to launch Exhibit treats rocket launches like music tours Shereen Ahmed Rafea Contributor Rocket launches are a synthesis of speed, force, gravity and sometimes pure beauty. Attempting to capture that, former Concordia student Charles Stankievech created Ghost Rockets World Tour. The exhibit, however, is a failure to launch.

Ghost Rockets is based on a series of 12 launches that occurred over the course of a year.

Stankievech travelled around the world to launch his rockets in conjunction with local artists in locations that include the Mojave Desert, MIT laboratories, Cape Canaveral, Florida (NASA HQ), various military bases and the Arctic. Some of the launches were in areas easily accessible to the public, while others were at more remote or “high-risk security locations.” All of them trace the geographical history of rockets, from their invention in Europe to NASA launches and their refinement in northern research locations.

Each launch site was set up with music, lights and smoke grenades, paralleling the setting of a

global celebrity music tour.

The exhibit takes place in a small, dimly lit room with a floor-to-ceiling screen placed in the centre. The projector repeatedly plays a video of three of the 12 rocket launches, with a leather couch in front of the screen. The first scene is in a deserted area covered in heavy snow. Stankievech approaches the site with music blaring in the background, ignites a rocket and steps away.

The rocket lights up and, with incredible speed, bursts in the air.

While the theme is an interesting one, the video is low in quality. At certain parts of the video, the audio and visuals are unclear, the sound becoming incoherent, the picture fading, and at one point stopping altogether.

The images lack explanation and coherence.

People watching the video may not be able to identify the locations, or why it was chosen in the first place. All that they can speculate is that he was in a desert, in the Arctic and on an island.

Next to the screen, there are two displays. One is a collection of three black frames on the wall.

Each shows what appears to be the launch pads of different rockets. The other is a glass display with various items related to the launch scattered together. The objects vary from space crystals and sand from the desert to a Zippo lighter that

A still of Stankievech launching a rocket into the night’s sky in the Mojave desert. was used to light the rockets. Each display lacked labelling. The entire setting of the exhibit is disappointingly average.

Stankievech, who received his master’s in fine arts at Concordia, is a conceptual artist and writer who incorporates architecture, sound and theory in his projects. A previous exhibition of his, Magnetic North, at the Leonard + Bina Ellen art gallery last spring, examined the Arctic.

Ghost Rockets is meant to complement Stankievech’s 2009 DEW project (another field work piece examining missile defence infrastructure).

Ghost Rockets has stopped in Paris and New York

City, and was done in collaboration with artists Will Cotton, E.V. Day, Haseeb Ahmed and Mai Hofstad Gunnes.

Fifteen minutes is all the time that is needed to view this event. While the idea of launching rockets around the world is unique and creative, Ghost Rockets itself failed to excite and live up to expectations.

Ghost Rockets World Tour is on display for free until Nov. 13 at the Donald Browne Gallery, at 372 Ste-Catherine St. W.

Follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/concordianarts

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

11

FESTIVAL

Festival du Nouveau Cinéma updates and innovates Three picks from fest’s focus Québec/Canada

non-Montrealers alike, this film is a gem.

Screenings of La Fille de Montréal in French will be at Ex-Centris and Parallèle Oct. 14 at 9:15 p.m. and Oct. 19 at 2:45 p.m.

Katelyn Spidle Staff writer

You Don’t Like The Truth: 4 Days in Guantánamo Award-winning and internationally-recognized directors Patricio Henríquez and Luc Côté team up in You Don’t Like The Truth, a haunting documentary about Omar Khadr, a Canadian-born Afghan boy who at 15 was arrested and has since been detained at Guantánamo Bay for allegedly killing a U.S. special forces soldier. The film uses security camera footage from February 2003 when two Canadian Security Intelligence Service agents interrogated Khadr, now 23, over a four-day period. While initially thrilled to see Canadians, we see Khadr undergo terrible psychological torture and slowly regress after facing the realization that the CSIS agents would not help him. The footage was shown alongside an excellent cast of interviewees, including lawyers, past prisoners, an ex-interrogator and a psychologist, giving important insight into what was taking place in the footage.

Khadr’s mother and sister raise the emotional intensity of the film, while ex-interrogator Damien Corsetti sheds a disturbing light on the torture methods used in Bagram, a U.S. military base in Afghanistan. Already known for making social documentaries, Henríquez and Côté have made an important film which shows Khadr’s story - a side which has until now been denied public exposure. Khadr’s innocence is debated, some theorizing that because he was so badly injured it would have been impossible for him to have killed the U.S. soldier, and that at the age of 15 he should be considered a child soldier. The film also suggests that CSIS, in a joint venture with U.S. intelligence agencies, wished to exploit Khadr to gain information about his father, who allegedly had ties to Al-Qaeda.

This must-see film will surely cause some waves.

You Don’t Like The Truth: 4 Days in Guantánamo will screen at Impérial Oct. 14 at 7 p.m.

Montreal’s Festival du Nouveau Cinéma, which emphasizes new filmmaking technology and trends while prizing cinema d’auteur, is back for its 39th consecutive year. Running Oct. 13 to 24, the program features full-length and short films from Quebec, Canadian and international directors.

With some fun new features, the year’s keyword, in executive director Nicolas Girard Deltruc’s opinion, is ‘innovation.’ Additions include interactive art installations, a new subscription deal for Illico users, and a firstever 3D section, intended to be a permanent part of the fest. Part of the program is Focus Quebec/Canada, which will feature 16 fulllength and 15 short films. Below are three picks from this section to check out.

La Fille de Montréal In La Fille de Montréal, director Jeanne Crépeau takes a nostalgic look at the Plateau neighborhood in Montreal through the eyes of Ariane Rondeau. Rondeau is 46 years old and has been living in her apartment on de Bullion Street for 25 years. She receives a devastating letter from her landlord informing her that she has six months to move because he is repossessing her apartment. Having no family or children, Rondeau turns to her friends to help her pack and find a new place to live. For Rondeau, the move symbolizes the end of her old life and the beginning of her new life. The history of Rondeau’s relationship with both her friends and her neighborhood are beautifully captured in the depiction of memories triggered by certain objects in her apartment and places in her neighborhood. As much as La Fille de Montréal is an autobiography, it is also a documentary in the sense that particular shops, landmarks, and historical events are incorporated into the film. The cinematography is creative, adding character and consistency to the film. Many scenes were shot by leaving the camera in one place for a long time, while the surrounding activity was captured. One repeating scene is the view from Ariane’s roof, shot at different times of day and in different seasons. These kinds of scenes illustrated how landscapes and people evolve over time.

There were also many instances where the actors speak directly into the camera, which added a raw and intimate dimension to the film. Crépeau manages to tell a sad story with charm and humor. For Montrealers and

Deux Fois Une Femme Concordia graduate François Delisle will challenge you with his latest film, Deux Fois Une Femme. While extremely powerful, the subject matter is heavy. Catherine is a battered wife who finally decides to take her son Leo and disappear. Without telling anyone or leaving any kind of paper trail, Catherine changes her name to Sophie and relocates to a small town on the Quebec-Ontario border to start a new life. Things don’t improve right away, however, and the road ahead proves both long and dreary. Determined to regain

Top: Catherine is the beatn wife in Deux fois une femme. Bottom: Omar Khadr as a teenager and as a young man after years of imprisonment. they are poetic. Delisle draws a rich contrast her autonomy and independence, Catherine between the barren suburb where Catherine remains confident in her ability to build a lived in her old life, to the untouched country new life. The actors give fierce performances throughout, causing the story to linger once it landscape in her new life. This film is definitely worth seeing, albeit not as a form of is finished. Dialogue is rare and sporadic, but light entertainment. this adds to the complexity of emotions that Screenings of Deux Fois Une Femme will the story evokes. These emotions are expertly conveyed in the actors’ use of body language. be held in the original French version at Le Quartier Latin Oct. 22 at 9:15 p.m. and at Catherine projects a delicate and fragile apEx-Centris and Parallèle on Oct. 24 at 9:30 pearance, Leo stares with troubled, tear-filled p.m. eyes, and the husband displays affections which oscillate between violent and loving.

For tickets and schedules, head to www.

Two particularly graphic scenes are proceeded by monologues which are as heartbreaking as nouveaucinema.ca.

FILM

One minute to tell all: M60 screens 80 short films Best, third edition of fest brings the adventure a minute at a time Stephanie Mercier Voyer Contributor The Montreal 60 Second Film Festival is a film fest that has nothing to do with self-centered and hard-to-approach filmmakers.

“To me, M60 is a bunch of guys and gals from Mile End who like throwing a party.

This one just happens to require a lot of planning” said Daniel Kay, a Concordia film studies student whose film, Tamponandon, was well-received at this year’s M60.

The third edition of Montreal 60 Second Film Festival took place Oct. 7 to 9 with screenings at both Cinema du Parc and Sala Rossa. M60 stands out from other film festivals, in part due to the length of the movies it shows; it is indeed Montreal’s shortest film festival.

“It came like a lightning bolt on the night of a lunar eclipse. We talked about making a film, or perhaps making a very short film, or perhaps each of us making a different short film... and before we knew it, M60 was born” said organizer Sean Michaels.

According to Michaels, this is M60’s best year in term of the quantity and, most importantly, the quality of the films presented.

The festival screened 80 surprisingly different one-minute-long films revolving around the theme of “adventure.” Whether it was the tone or the production techniques, no movie looked nor felt the same, but most of them

were touching in their own particular way.

One minute might seem too short to tell a story properly or to convey a certain message.

Still, this limitation did not affect any of the films presented at M60. It gave plenty of time to set a tone and the audience also had the chance to get attached to characters they had been introduced to 15 seconds earlier.

