| >> The Kristian Perspective : Graveyard rib-ticklers
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| Definitely not Ben-Hur: Montreal’s first Horse Parade, held on Saturday morning in Little Italy, opened the weekend fun for the Hippodrome’s 2002 Montreal Trot Mondial, a major race organized by the National Horseracing Society. Over 20 horses took part in the parade on St-Laurent between St-Zotique and Jean-Talon. Photo by Jason Felker >> |
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| Calling all Creolophones TSaturday, October 5 is the 20th annual International Creole Day. October is also International Creole Month, and this year marks the first time it’s ever been celebrated anywhere in the world. In coordination with the Université de Montréal,
the Komité Inisyativ pou kore alfabetizasyon ann Ayiti (KIPKAA—which
in French translates to Comité d’initiative pour soutenir
l’alphabétisation en Haïti) is holding a series of events
celebrating Creole language, culture and literacy throughout the month. The opening night is a reception for Albert Valdman, a University of Indiana linguistics scholar who has spent 40 years studying the Creole language. He will be speaking on the history, linguistic aspects, similarities to Creole spoken elsewhere and literacy and education. Every weekend, from Thursday to Sunday throughout the month, will feature different events at different venues organized by 13 different groups. “There will be songs, poetry recitals, painting and book expositions, food and proverb nights, where we will tell the history, meaning and moral lessons of proverbs,” Bain says. The events are open to all and are mostly free. The opening
night takes place in UdeM’s Jean-Brillant Building (3200 Jean-Brillant)
from 2:30–10 p.m. For more information, call (450) 651-0157, e-mail
kipkaa@attcanada.ca or visit
http://hometown.aol.com/mit2kreyol/KIP-Calendar-02.htm.
: Costco clobbers heritage casino Costco, a big American corporation Quebecers know better as Club Price, is not just in the business of offering you great savings while keeping you in oatmeal, frozen waffles and Cheetos for a month. It’s also busy in Mexico right now destroying heritage buildings, ripping up trees and watching people getting arrested and beat up by police. That’s the message Michael Werbowski wants to get out, and as the Montreal spokesperson for the Coalition to Save the Casino de la Selva, he’s busy getting a Costco/Club Price boycott rolling. What he’s protesting is the merciless grind of progress, Mexico-style. Costco had bought a large chunk of land in downtown Cuernavaca, 40 miles southwest of Mexico City, and has already torn down an historic casino with murals by some of the country’s most famous artists from the 1930s. The area had been declared a national heritage site. The company is now getting ready to chop down some 500 trees and put up a bright, shiny box-like store. The same old drill happened in late August: residents were outraged, protested, and were then beaten and tossed in jail by local cops, according to Werbowski. “The whole project just reeks of corruption,”
he says. “We’re sure there were a lot of kickbacks. One art
historian wrote saying that this was the Disneyland-ization of culture.”
He also says prominent Montreal architect and conservationist Phyllis
Lambert appealed to the local government to at least assess the historical
value of the casino, to no avail. : Jeanne-Mance Park going to the dogs IDogs might soon be running around leash-free in Jeanne-Mance Park from 7–9 a.m. and 9–11 p.m. Last summer, 690 nearby residents petitioned for a dog run in the park, but now the canine owners are angling to allow their dogs to run without leashes during designated periods. “Dog runs are pretty shitty places, they’re very unpleasant and they’re a mess of disease,” says Eric-Daniel Oudin of the Jeanne-Mance Park Dog Owners Association. Oudin says that local cops have needlessly and relentlessly pursued owners of leashless dogs, noting that he himself was busted for having his dog off the leash last summer. “There were two vans, four cops and six or seven canine patrol agents there. The response was completely disproportionate,” says Oudin, who was eventually served a ticket, which he plans to contest. Nelson Paciencia, another area dog-lover, also welcomes the end to an era in which dog owners have been emphatically targeted for allowing their dogs to run free. “There are guys offering me drugs, drinking beer and riding bicycles in the park—those are all against the law, technically. If you’re going to apply the law, why not them too?” he asks. City representative Pierre J. Laporte says that the doggy
freedom hours could become reality soon in Jeanne-Mance and Laurier Park,
after legalities are ironed out. “They’re looking at how they
can change and amend the existing bylaws,” he says. :
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Communications Gratte-Ciel Ltée 2002 |
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Angel
>> Farha Foundation turning 10 Now a well-known
annual event, the Farha Foundation’s “Ça marche!”
walk drew upwards of 20,000 people to the streets on Sunday morning
to raise money for AIDS-care organizations. This year alone, the walk
raised over $400,000, which will be distributed to 44 different organizations
in the province to fight against the disease. They hope to raise an
additional $100,000 by December 1, International AIDS Day. What started
out as a march with a couple of hundred has exploded into a national
event, with similar walks in 125 towns and cities across the country.
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Insect
>> Conferences about drug use without any drug users
At the World Forum on Drugs, Dependencies, Impacts and Responses, which
wraps up in Montreal today, the 3,000 delegates listened to politicians,
policemen, academics and Middle Eastern royalty talk about the perils
of drugs. Meanwhile, drug addicts, street counsellors and social workers
were excluded—unless of course they could cough up the $825 registration
fee (although organizers said that they could’ve paid the reduced
rate of only $565). But by limiting entry to an elite group, conference
organizers and delegates definitely won’t be coming any closer
to realistic policies on the subject.