“There is something very challenging about having one minute to convey a complete action” says Rhea Nelken, a student in theatre and development at Concordia, whose film about the Prairies was titled On our Way to Iceland. Filmmakers had one month after registering in late July to complete their film, and needed to be organized and concise in order to create a complete and interesting piece, because “a badly made minute can seem like forever” said Nelken.

Kay’s film follows a young, business-oriented couple through the various stages of their

relationship. According to Kay, the the last scene is “pretty much what sells the film.”

The man closes his eyes and points a rifle at his pregnant wife, who is waiting in the car, smiling. “Eventually, it’s about their disillusionment at the reality of the situation.”

Participants were thrilled to be part of the M60 festival, simply because it is a great opportunity to experiment with filmmaking.

Since it is not a contest and there is no jury, people dare to produce movies out of the ordinary, while having fun with the creative process. There is no pressure, and it shows in the end that the filmmakers genuinely enjoyed working on their movies.

theconcordian

12 CINEMA POLITICA

Doc goes for the gold in exposing town s resistance They Come for the Gold, They Come for it All looks at mining projects in an Argentinean town Valerie Cardinal Staff writer Cristián Harbaruk likes to say that he did not choose to make They Come for the Gold, They Come for it All; instead, the movie chose him. The director and his crew arrived in the Argentinean town of Esquel just in time for a referendum on whether or not to allow a Canadian mining company to extract gold from the area.

Harbaruk’s crew had been filming an adventure television show, and had all the equipment to make a documentary. “It would have been more difficult not to tell this story,” he said.

The possible impact of mining in Esquel was new to everyone. “We began to learn at the same time as the people what it was about,” revealed Harbaruk. The process involves using explosives to break up the mountain rocks, as well as cyanide to separate the gold. They Come for the Gold explores the reactions of people of all classes and opinions in a very poor town that cares deeply about its environment.

In the film, villagers seem to know little about the issue when confronted with a petition. “I don’t know what to think,” admitted a young girl in a poor neighborhood. Her mother signed the petition; according to her, health is more important than anything. An unemployed man replied that he didn’t know much about the cyanide used in the extraction process. “Many of us don’t know, but we all want to work,” he stated.

Harbaruk affirmed that mining companies in Argentina have almost everything they need to start projects all over the country.

“What they don’t have is the social agreement; they have all the rest.”

In 1993, the Argentinean government opened up the industry by establishing incentives and tax benefits for foreign mining companies. According to the Argentinean Mining Secretariat, in 2008 the mining industry at-

Citizens of Esquel lying down in protest of the proposed gold mine. tracted about $2.3 billion US in investments, a 1,000 per cent increase from 2003.

They Come for the Gold finds opponents of the mine getting more and more radical to have their voices heard. During the town’s anniversary, the mayor waves and smiles to a crowd whose rallying cries of “Murderer!

Murderer! Murderer!” are paused only long enough for the Argentinean flag to be hoisted up the pole. Flavio, a doctor interviewed during the film, stated that the referendum turned into a battle: “You’re left with no other choice but going out on the street and getting fanatical at some point, in some way.”

Harbaruk said the movie is having an impact in places where new mining projects are starting, such as Costa Rica. Most importantly, he wants viewers to leave the film with “the precious idea that everyone is able to choose their future.”

The Quebec premiere of They Come for the Gold, They Come for it All will be playing at Cinema Politica Oct. 18 at 7 p.m. in H-110. For more information, check out www.cinemapolitica.org.

Co-directors of They Come for the Gold Pablo D’Alo Abba (left) and Cristián Harbaruk (right).

Be part of a newspaper We’re holding elections for the following positions: t Arts editor

t Assistant arts editor

t Music editor

t Sports editor

To apply, just send in your CV with two writing samples to elections@theconcordian.com The deadline to apply is Friday Oct. 15 at 4 p.m.

Elections will be held Oct. 17 at our Loyola office, CC-431

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

13

FILM

Old horror films are new again Concordia students play music to classic screenings Max Blatherwick Contributor

Horror is coming to the big screen while we approach the Halloween season, though not in the way you would typically expect.

Montreal’s film screening group, Le CinéClub - The Film Society is holding a screening of classic silent films from the 1920s and 1930s at the Rialto Theatre on the Oct. 17 and 2 4.

The films are being projected on their original prints, with a “reel” projector, as they were intended to be seen.

This is a cool way for cinephiles to see some classic horror flicks on the cheap, in a classic atmosphere to boot: the Rialto is a Neo-Baroque Montreal movie theatre from the ‘20s that is visually dramatic itself. The décor alone is worth checking out.

On Oct. 17, two classic German expressionist entries in the film noir genre are being shown: 1920’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, about a sleepwalking murderer and the 1922 vampire film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Terror (the one with the creepy bald bloodsucker).

On Oct. 24, American films The Black Cat, with horror icons Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff, and 1934 zombie thriller White Zombie, will be screened. Throw all that in a bag, mix it up, and you’ve got wicked evening at the pictures.

Live musical accompaniment will also provide the soundtrack on Oct. 17. Eric Kaplin and Justin Wright, both Concordia students in animation and biology, respectively, and musicians in Montreal band Sweet Mother Logic, have accompanied film screenings before. They shared what it’s like playing live music to movies.

How is doing this kind of thing different than the other kind of music you get to perform?

E: Yeah, the other shows are obviously different. I’m in a rock band and it’s definitely a loud rock show with lots of different elements going on. This is more quiet, melodic, and intimate, so it’s definitely a different vibe.

J: It’s a bit easier to work with one other person, other than that its not that different.

It’s arranged a lot less then the stuff my band plays. It’s more of a compromise between the two of us. But it’s cool in other ways, sometimes we’ll talk during the movie to try and work different stuff out. Why the live band and not just a soundtrack?

E: The organizer for this event got the original prints, so he’s really trying to create an authentic viewing, and when these films were first screened there was no soundtrack, just live musical accompaniment. This was the way it was done in the past and the organizer [Philippe Spurrel] is really into making it authentic, because he wants it to be like you’re watching a movie in the 1920s.

J: Philippe likes things done traditionally, he’s actually working as the projectionist during it. We’re going to dress up as two musicians might have in the silent film era.

It’s a fun event.

So are you trying to create a creepy atmosphere or are you just linking up the sounds with the image onscreen?

J: Yeah, most of it’s improvised, so it’s different every time. Before we would follow a certain event in the movie and try and match the sounds, but we don’t like that approach as much, we call it “Mickey Mousing.” This time we’re doing it more abstract. Mickey Mousing gets a bit corny.

E: We try to make a different sound for each of the movies, we don’t Mickey Mouse and try to make something silly to fit Halloween. We try to come up with something that fits the movie but also something that’s our own and is original to us.

Is it weird playing for an audience that isn’t supposed to be paying attention to you?

E: It’s a little strange, since we don’t see a lot of immediate reaction… it’s a bit harder,

yeah, but it’s kind of cool actually. I sit back and watch the movie myself sometimes, it’s a much more intimate way to perform.

J: Yeah, that’s true but that’s our job, to be the background artists. I’m excited to be doing it at the Rialto. We’ll be dressing up, the ambience is great, it’s a really cool venue to be doing a screening like this and I really think it fits the mood.

The screenings are being held Oct. 17 and 24 at the Rialto Theatre, 5723 ave. du Parc (corner Bernard Ave. W.) Doors open at 6 p.m. Student tickets are $7 for Dr. Caligari and Nosferatu and $5 for White Zombie and The Black Cat. Finger foods will be offered as well as beer, wine, and “(dead) spirits” to throw down your gullet.

Posters for Nosferatu and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Both are being screened on Oct. 17 at the Rialto Theatre.

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music

14

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Write to the editor: music@theconcordian.com

POP CULTURE

Video game music: more than just bleeping and blooping Modern culture is showing a growing appreciation for video game music Lana Polansky Contributor If recent films, Internet culture and contemporary music are any indication, there is a rising interest in videogame music (VGM).

The Universal logo, rendered in 16-bit graphics and sound for the recent film adaptation of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, shows that gaming has begun a foray into the world of popular art. The film, as well as the source comic book by Bryan Lee O’Malley, borrows an aesthetic and formal structure from video game conventions. Examples of this include the use of episodic bosses (the “Seven Evil Exes”) and to the “death” animations reminiscent of River City Ransom in which enemies explode into a flurry of coins.

But an integral element of video gaming has also insinuated itself into the comedic film: music. Beyond the retro-rendered Universal jingle, “The Great Fairy Fountain” from The Legend of Zelda (LoZ) series is applied in the movie. Scott Pilgrim experiences his first dream sequence of love interest Ramona Flowers when that gentle piano melody crescendos into a swelling orchestration, imbuing the scene with both a sense of romance and mystique. Not only is that piece by Koji Kondo esthetically suited to the drama of the moment, it is also reminder of the 24-year-old LoZ franchise.

Scouring YouTube pulls up VGM appreciation in the form of fan homage and user-generated content. The wealth of fan reinterpretation speaks to this music’s cultural integration in the contemporary era. The ocarina, the musical component added to the 1998 LoZ: Ocarina of Time game requires the player to input commands in order to produce a magical melody. This actually allows the user to manipulate the ocarina’s tones by pressing buttons and moving the joystick to bend notes up and down. Flattening and sharpening various tones on the virtual ocarina is capable of producing a variety of notes as well as musical accents. Many LoZ fans have uploaded videos of their own user-generated content. BusinessDog2000’s YouTube account, for example, is dedicated to Ocarina of Time renditions of popular songs. All together BusinessDog2000 has earned almost 700,000 upload views and 856 subscribers since joining the site in 2007. He has since uploaded renditions of songs such as “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” and “Greensleeves.”

DIY: game music systems and digital music The Ocarina of Time is not the only musical game featuring a tuned-creative-tool. Games like Mario Paint that allow the user to produce original content using game mechanics have also made YouTube appearances. A music system allots the user a limited treble staff and 16-bit tones (in the spirit of a true diatonic staff), each one represented by a Mario character. unFun Games created the free PC game, Mario Paint Composer, using those mechanics (with the addition of a longer staff). As a

Mario Bros redefine “alternative music” with Mario Paint Composer, a free PC game from unFun Games. possible precursor to the Rock Band franchise, creative players have reinterpreted such songs as Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” and Dragonforce’s “Through the Fire and Flames,” as well as original compositions.

The video for “Mario Paint Thriller,” uploaded by user geoffnet1, has gained just over two million views in two years and the video for “Through the Fire and Flames,” uploaded

by Levus28, has gained 4.3 million views in the same amount of time.

VGM is having an effect on various musical approaches. In a larger context, the application of digital media in terms of music has taken an experimental turn. An unknown artist uploaded his work to various websites, including YouTube, and received attention for his digital composition known as “Windows 98 Jam.” The piece features only Windows 98 and XP system sounds as instrumentation, while the composer uses an editing program to arrange and alter the tones. The song itself uses such unconventional noises as the staccato mouse-click sound, the standard “Critical Stop” noise in a repeating loop to provide a percussion section and sounds such as the “98 Ding” in modulations, varying dynamics and accents in order to create a melody. There are more of these types of compositions on the Internet, but “Windows 98 Jam” remains foremost of its type, with over seven million views on YouTube since 2007.

The emergence of web celebrities The reinterpretation of nostalgic tunes and sounds establishes both their musical versatility and their significance to culture. Swedish musician Freddegredde (aka Fredrik Larsson)

plays an impressive variety of instruments and is a VGM and popular music arranger. One of his arrangements is a one-man rendition of the theme from LoZ: Wind Waker which he has titled “Wind Waker Unplugged.”

In it, he plays all of the parts in the piece using various instruments including water glasses, a spoon and baking sheet, the pan flute, the guitar (for which he plays two separate parts), the bongo, the accordion (for which he plays two parts), the recorder and his own voice (for which he sings nine parts).

He has overlapped all the separate recordings, which he represents in the music video by introducing footage of him playing each instrument as it appears in the composition.

Freddegredde has garnered over 15 million views for his arrangements on YouTube and says on his website, Freddegredde.com, that he intends to keep playing. “I’ve started on lots of stuff, like rock medleys of Super Mario Galaxy and Phoenix Wright, and I’m also thinking about doing a pop medley of famous songs with just the guitar and vocals.”

Nerdcore rocker Jonathan Coulton has worked directly with game company Valve.

Coulton’s song “Stay Alive,” in which a passive game character reflects on his experience in the world of Portal, was in fact written and composed by Coulton after he was approached by Valve representatives at one of his Seattle shows.

Coulton said on his site’s blog in 2007, “I’ve long been a fan of Half-Life, so I said yes yes yes. We got together to talk about a couple of ideas, and somehow we decided it would be a good idea for me to write a song in the voice of one of the characters in the game, something that would sort of tie up the story arc at

the end.”

The version which appears in Portal is sung

by Ellen McLain. Coulton does not keep his own version on the music page of his website, but a music video featuring an upbeat (yet darkly comedic) acoustic rendition of the song

by Coulton is available on YouTube.

The web is a plenum of musical creativity of this type. In it, is a generous share of video game appreciation and cross-referencing in various artistic forms, popular and high, digital and non-digital. VGM, as a style of music, has begun to flourish in the consciousness of contemporary culture.

Link harnesses the power of the pan flute in LoZ: Wind Waker.

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Tuesday, October 12, 2010

15

PROFILE

Bruce Peninsula throw their many colours into the pot A band far beyond categorization is creating contours in Canadian music Katelyn Spidle Staff writer If you cook, you are either the type who prefers a rigidly organized recipe from which you could never defer or you are the type who prefers to throw together whatever happens to be in the refrigerator. This difference is fairly similar with music.

For Bruce Peninsula, a combination of meticulous composition and fluid contribution is what has come to define their unique sound. The band came together in 2006 and has between three and seven core members, depending on who can get together at any given time. There are five who contribute most often, which include Neil Haverty (guitar and lead vocals), Matt Cully (guitar and vocals), Steve McKay (drums), Andrew Barker (bass), and Misha Bower (vocals).

“We’re willing to expand and deflate as needed,” explained Haverty. Clearly, the band’s composition is not limited to a specific number, with their biggest show boasting a total of 15 on stage.

Cully and Bower, followed shortly by Haverty, formed in Toronto and were originally inspired by 1930s American folk and blues recordings.

The format of the band evolved quickly as the trio realized that many of their friends could sing, creating the choir of backup singers that add a soulful dynamic to their lyrics.

The past year has been a busy one, albeit not in terms of shows. They’ve been writing and recording their new album, set to come out in March. It will be a follow up to their 2009 debut, A Mountain Is A Mouth, which was long-listed for the 2009 Polaris Music Prize.

“We want to get a lot more progressive and weird,” Haverty said of the new album, while also adding that they have been most recently inspired by modern classical music. Bruce Peninsula has been described as many different genres, from folk, rock, country, and pop, to gospel. However, the band refuses to categorize themselves. “I don’t like categorization. I think that we’re constantly striving to not be categorized. As soon as you can sort of paint us into a corner, we try to paint ourselves out of it and go to another corner,” said Haverty. “I’d like to think it’s chameleon music,” he continued.

The members of Bruce Peninsula are not only painting themselves into different corners of musical genres, but are also spreading their music into all corners of the globe. Although no international tour is currently scheduled, they definitely have an international fanbase which stretches as far as China. “The Internet has made Canadian music that much easier to absorb,” commented Haverty.

Bruce Peninsula has been compared to bands like Arcade Fire and Broken Social Scene in terms of their large and fluid membership, which brings to mind the idea of the Canadian collective. They are one of many bands that are redefining the common perception of Canadian music. “I think we’ve got a pretty good thing going right now,” mused Haverty. “Canada is in a pretty good position as far as taste-making and trendsetting.”

Having played in Montreal several times, they are looking forward to their concert this week.

“It’s Montreal that really put Canada on the map in the last five to 10 years,” Haverty said of the music scene. After this show the band will be playing longer stretches leading up to their

Ten of Bruce Peninsula’s rotating roster of members. Photo by Yuula Benivoski album release. A three- or four-month tour is expected to follow.

Quick Spins

Sufjan Stevens - The Age of Adz (Asthmatic Kitty; 2010) Sufjan Stevens fans rejoice! Not only were we treated to the All Delighted People EP earlier this summer, but after five years, a new full-length album titled The Age of Adz (pronounced “Odds”).

The work of Royal Robertson, a schizophrenic artist whose themes revolved around aliens, spaceships and the unfaithfulness of women, is cited as the main inspiration for The Age of Adz. But it is also undeniably influenced by The BQE - Stevens’ 2009 concept album based on a creative portrait of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway - in its heavy dependence on an orchestra and layering, but also in its spastic nature. This is certainly not the folky, mainstream sound of previous albums. The new release is highly experimental and the psychedelic. Despite this significant change in direction, Stevens’ songwriting is strong and his uncanny gift for blending various concepts (no matter how “Odd”) into something personal is always present.

7.0/10

-Paul Traunero

Retro review

Belle & Sebastian – Belle & Sebastian Write About Love (Rough Trade; 2010)

Women - Public Strain (Jagjaguwar; 2010)

Bob Dylan - Blood on the Tracks (Columbia Records ; 1975)

Belle & Sebastian have become famous for making hipsters cry. Known for their brand of twee pop – the “technical” term for sad and soft indie rock – these Scottish heartbreakers sing about love and loss over sweeping, mournful melodies. Which is why there seems to be something wrong with Belle & Sebastian Write About Love.

The woeful chords are still firmly in place and Stuart Murdoch’s singing remains fragile and downcast, yet the record as a whole smacks of – could it be? – happiness. The tracks are short, catchy and undeniably tongue-in-cheek. In “I Want the World to Stop,” horns, a calliope-like instrument and tambourine creates an upbeat danceable track. “I’m Not Living in the Real World” is a Frank Zappa-meets-’60s-pop melody, which is touching, even without a melancholic air. Though B&S have not made a head-turning album, they still have demonstrated their ability to evolve. And they can still make you cry.

Heavily influenced by the reverb haze of Sonic Youth and The Velvet Underground, Calgary’s Women deliver a more delicate aggression with their newest release Public Strain. The sparingly-delivered vocals never take front stage, with songs generally driven by the interplay of the guitars.

The rhythm section is also atmospherically modest, although it’s the booming kick drum that really defines the track “China Steps.” Clearly no one is showing off here, and it is this carefully balanced tension and release that shapes the sound of the album. With mainstream artist such as M.I.A and Kevin Drew linking themselves so openly to indie music, claiming authenticity within the genre remains difficult. So how does Public Strain avoid being lumped into heaps of other noise-pop indie records? Give it a spin and see how they aren’t following trends. This beautifully bleak shoegaze album treats us to a well-awaited shot of originality.

Blood on the Tracks was released in 1975 after Bob Dylan’s divorce from his wife. This event in Dylan’s life was often used to explain the album’s melancholic and honest lyrics. However, he denied that the songs were autobiographical and instead attributed his inspiration to short stories written

by Anton Chekhov.

Although the album is filled with reminiscence and pain, the listener cannot help but revel in the beauty and honesty of the lyrical content. Through the use of long narrative songs like “Tangled Up in Blue” as well as shorter tracks like “Buckets in the Rain,” Dylan manages to evoke a sentimental reaction in his listeners. In his stream of consciousness style, Dylan often only reveals fragments of a story yet still manages to express loss and sadness. Autobiographical or not, the lyrical rawness of this album is undeniable, which is why Blood on the Track still strikes a chord with listeners today.

Trial Track: “I Want The World to Stop”

Trail Track: “I Walked”

Bruce Peninsula will be playing Casa Del Popolo Oct. 13 at 8:30 p.m. with Charlotte Cornfield and Ghostkeeper.

7.0/10

- Cora Ballou

Trial track: “Tangled Up in Blue”

Trial Track: “China Steps”

7.8/10

- Colin Harris

- Hannah Jung

16

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

FICTION

theconcordian

I Love You, Side A: a sentiment in 60 minutes A confession in song is the modern love letter Nathan Schoepp Contributor

In High Fidelity, John Cusack says that you have to be careful making a mixtape, because you’re using someone else’s words to express your own emotions. Well, I came up with the best ‘I Love You’ tape ever for Cheryl. #1: “Hey” by The Pixies. That guy Black Francis was a total genius. I mean, who else could come up with the line “been trying to meet you, must be a devil between us”? That’s so perfect. I just couldn’t figure out a way to talk to her until I saw her wearing that Velvet Underground t-shirt. That’s when I knew she was the girl for me. #2: “Pale Blue Eyes” by The Velvet Underground. Cheryl has blue eyes and she has the shirt; it’s totally perfect. They say that the first song of any mixtape is supposed to be amazing, but the second song should be even better -- that it should actually be the best song of the whole mix, and it is. It’s just so slow and pretty.

It’s practically our song. I even made it so that it was playing in my car when I picked her up to take her out for coffee for the fist time. #3: “Do You Like Me” by Fugazi. I figured that just in case it wasn’t already clearly an ‘I

Love You’ tape, I should just come out and say it and then see what she thinks. I’m not really sure if love is what Guy is screaming about when he keeps on saying “do you like me?” over and over. I mean, they were pretty punk, so I don’t know if they’d sing about love per se.

But, within the context of the rest of the tape, I think it’s clear that it’s actually me talking to Cheryl about how I feel. #4: “The Hymn for the Cigarettes” by Hefner. I knew that after that, I had to slow it down a little. And I know that all girls (the ones worth dating at least) love pop music from the UK. I was thinking Belle & Sebastian, but that was a little too obvious. So I went with Hefner, who are cooler than Belle & Sebastian anyways, because all of their songs are about girls, smoking, or both. It was between “The Sweetness Lies Within” and “The Hymn for the Cigarettes.” I went for “Hymn” for two reasons: one, the line about loving it when girls smoke, because Cheryl smokes, and two, it contains the line “how can she love me if she doesn’t even love the cinema that I love?” Because Cheryl does love the movies I love. We love the same stuff in everything that’s important: music, movies, books… everything. #5: “New Partner” by Palace Music. So far all the songs are rock, and since this is a mixtape after all, I figured I should throw something else in. As a result, song number five is “New Partner”: without a doubt the greatest song Will Oldham ever wrote. It’s probably the best country song of all time. The guitars sound so warm, and I’m pretty sure the harmonies are improvised. I love it when he sings “I’ve got a new partner riding with me.” Because Cheryl is totally my new partner. I mean, we’ve only been dating for two months, but I know that

MIX

Photo by Shannon H. Myers

she’s the one. It was basically written for us. #6: “Captain Badass” by Songs: Ohia. I decided that I should keep things kind of slow and soft for a bit longer to create an effect. Everyone knows that Axxess & Ace is the best make-out album of all time, so it was an easy choice. This part is brilliant: “quote captain badass: I am setting your heart on fire so when you leave me I will burn on in your soul, you won’t have to think twice if it’s love, you will know.” I mean, it’s not like Cheryl would ever leave me, but the part about her heart being on fire for me and how she’ll just know that it’s love and we’re meant to be together - it’s just perfect. I love

that part. #7: “Close to Me” by The Cure. Sure Robert Smith was mopey, but he could sure write love songs. He totally knew what it was like to need to tell someone you love them: “I’ve been waiting hours for this, I made myself so sick,” and then later “I never thought this day would end, I never though tonight would be this close to me.” And that’s exactly what this tape is: me telling Cheryl how I feel. Plus, the hand claps are absolutely perfect.

It’s only a 60-minute tape, so that’s the whole first side. Like I said: best ‘I Love You’ tape ever.

Time to face the music...

We’re holding elections for our next

The best ‘I Love You’ tape ever Arranged by Nathan Schoepp

Mix corresponding to this week’s fiction piece: I Love You, Side A(above). To listen, visit 8tracks.com/the_ concordian/best-i-loveyou-tape-ever SIDE A: 1. “Hey” - The Pixies - Doolittle, 1989 2. “Pale Blue Eyes” - The Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground, 1968 3. “Do You Like Me” - Fugazi - Red Medicine, 1995 4. “The Hymn for the Cigarettes” - Hefner The Fidelity Wars, 1999 5. “New Partner” - Palace Music - Viva Last Blues, 1995 6. “Captain Badass” - Songs: Ohia - Axxess & Ace, 1999 7. “Close to Me” - The Cure - The Head on the Door, 1985 SIDE B: 1. “With Arms Outstretched” - Rilo Kiley The Execution of All Things, 2002 2. “Lost Continent” - Joel RL Phelps & The

Downer Trio - Blackbird, 2001 3. “Walkin’ After Midnight” - Patsy Cline Patsy Cline, 1957 4. “The Bad Arts” - Destroyer Wiki Streethawk: A Seduction, 2001 5. “Honolulu” - Chet - EP, 2003 6. “Today” - The Innocence Mission - Small Planes, 2001 7. “Fade Into You” - Mazzy Star - So Tonight That I Might See, 1993 8. “Say Yes” - Elliott Smith - Either/Or, 1997

MUSIC EDITOR To apply, just send in your CV with two writing samples to elections@theconcordian.com

Corrections

Vol. 28, Issue 4 (Sept. 21) Regarding the Caribou concert review, Scott Farmer is the touring keyboard player for Russian Futurists, not the drummer. The drummer was Clint Frazier from Shout Out Out Out. Additionally, the soprano saxophone was incorrectly identified as a brass oboe and there was no trumpet, as was listed. The song for the second encore was “Barnowl,” not “Sun,” which was played in the concert set.

Vol. 28, Issue 4 (Sept. 21) The Little Burgundy POP Loft at l’Espace Réunion (6660 Hutchison) was incorrectly identified as Place Ubisoft.

Vol. 28, Issue 6 (Oct. 5) The photographer for the “Highlights of POP Montreal’s annual unofficial loft party” article was incorrectly identified. Correct photo credit to Gracie Mitchell.

Elections will be held Oct. 17 at our Loyola office, CC-431 The deadline to apply is Friday, Oct. 15 at 4 p.m.

theconcordian

sports

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

17

Write to the editor: sports@theconcordian.com

BASEBALL

In defence of their title Men’s baseball dominates all week, earns berth in conference finals Kamila Hinkson Interim sports editor The men’s baseball team began the defense of their National Championship title this past weekend by winning their conference semi-final series against the Ottawa Gee-Gees two games to one.

The Stingers won their last four regular season matchups last week by a combined score of 47-7.

The two games Friday night against firstplace McGill were originally rain-outs and were rescheduled at the request of the league.

The wins secured them second place in their conference and home-field advantage for the first two games of the semi-finals.

“We didn’t want to play,” explained head coach Howie Schwartz. “But the fact that we’d been struggling with our bats in the last [few] games now, this may have been the best tonic for us for the entire season.”

Saturday afternoon, the Stingers scored nine unanswered runs in the first three innings and took the first game of the doubleheader by a score of 9-1. Centre fielder Emilio Pampena knocked in three runs, while third baseman Mark Nadler and shortstop Marco Masciotra had two RBI apiece. Winning pitcher Medhi Djebbar struck out seven batters and allowed only three hits.

Errors made by Gee-Gee shortstop Steve Kutcher led to Concordia scoring the second game’s first run.

Still feeding off the high from their week of wins, the team seemed to have the game under control. However, they didn’t score another run until the fifth inning.

Kutcher overthrew a ball intended for second base, which ended up in the Stingers’ dugout.

The two free bases for the runners resulted in second baseman Jason Katz scoring, and the Stingers finished the inning with a 4-1 lead.

But the lead was short-lived. In the top of the sixth, Masciotra came in to pitch. He retired the

Stingers’ pitcher Medhi Djebbar only allowed three hits during game one Saturday afternoon. Photo by writer first batter, but gave two walks and hit a batter to load the bases. The Gee-Gees’ Scott Derbyshire then hit a single, which drove in a run. Christian Jadah, who had taken over from Djebbar in the fourth inning, returned to the mound afterwards.

But the next three batters hit as well, including a two-run single by Hayden Ford.

The inning came to a close with two groundouts at first, but the Gee-Gees had done their damage.

The Stingers failed to score any runs in the sixth, but they held the Gee-Gees at bay in the top of the seventh.

In the final inning, Masciotra reached first after being hit by a pitch. An error moved him over to second, and he stole third in time for Nadler to

hit him in and make it a one-run game. Pampena also reached first with a single, and the Stingers now had two runners on base with two outs.

Right fielder Marc-André Fleury was up next, but hit a foul ball caught by the third baseman to end the game.

The Stingers won the final game of the matchup Sunday in Ottawa 14-5.

Braden Simpson, who had had problems with an elbow injury this season, “pitched a gem,” said Schwartz.

The team combined for 14 hits in the game and only two defensive errors. The entire team contributed offensively.

Notably, RJ Leibovitch went 2-for-4 with four RBI, and Katz went 3-for-5 with two runs scored

Scoreboard Women’s basketball at University of New Brunswick tournament UNB 88 Concordia 54 Concordia 57 Dalhousie 45

Men’s hockey Concordia-Nike tournament Concordia 85 Winnipeg 80 Concordia 73 NYIT 72

Women’s hockey - at McGill

McGill 7 Concordia 4

Men’s hockey - at Ryerson

Men’s baseball - vs.

McGill Concordia 13 McGill 3

Concordia 7 Ryerson 4

Concordia 15 McGill 2

Concordia 8 Queen’s 5

vs. Ottawa

Women’s rugby - at Laval Concordia 15 Laval 10

Men’s football - vs.

McGill Concordia 21 McGill 11

and an RBI. “The team that was dormant all year, in the last week has just come alive,” Schwartz explained over the phone during the team’s postgame celebration at his house.

“The one thing I’ve been preaching to them in the last two weeks has been to take more disciplined at-bats, and become more confident at the plate, […] and it looks like it’s finally caught fire.”

The Stingers will take on McGill in the conference final this weekend at Trudeau Park.

Game one of the doubleheader starts at noon Oct. 16, and game two will follow after.

Men’s golf - Provincial championships Team score: 5th place Individual scores : Jeff Barkun - 5th place, Ryan Galbraith - 12th place

Concordia 9 Ottawa 1

Corrections

Ottawa 6 Concordia 5

In last week’s column, “From the Beehive,” it was incorrectly implied that the aforementioned lacrosse team is affiliated with Concordia University. The Concordian regrets the error.

@ Ottawa Concordia 14 Ottawa 5

18

theconcordian

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

FOOTBALL

Stingers earn first home win of the season Football team is now at .500, playoff dreams still alive Stefano Mocella Contributor The Stingers were finally able to close out a game at home, defeating the McGill Redmen 21-11 to move up to 3-3. By doing so, the Stingers kept their playoff hopes alive and dashed McGill’s hopes. Concordia scored 13 unanswered points in the fourth quarter to defeat their rivals for the 12th straight time.

With Robert Mackay still out with a concussion and showing no signs of returning soon, Terrance Morsink once again started for the Stingers. In his fifth straight start, Morsink went 14-of-31 for 104 yards, a touchdown and an interception. Morsink also rushed for a touchdown late in the first half.

Morsink had a slow start to the game, as a few key drops by his receivers wiped out potential big plays. But the Stingers stayed in the game and Morsink eventually made some big plays using both his arm and his legs.

“Every game I feel like I’m getting more comfortable with the offence and we’re starting to gel,” said Morsink.

Trailing 11-8 early in the fourth quarter, the Concordia defence forced a big turnover as McGill fumbled inside their own 30-yard line.

Morsink took over with a short field and found Michael Harrington with a go-ahead 13-yard touchdown. Harrington was able to find open space behind McGill’s linebackers for his first touchdown of the season. It proved to be the winning points of the game for the big rivalry win, but for Harrington, it was just another game.

“We go into every game with the same approach,” said Harrington. “We just have to believe in ourselves, execute and avoid mistakes,

Left: Slotback Liam Mahoney celebrates a job well done. Right: Centre Corey Newman (64) stops a McGill player in his tracks. Photos by Camille Nerant it’s the same philosophy for any opponent.”

Concordia missed some opportunities early in the game. With McGill leading 5-0 in an uneventful first half, Concordia’s special teams came up big, forcing a fumble on a free kick following a McGill team safety. The fumble allowed Concordia to take over at the 20-yard line and Morsink accounted for all 20 yards en route to the end zone. After a big 18-yard run to bring the ball to the two, Morsink again scrambled up the middle and took a big hit at the goal line. The hit was worth it as Morsink gave the Stingers their first lead with just over a minute left in the first half.

The Stingers again started the second half

slow, but their big fourth quarter got them the win for their home crowd. The true heroes of the game were the Stingers’ defence. They forced six turnovers, including three interceptions and three fumbles lost by the McGill offence. That kept the Stingers in the game and gave their offence time to find a rhythm.

Concordia’s special teams made some timely plays as well, recovering a fumble that led to Concordia’s first touchdown. Leading by three in the fourth quarter, it was the return team that gave the Stinger offence good field position with a 52-yard punt return by Kris Robertson to the McGill 22. With the short field, the Stingers put

the game away with a 7-yard run by Michael Donnelly. The Stingers shut it down from there, holding on for the remaining five minutes.

The Stingers are now 3-3 and still alive in their playoff push. “We’re a very young team and the guys are playing hard,” said coach Gerry McGrath. “You can’t buy experience but these guys are doing everything we (the coaches) are asking of them. Hopefully as every week goes along, we can keep improving.”

Concordia now leads the all-time series with McGill 35-34. The Stingers are on the road at Sherbrooke next week as they try to go over .500. Kickoff is Oct. 16 at 1 p.m.

BASKETBALL

Concordia edges past NYIT to win

Concordia-Nike basketball tournament Stingers guard Decee Krah named tournament MVP Kamila Hinkson Interim sports editor The men’s basketball team came out on top of a nail-biter Saturday night, as they won the 45th annual Concordia-Nike tournament by a score of 73-72 against the New York Institute of Technology Bears.

The win marks the sixth time in 10 years that the Stingers take the championship game.

Concordia got off to a good start, scoring 13 points in the first three minutes. Fourth-year forwards James Clark and Decee Krah, who was also tournament MVP, combined for eight of those points.

After taking a time out, NYIT picked up their play and somewhat closed the gap, but still trailed 21-17 after the first quarter.

The second quarter saw NYIT eventually take the lead for the first time since the opening minute.

But all-star team member Evens Laroche made no mistake on a lay-up after Krah fed him a bounce pass to inbound the ball under the Bears’ net, and the Stingers were back on top 29-28.

The two teams then traded the lead for the remainder of the quarter. Despite being outscored by one point in the second, the Stingers went into halftime ahead by three points.

With just under five minutes remaining in the third quarter, guard Kyle Desmarais’ bounce pass to Laroche, and the ensuing dunk, drew an excited response from his teammates and the crowd alike, tying up the score at 54.

Both Desmarais and Clark saw a reduction in minutes during the third, after amassing three and four fouls respectively.

The Stingers held on to their three-point lead going into the fourth. It took Clark five minutes to foul out of the game, but not before contributing a basket and a block. Laroche scored nine out of 13 points in the quarter.

With just over a minute to go, Concordia led 73-70. Bears forward Kresimir Knez scored just two baskets for the entire game. His first was with 45 seconds to go in the first quarter, and his second came with 36 seconds on the clock in the fourth, to bring the Bears within one point of the championship. But NYIT failed to score, and Concordia squeaked by to clinch the victory.

To reach the championship game, the Stingers first had to get by the Winnipeg Wesmen Friday night. Krah and Desmarais were the two offensive powerhouses for the Stingers, Krah hitting five three-point shots out of seven attempts and finishing with 24 points, and Desmarais scoring 22 points, including six points from the foul line.

The Stingers dominated in the first quarter, but struggled in the second. The first basket for Concordia in the second only came halfway into the quarter. Meanwhile, the Wesmen scored 22 points and led the Stingers 41-40 going into halftime.

The Wesmen held the lead for most of the third quarter. With three minutes left, secondyear guard Morgan Tajfel missed a jump shot,

MPV Decee Krah stares down Winnipeg’s Nolin Gooding on Friday night. Photo by Cindy Lopez but Desmarais recuperated the rebound, and Tajfel hit a three-pointer to bring the Stingers to within two points of the lead.

That shot would be the last the Stingers made for the quarter, and they went into the final quarter losing 63-54.

Clark scored six points in the opening four minutes of the fourth, including the basket that put the Stingers back on top.

They never lost the lead after that, and took the game 85-80.

“From yesterday to today, we grew up a little

bit. We didn’t make as many mistakes,” said head coach John Dore after the final game. “I think our young guys played well defensively.

We have to follow the game plan, we can’t deviate, and we’re starting to do that a little bit better.”

The Stingers will be playing a string of tournaments and away games in Ontario and the U.S. before opening the regular season Nov. 12 at Laval.

Write to the editor: sports@theconcordian.com

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

19

HOCKEY

Stingers lose their season opener against powerhouse McGill in women s hockey But the team is showing improvement in the offence department Christopher Palma Alfaro Staff Writer The Concordia Stingers opened the new season with a 7-4 loss at the hands of the secondranked McGill Martlets Friday evening.

Although they lost, the Stingers can still say that they are the first team from the Quebec conference in a little less than two years to score more than three goals against McGill. The last team to do so was Ottawa, who lost 6-4 to the Martlets in November 2008.

This goal-scoring improvement comes as a pleasant surprise, since one of Concordia’s major woes last year was offence.

They only scored 31 goals in 18 regular season games, the lowest in the Quebec conference.

McGill, the defending Quebec champions from the past five years and last year’s runnerup for the Canadian title, wasted little time to make their mark. Thirty seconds into the contest, freshman Leslie Oles fired in the first goal of her university career and gave the lead to McGill, who never looked back.

The Stingers displayed a young opening night line-up as six freshmen made their entrance onto the university rink.

They may have been nervous, as the Stingers looked shaky during the first period allowing 23 shots on goaltender Audrey Doyon-Lessard, which resulted in five unanswered goals from McGill.

After the goals of Martlets Leslie Oles, AnnSophie Bettez, Caroline Hill, Katia ClementHeydra, and Lainie Smith, Concordia replied with 25 seconds left in the first period with a power play goal by Erin Lally making it 5-1. The opportune tip-in goal was the result of only four shots during the period.

The second span was more even; each team scored once and the shots were 12 to 11 for McGill. The Martlets were able to capitalize on a second period power play when captain and reigning MVP Cathy Chartrand scored.

Concordia was the more undisciplined team during the match, taking eight penalties compared to only three by McGill. Stingers forward Maggie MacNeil, who finished the game with three penalties, scored in the second period to make it 6-2. The goal came with less than two minutes left in the second, when Stingers’ freshman Jaymee Shell was able to take a loose puck from a scrum in front of the McGill crease and pass it to a wide-open MacNeil who buried the puck in the net.

The last poeriod saw Concordia’s top scorer from last year, Emilie Bocchia, score her first goal of the year 3:12 into the period with a shot that sailed in the lower half of the net. She also helped to set up Lally’s second goal with a nice pass to start an offensive rush from her own

Top: Stingers right winger Keely Covo, skates down the ice with centre Mallory Lawton close behind. Bottom: The Stingers celebrate one of their four goals Friday night. Photos by Antony Tony zone. Freshman Moira Frier assisted on both third period goals. This made it 6-4 but penalties and a late McGill power play goal sealed the outcome.

Stingers head coach Les Lawton said that he liked how his young team “held their own” against a powerhouse like McGill and hopes that it “build[s] confidence” going forward.

McGill’s bench boss Peter Smith also had kind words for the Stingers, saying that they have “a young and improved team” that pres-

sured them during parts of the game.

McGill rookie Leslie Oles stole the show finishing her debut with a goal, two assists and being named the first star of the game.

Other Martlets freshmen also contributed in their first appearance; Katia Clement-Heydra equalled Oles’ output with a goal and two assists, defence woman Gillian Ferrari scored a powerplay goal with 1:53 left in the game, and defence woman Adrienne Crampton assisted on Clement-Heydra’s goal.

Concordia’s rookie sensation, Holli Monahan, will have to wait to make her debut due to a groin injury which kept her out of Friday’s opener.

With the win, McGill’s unbeaten streak against Quebec league teams now stands at 82 consecutive wins.

The Stingers will take on Montreal this Friday at CEPSUM. Game time is 7 p.m.

editorial 20

PROVINCE

Preserving ourselves or isolating ourselves?

Short-term benefits will have long-term consequences for provincial government This past week, the province of Quebec passed a special bill in order to be able to bypass the usual bidding process and award a contract to replace Montreal’s outdated metro cars to a consortium involving Quebec-based company Bombardier inc. while blocking any challenges from other companies. In the process, the province managed to isolate an entire nation.

By essentially leaving a Spanish company out of the bidding process, and showing their blatant preference to a local corporation, the province and city not only angered the company, but also the Spanish prime minister who sent a letter to Premier Jean Charest making it clear that future trade dealings could be hampered because of this situation. We’ve all heard of the benefits, in jobs and taxes, that the selection of a local company brings, but the Spanish PM’s comments bring to light the troubling other side of this preferential logic.

The idea of favouring the “homegrown” isn’t limited to the economic sector either, and has manifested itself in many areas of Quebec society over the last two months. From the Bloc Quebecois’ complaints over the lack of Francophone players on the Montreal Canadiens, to the more youth-relevant decision to start alleviating university finance problems by raising the tuition of international students before anyone else.

All of these situations are symptoms of a much greater problem we have in the province: our tendency to isolate. In favouring Quebec companies, arts and even foods, we are not only isolating the international producers trying to introduce their product into our very diverse market, but we’re also isolating ourselves from the widespread global perception of Canada as a free and open nation.

Graphic by Vincent Beauchemin

For a nation that has always been perceived as incredibly free and accepting, our province seems to be working hard to close us off and decline that which is different and from afar at the door.

The notion of preservation is fine, when it comes to issues where the province sees itself as “in danger” or “under attack.” Preserve the French language, preserve the culture and preserve the economy. But what are we preserving in shutting a Spanish company out of the

LETTERS

An open letter to President Woodsworth I am writing to you to express my concern about your comments regarding the lack of Concordia student participation in the 21st annual Concordia Shuffle (“Concordia bursary fundraiser marches on despite minimal student presence” Sept. 28).

Thinking that current students should or would ask their friends and family to donate to Concordia fundraising activities is wrongheaded.

Many of us have tapped into our family and friends to help fund our tuition fees and povertylevel lifestyle during our education. Wanting students to show up to indicate their support for Concordia’s fundraising efforts for student bursaries is also wrongheaded. Perhaps the next time you should ask students to raise funds using strategies that suit their particular life circumstances (like a dance party fundraiser).You have publicly linked student bursaries to the debate on increased tuition fees. I sense a low-level spin happening with your comments. I ask you to please avoid the advice of your public relations gurus. Their puppet-playing hands will lead to a (more) disaffected student body and (more) scornful student leaders. Concordia University is too valuable a community resource. Concordia students compete to be involved in these projects. Maybe you can learn something from these community-building initiatives that would be beneficial to increase student participation in the ‘Open to Question’ and Concordia Shuffle.

Instead, maybe it is time for an “agora” on

Concordia funding, where you bring back Peter Marcuse (who commented on how increased tuition fees extend social injustice) and invite John Molson MBA faculty and anybody who wants to participate in an intensive, demanding and transparent visioning and accounting process to come up with viable funding options. This think tank could be creatively linked to presentations like Patrick Kelley’s planned “Financing of Quebec universities,” where the focus would be innovative solutions rather than informationsharing and commiseration on the sad state of university funding.

I was recently at the GSA BBQ at Loyola where students were discussing the proposed tuition fee increases and the general confusion that Concordia’s communication strategy has hatched. Students understand that you, professionally, are in a difficult position, having to balance the interests of so many different and often disagreeing parties. Yet, there was a feeling that you must toe the party line that fee increases lead to more bursaries that will allow more low-income students to gain access to university.

Similar to the Reagan trickle-down theory, the party line fails to impress or convince. Plainly, it ain’t working for ya. With just over two years on the job, you can still change strategies to build a more inclusive and socially just university. If you don’t, you will surely continue erasing students’ trust in the university administration.

Respectfully submitted, Rosalind Franklin M.Sc. candidate Geography, planning and environment

bidding process? What are we preserving in placing academic financing on the shoulders of international students? We’re preserving a view of Quebec as in it for itself, and no one else.

Former Mexican president Carlos Salinas de Gortari once said “Globalization is a fact of economic life; isolation is a self-defeating dream.”

As the world becomes more and more integrated not only economically but culturally, why is our province headed in the opposite direction?

As students, we may not have that much

influence on a multimillion dollar metro contract.

What we can do is show our support for the international students who have been singled out to bear all of our burden. Cater to the diversity of our university, and our province or we’re going to lose a little more than a trade partner, we’re going to lose our Canadian identity.

Isolation isn’t the answer.e

What did you think of this paper?

The Concordian welcomes your letters to the editor, and any other feedback.

Letters to the editor must be received by Friday at 4 p.m.

The Concordian reserves the right to edit your letters for length, clarity and style.

Send your letters to opinions@theconcordian. com Your friends at

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opinions

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

21

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ONLINE

The Internet is not a safe haven for insults and threats People need to take responsibility for what they say and do on the web André-Joseph Cordeiro Contributor IIt’s hard to guess exactly what David Abitbol, or “Darkiller” as he goes by on Facebook, was thinking when he used an instant messaging service to send death threats to former teachers and classmates. He probably didn’t think anyone would take him seriously. But how could they know he wasn’t serious?

The 28-year-old unemployed man took out his anger out on a medium that is public. In this age of information, people need to realize that just because you are separated by a monitor and a couple of miles of fibre-optic cable, it does not mean you are not responsible for the things you write or access online.

Privacy, or at least the illusion of privacy, seems to provide any old idiot with the idea that they can write or say anything online without suffering consequences. Abitbol

Graphic by Sean Kershaw

keeps claiming that he was “fooling around”.

What kind of excuse is that? The details of his stupidity are cringe-worthy. It doesn’t help that the police found child pornography on his computer. Abitbol is also being charged with improper storage of a firearm.

You are not anonymous online. You are accountable for everything you do and say. This isn’t a one-on-one transaction of information, and it never has been. The Internet is a very public place, as it was designed to be, and an information source accessible by anyone.

In today’s society,certain aspects of our lives that are not necessarily on the Internet are accessible by others. From every debit transaction to every time you use your Opus card, you are leaving a trace of where you have been and what you have spent, regardless of your consent. In these cases, the convenience

of the two technologies greatly outweighs the idea of going back to only using cash or bartering and walking or riding a horse. It is understood that there is a certain amount of privacy that we all consciously surrender when using those services.

I had a friend once say that Facebook is the soap-opera theatre of our generation, allowing friends, foes and stalkers alike a glimpse into our lives. From our vacation photos to past work experience, we allow the different members of our social life to experience what we think, act, and feel. However, that glimpse has grown to a systematic breakdown of our days, with constant updates published for all our followers to see. We all seem to enjoy the attention and like to pretend that people hang on our every word that is posted in our statuses. Even with the rise of location-based

services, users fail to realize the extent of the information that they are willing to divulge to the public.

It’s time to face the facts: if we are willing to post publicly, we must understand the consequences and face them when the time comes. These do not diminish simply because you are using social media. Remember all the fine print about not publishing hateful content or bullying other users you supposedly agreed to when you joined Facebook?

Most of us just clicked “I accept”, and didn’t bother reading it.

Let David Abitbol be a lesson for all us. As the old adage says, integrity is doing the right thing when no one is looking at you. Maybe it’s time to realize that everyone is always looking.

HEALTH

Current medical marijuana regulations discriminate against non-smokers Alternative methods of consumption must be allowed Peter Grubesic Contributor In Canada, the possession of marijuana has been illegal since 1923. Today there are over 5,000 Canadians with permission from the federal government to smoke medical marijuana to relieve the pain brought on by their illness. The law does not allow people to consume marijuana in other forms, not considering and recognizing those who cannot smoke due to other illnesses like lung cancer.

Samuel Mellace, a 55-year-old pot grower from British Columbia lit a joint in the House of Commons on Oct. 4 to demonstrate an inconsistency he sees with the Medical Marijuana Access Regulation. Mellace and his wife are both authorized medical marijuana users, and their issue is with the regulation that forces them to ‘light up’ to relieve their pain. As he told CTV, his wife “can’t smoke her medication, because she has lung cancer.”

Mellace, through his actions, was trying to point out the problematic regulations currently enforced in the MMAR, namely that they are forced to smoke marijuana and are not allowed to use alternative methods of consumption. Furthermore, he wanted to suggest that it could take 10 months, or more, for a medical marijuana renewal to be processed — and for people suffering from chronic pain, this is a long time. Mellace and his wife feel that they should not have to fear

going to jail simply because they are applying a marijuana cream rather than smoking a joint.

It is clear that the laws set by Health Canada conflict with the MMAR in that they do not protect people who cannot smoke marijuana and must use alternative forms.

This is an issue that needs to be solved — and solved quickly. If we accept that medical marijuana is an effective pain-relieving medication, then we should allow people to consume the product however they want — whether it is smoking a joint or eating a cookie. If we allow people to grow marijuana and distribute it legally to authorized users, then I see no difference in allowing the distributors to cook it, blend it, or process it in whichever way to ensure that people who cannot smoke are offered an alternative form of the substance.

Marijuana is seen as a ‘soft drug’ to some and a ‘hard drug’ to others. The debate over the legalization of it has been going on for far too long now. It has become stagnant, and the arguments for either side are now circular. The case here does not advocate the legalization or decriminalization of marijuana for the general public. Rather, people who suffer from

chronic pain and want to use medical marijuana to relieve their suffering must be able to do so as desired and needed. The focus is on the well-being of those who are suffering from pain caused by illness, accidents or other causes. The current regulations and

laws pertaining to these users’ rights should be reviewed and modified so that users and growers are legally permitted to consume and produce medical marijuana in any form.

theconcordian

Concordia’s weekly, independent student newspaper.

Tuesday, Oct. 12, 2010 Volume 28 Issue 7.

Sarah Deshaies Editor-in-chief editor@theconcordian.com Brennan Neill Managing editor managing@theconcordian.com Evan LePage News editor news@theconcordian.com Jacques Gallant Assistant news editor Emily White Life editor life@theconcordian.com Savannah Sher Assistant life editor OPEN Arts editor arts@theconcordian.com Shannon H. Myers Music editor music@theconcordian.com Cora Ballou Assistant music editor Kamila Hinkson Interim sports editor sports@theconcordian.com Chris Hanna Opinions editor opinions@theconcordian.com Owen Nagels Assistant opinions editor Jacob Serebrin Online editor online@theconcordian.com Tiffany Blaise Photo editor photo@theconcordian.com Katie Brioux Graphics editor graphics@theconcordian.com Aeron MacHattie Chief copy editor copy@theconcordian.com Alecs Kakon Trevor Smith Copy editors Jill Fowler Production manager production@theconcordian. com Jennifer Barkun Francois Descoteaux Vincent Beauchemin Lindsay Sykes Production Assistants Board of Directors Tobi Elliott Ben Ngai Richard Tardif directors@theconcordian.com

Editorial 7141 Sherbrooke St. W. CC.431 Montreal, QC H4B 1R6 514.848.2424 x7458 (Newsroom) 514.848.2424 x7499 (Editors) 514.848.2424 x7404 (Production) Francesco Sacco Business Manager business@theconcordian.com Marshall Johnston Advertising advertising@theconcordian. com Business and Advertising: 1455 de Maisonneuve W. H.733-4 Montreal, QC H3G 1M8 514.848.2424 x7420 (Office) 514.848.7427 (Fax) STAFF WRITERS AND CONTRIBUTORS: Jordan Namur, Emily Brass, Valeria Nekhim, Marissa Miller, Katelyn Spidle, Valerie Cardinal, Max Blatherwick, Shereen Rafea, Stephanie Mercier Voyer, Katelyn Spidle,Jacob Roberts, Michel Boyer, Colin Harris, Lana Polansky, Katelyn Spidle, Nathan Schoepp, Paul Traunero, Hannah Jung, Christopher Palma Alfaro, Stefano Mocella, Peter Grubesic, Andre-Joseph Cordeiro, Jeremy Gravelle, Antony Tony, Clovis-Alexandre Desvarieux, Camille Nerant, Cindy Lopez

theconcordian

PROVINCE

Plans to restore Quebec churches are divine Churches, like language, are part of the province’s culture and history André-Joseph Cordeiro Contributor Très-Saint-Nom-de-Jesus is a dilapidated, old and rundown church. It’s so unwanted, even the Archdiocese of Montreal has no interest in keeping it open. With reported annual costs of over $100,000 spent just on heating the Casavant organ, the church was closed by the fire department in June 2009. The costs of just demolishing the church are estimated at close to $1 million, not including the removal of the organ.

The Quebec government recently announced that it would grant $18.6 million towards restoring churches across the province.

However, culture minister Christine St-Pierre has placed no funds towards the repairs desperately needed by this Hochelaga-Maisonneuve district church, while money has been earmarked for functioning churches.

Nevertheless, a small group of citizens, led by borough mayor Réal Ménard, are fighting to keep the building open. They argue that the building should be turned into a performance centre, where the organ can continue to be used and cared for, a cause that has united organists and citizens from the community.

As much as the Casavant organ is a treasure of provincial history, it is unfortunately in the wrong place, at the wrong time. Maybe it is time to accept that, and move on. But it must dawn on us all that a significant slice of our history might be demolished. The TrèsSaint is not the only old church in the news, as it was announced that the storied Anglican

St. James United Church on Ste-Catherine will require millions of dollars in provincial and federal funding to keep from falling apart.

Some have questioned the culture minister’s motivation for the restoration of churches, leading to the wider question of the separation of church and state.

The government has its own motivations, of course, and a possible reason for allocating the not-so-extravagant amount of money towards the restoration of churches is to increase Quebec tourism. Religious tourism is reportedly an $18 billion industry, and Quebec is long overdue in getting its share of the tourists. With the canonization of the Brother André just around the corner, the pious around the world will soon have another reason to come to Quebec. The Oratory itself receives over two million visitors every year and the Notre-Dame Basilica gets close to 700,000.

The province has scores of chapels, pilgrimage

sites, and churches. Even Mark Twain once noted of Montreal that you couldn’t throw a brick without breaking a church window.

Pierre Bellerose, vice-president of Tourism Montreal, agreed that the province has focused less on the spiritual elements of the province, in favour of the city’s vibrant festival scene.

Regardless of the separation of church and state, when it comes down to it, Quebec needs to protect its heritage. Although the Roman Catholic Church is no longer the voice it used be, it still is a vibrant piece of this province’s heritage. Nobody would argue that Notre-Dame Basilica downtown isn’t a tourist site. In fact, some fervent Catholics believe it’s more of a tourist attraction and performance centre than an actual church. Still, the city and province need to protect all aspects of their culture, including language, schools and churches. Notre patrimoine, notre histoire.

The Notre-Dame Basilica, in downtown Montreal, is a major tourist attraction. Flickr

HEALTH

Deflating the stigma of mental illness People do not choose to be ill, so why hold it against them?

Michael Veenema — Interrobang (Fanshawe College) LONDON, Ont. (CUP) — Mental illness can be isolating, leaving the victim alone with her fears or delusions. The person can feel that friends are no longer interested in them.

Whether it is paranoia, depression, psychotic episodes, an eating disorder or some other form of mental illness, the victim has to deal with more than their condition.

There are also these things to contend with: isolation, feelings of abandonment, loneliness, fear of other people, rejection and ostracism. Not many of us want to be around those who are sliding into a mental health crisis. We want to be around “normal” people.

So what should we do when a friend or relative seems to be talking incoherently, has an eating disorder, has become afraid for no apparent reason, or is depressed? It’s tempting to stay away, but consider how important

it would be to you, if you were experiencing a mental illness, that your family and friends not abandon you.

The first thing to do when someone you know is having a mental health difficulty is to not abandon that person, but to remain available and be their friend. The main caution here is to watch your own personal boundaries. You cannot become absorbed into the needs the person presents to you.

Sometimes the mentally ill do not appreciate that they are indeed ill. That would mean possibly submitting to treatment — perhaps therapy or medication. And the side effects of mental health medications are not pleasant. Weight gain and sluggish behaviour are somewhere near the top of the list.

Friends may not want to hear that they are not behaving well, so you risk your friendship by raising the possibility. Maybe the best that can be done is to offer a gentle suggestion that perhaps all is not well and school counsellors are available to listen and help.

Most of us, when we become mentally ill — and many of us will experience a mental illness in the course of our lives — will do all we can to avoid being seen as ill. We don’t want the stigma of mental disorder to stick to us. And yet, whether we experience mental illness or just observe it, why should there be a stigma? People do not choose to be mentally ill. Though there are likely always things we can do to lessen symptoms, we do not choose to have them.

Perhaps we need to begin with learning about mental illness. That is a choice all of us can make. Reducing the stigma for the sake of our friends who are, or may become, mentally ill will take understanding and knowledge. Reducing the stigma is important, not only for them, but also for anyone else who may become mentally ill.

Not all of us will be in college courses that educate students on mental illness. But we all have access to the website of the Canadian Mental Health Association. It’s a great site to begin learning about the different kinds of mental illnesses, what treatments are available, what mental illnesses are most likely to hit college populations and how to stay mentally healthy.

The Canadian Mental Health Association website is www.cmha.ca.

Sometimes the mentally ill do not appreciate that they are indeed ill.

The Etcetera Page Want your quote featured on this page? Overheard something at Concordia that’s too outrageous not to tell everyone about?

Tweet it with the hash tag #ConcordianQOTW or submit your quotes to opinions@theconcordian.com - “What are you supposed to say when God sneezes?” - Larry King (@ kingsthings) - “Do you have to buy wedding gifts for couples you know are going to get divorced?” - Donald Glover (@MrDonaldGlover)

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

23

Word on campus Complied by Brennan Neill & Emily White

Q. Should the things people write on Facebook be taken seriously?

Anne-Morag McGavin 1st-year psychology student “It depends on the person, if the person is usually serious in life than probably. But if they are a joking type of person then I guess you don’t have to listen to everything they write on Facebook.”

- “Live your life like a young Kermit the Frog is learning how to be from you.” - Sarah Silverman (@SarahKSilverman) Brandon Bernstein 1st-year SEL 149 “I think it should be taken seriously because someone ranting or threatening people like that is still a threat, it’s still threatening and should be taken seriously.”

Philip Fry 2nd-year communications student “Definitely I think things said on Facebook should be taken with merit. The same with blogging or anything teens use on the internet, I definitely think it should be taken seriously.”

Photo taken during the women’s soccer game against UQAM on September 26th.

The Stingers lost 2-0. Photo by Clovis Alexander Desvarieux

Horoscopes Aries – March 21 to April 20 I’m walking down a hill, I’m walking over rocks, now I’m on a bridge and the water is coursing beneath my feet. Where am I going?

To a great green island, the dominion of peace and tranquility. Wanna come?

Taurus – April 21 to May 21 Someone close to you has been filling your mind with dreams of legacy recently, telling you that there is one true path and trying to convince you that they are on it. Is there one true path? Are you on it?

Gemini – May 22 to June 21 Something like 25 per cent of the living plants on the planet are some kind of grass. Wheat, grains, Kentucky Blue; its pretty crazy if you think about it. You should go to grass, and be around it. See what it can do for you.

Cancer – June 22 to July 23 You will be confronted by a conflict of interest this week, and be forced to chose between competing inclinations. But you don’t have to

make things so black and white if you don’t want to. You can have your cake and eat it too.

Leo – July 24 to August 23 Righteousness. We all want it, but how can we ever know it or get it? Calling yourself righteous or calling someone else out for not being righteous isn’t very righteous, is it? Such are the challenges of leading a good life.

Virgo – August 24 to September 23 Time to find an old friend and do some rekindling. I’ll bet, if it was the right friend and the right circumstances, you could actually work yourself into a good cry, which would be a good thing. We all need to emote every so often.

Libra – September 24 to October 23 Twitter makes you limit your posts to 140 characters. As an aspiring writer, I see this as an obstruction to be worked around. It’s challenging to get it all out in a sentence or two.

Sorry, I’m talking about myself. Everything good with you?

Scorpio – October 24 to November 23 You are on the cusp of becoming something of a local celebrity in the next week. Its true, people will be saying your name. Now it’s up to you to either capitalize on this, or let it become just another 15 minutes of fame.

Sagittarius – November 24 to December 21 Reading informs the way you speak, subtly and explicitly. For example, after reading a fuck ton of Shakespeare over the course of last year, I started talking like Yoda. If you don’t get it, you haven’t read enough Shakespeare.

Capricorn – December 22 to January 20 Now is a good time to focus on interconnectedness, a good time to synchronize the various aspects of your life. Maybe a good idea would be to start with a Venn diagram: two circles, overlapping only partially. Sounds tasty.

Aquarius – January 21 to February 19 If some piece of shit graffiti artist decides to spend an evening bombing on the tracks, they

can get their work to travel from coast to coast without paying a cent. How can you make your cheap and easy markon the world?

Pisces – February 20 to March 20 Have you been contemplating the divide between style and substance lately? I sure have.

I worry that aiming for style is always vain and that aiming for substance is always foolish. Which side of the line do you fall on?

You share a birthday with...

Oct. 12: Hugh Jackman, Luciano Pavarotti, Chris Hanna Oct. 13: Sacha Baron Cohen, Paul Simon, Margaret Thatcher Oct. 14: Usher, Ralph Lauren, Dwight Eisenhower Oct. 15: Emeril Lagasse, John Kenneth Galbraith, Friedrich Nietzsche Oct. 16: John Mayer, Angela Lansbury, Oscar Wilde Oct. 17: Eminem, Wyclef Jean, Rita Hayworth Oct. 18: Zac Efron, Freida Pinto, JeanClaude Van Damme

EVENTS T AT EVENTS A A GLANC E GLANCE

TUES 12 WED 13 THURS 14

FRI 15

SAT 16

SUN 17

MON 18

+EXHIBIT +MUSIC +CINEMA POLITICA +EXHIBIT +LITERARY LOVE-IN +READING +MUSIC +PARTY! +MUSIC +VISUAL ARTS +MUSIC +STINGERS +MUSIC +FILM +MUSIC +MUSIC + +MUSIC +MUSIC +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +MOVIES +MUSIC +MUSIC +MUSIC +VISUAL ARTS +FESTIVAL! +FESTIVAL! +MUSIC +MUSIC +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +LECTURE +MUSIC +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +STINGERS +FILM +MUSIC +FILM

Ghost Rocket World Tour Sufjan Stevens Water on the Table Simple Pleasures #2: Silk Paintings by Creations Sekai Lire: An Act of Love Local Legends Reading Series Bruce Peninsula w/ Ghostkeeper + Charlotte Cornfield Art Matters info party Lightening Bolt w/ Dan Deacon Kaleidoscope: Yves Medam (ongoing) Kruder & Dorfmeister Men’s Basketball @ St. Lawrence College Omaha You Don’t Like the Truth: 4 Days in Guantanamo Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson Black Label Society w/ Children of Bodom + Clutch & 2 Cents Coco & Co. + Gianna Lauren + My Lovely Son Around Joshua + Tropik D + Love Beach

Donald Browne Gallery (ongoing until Nov. 13) 20h00 Metropolis Hall building room H-110 19h00 Galerie Nota Bene 19h30 La Sala Rossa Concordia Co-op Bookstore 19h00 Casa Del Popolo 20h00 La Sala Rossa 19h30 20h00 Cabaret Mile End 10h00-15h00 Galerie Dominique Bouffard Metropolis 21h00 Saint Lawrence College Gymnasium 19h30 Barfly 20h00 Imperial 18h00 Theatre St-Denis 20h00 Metropolis 19h30 Casa del Popolo 20h30 20h00 La Sala Rossa

Women’s Basketball @ University of Manitoba Tournament Investors Group Athletic Centre Men’s Basketball @ Wilfrid Laurier Tournament Wilfrid Laurier University Athletic Complex Loyola Field Women’s Soccer vs Sherbrooke Women’s Hockey @ Universite de Montreal CEPSUM Men’s Soccer vs Sherbrooke Loyola Field Premieres: Conviction, Hereafter, Jackass 3D, Nowhere Boy, Red, Stone Bad Religion Metropolis Casa del Popolo Half-Baked + Noia La Sala Rossa Elsiane + Hunter Eves DEJA VU – An exhibition by Jimmi Francoeur CTRL LAB Casa del Popolo L'OFF Jazz Festival presents Rodeoscopique La Sala Rossa L'OFF Jazz Festival presents Myra Melford Trio + Steve Raegele Trio Hot Hot Heat w/ Hey Rosetta! + Rich Aucoin Le Belmont Metropolis Blonde Redhead w/ Pantha Du Prince Men’s Basketball @ Wilfrid Laurier Tournament Wilfrid Laurier University Athletic Complex Investors Group Athletic Centre Women’s Basketball @ University of Manitoba Tournament Football @ Sherbrooke (SRC TV) Sherbrooke Stadium Women’s Hockey vs. Ottawa Ed Meagher Arena Men’s Hockey @ Carleton Carleton University Ice House Swiss musician and ethnomusicologist Felix Stussi talk The Drums Cabaret Just Pour Rire Investors Group Athletic Centre Women’s Basketball @ University of Manitoba Tournament Women’s Soccer vs Laval Women’s Rugby @ McGill Men’s Hockey vs Ottawa Men’s Rugby @ Sherbrooke Men’s Soccer vs Laval Horror Films: Dr. Caligari, Nosferatu, White Zombie, The Black Cat Deerhunter w/ Real Estate + Casino Vs Japan Quebec Premiere: They Come for the Gold, They Come for it all

HELP P

Loyola Field McEwen Field Ed Meagher Arena Annex field Loyola Field Rialto Theatre La Tulipe Cinema Politica

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S T N E V E A I D R O C N O C E T O M O D FOR FREE R

TBA TBA 18h30 19h00 20h30 13h00 20h00 20h30 20h00 19h00 21h00 19h00 20h00 20h30 TBA TBA 13h00 14h30 15h00 12h00 20h00 TBA 13h00 13h00 15h00 15h00 15h00 18h00 20h00 19h00

E S I T R E V D A E R M A O S C G .

N N I A T I S I D L R T O C N ALL EVE S TO EVENTS@THECON N, AND TIME A O I E T D A I C R O U L O , T Y N D E V E SEN F O E M A N PLEASE LIST