UPDATES - a quick summary

I haven’t written a post in a loOoOOng time, so here are some of the highlights of what happened during term 1 of my third year.

I missed Vale a lot while she was having a blast in Turkey learning how to say banana in Turkish. Our beautiful international Fairview house from last year is just a pleasant memory for me now. Rits was cool and quiet, and my roomies were adorable. I felt I was just there for four months and didn’t feel like it was my house or anything, so, for example, not much effort was put in beautifying and decorating the living room. Oh, this year I also had two unofficial roomies! One was Stephanie’s teddy bear and the other was the ant colony living under the kitchen. Exciting stuff :) However, the absolute BEST part of living in Rits was that I was super close to Nichole.

I was lucky enough to have a class with Sam, because otherwise he would still be “random forestry guy I barely talk to” and not most awesome guy ever. Because of him, I spent way more time downtown AND got the chance to visit his hometown Quadra Island. We went on the long week-end and I loved it. The wooden blue house, built by his dad, has a view of the ocean and the forest. And the inside of the house is pretty much a Mexican arts market, except that things are not for sale. His parents love Mexico so I felt even more at home, as if his very-welcoming family, fantastic home-made meals and super-thick room carpets weren’t enough.

Quadra Island

Christmas time came and one of the Christmassy things Nicki and I did was go to Stanley Park to watch the lights. The Van Dusen Botanical Gardens are way better; more professionally done and no incoherent displays sponsored by the Fire Department with moldy toy decorations and creepy mechatronic Santas. Still in the Christmas spirit, we made cookies. I took some home in a Ziploc bag. On the bus I put them on the seat next to me and forgot about them until I was downtown. I looked and they were gone. I searched under the seat, behind it, under my feet. But no, they were gone. There was a guy sitting on the other seat and he was looking at his phone. I touched his shoulder “Excuse me? Hi. Yeah, have you seen a bag with cookies that was here?” He looked at me for a couple seconds, deciding what to do, and then pulled them OUT OF HIS POCKET and said, “Oh yeah… these ones? Yes, sorry, I thought they were someone else’s and I was hungry.” Is that awkward or what.

One of the terrible decorations at Stanley Park. Looks like a sled running over someone, but those are not legs, they are actually two elves (I think?)

Blood In The Mobile

Yesterday I went with some friends to watch an acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF) documentary from 2010, "Blood in the mobile", directed by Frank Piasecki Poulsen. The documentary exposed the many horrors of the civil wars in Democratic Republic of Congo being financed by the electronics industry through the trade of minerals used for mobile phones and computers. It brought a huge human-rights problem to the attention of many unsuspecting users worldwide, however the movie itself was lacking and not very powerful as far as documentaries go. There was great potential, considering how much work is being done about this issue all over the world, but this film failed to meet the expectations.

Poulsen travels all over the world trying to talk to Nokia people (he focuses on this one company, as it is one of the largest. He usually got to talk to those who didn't make decisions); going to the illegal Bisie mine in Kivu, DRC, where the mineral casserite is obtained under extremely poor safety conditions; talking to various experts in mineral tracking and conflict minerals; and including politicians working towards having conflict minerals become illegal in the US. The questions he asked the interviewees often lacked the depth required to sound like he had done the appropriate research about conflict minerals beforheand. It seemed he just wanted to get the movie done and get the footage he needed for it, and although yes, the footage he got from inside the mine was very interesting and a great journalistic achievement, it was extremely irresponsible for him to take that boy, Chance, down with him to tour him around, especially considering all the negative reactions as the boy helped the 'white man'. Who knows what happened to Chance after he left?

It was saddening to see that although large companies have been aware about these issues for more than a decade, not much has been achieved in solving this massive problem, and I hope having this movie out there will speed up things. Of course, it all comes down to consumers and what WE demand. The Raise Hope For Congo website contains information about the terrible war going on far, far away, but so, so close at the same time, surrounding us, under my fingers as I'm typing this, and everyday as I use my phone. It explains what consumers can do about the problem, and it's a good resource to start off with if you want to become more informed about the place where people live under extreme conditions resembling slavery, where children stay inside mines for days due to the difficulty of going down. Down these poorly-built mines that collapse and kill people every day. Deaths that finance an inhumane war that leads to even more deaths. And suffering that cannot be explained through words.

Food post

Three really exciting things are happening this term too! And they are all related. So I'm part now of The Veggie Club, Common Energy's Food Subgroup, and The LFS Orchard Garden. WHAAAT are these things?? The Veggie Club and Common Energy are both UBC clubs, and they both deal with food and sustainability, and the Orchard Garden is a garden two minutes away from my place and Forestry (behind LFS building) where I volunteer every week. A really cool project is in the working, involving these three. Speaking of the Garden, I absolutely love it! When I started at UBC I was like, yeah I want to volunteer at the Farm! Well, guess what, the Farm is SO far away!! It's quite unrealistic for me to fit a Farm trip in my schedule. SOOO the Orchard Garden is the PERFECT solution! It's a joint-management thing between the Faculties of LFS, Education and Landscape Architecture. They grow many many delicious things, and most of the produce is sold to Agora, the LFS Café.

So far, I've harvested onions and zucchini, and we are clearing the beds to plant cover crops for the winter. Last week we composted lettuce which was flowering and was therefore very bitter, and we could take it home if we wanted to. It was too bitter for me, but they looked spectacular - well rounded, fresh, giant. A girl working with me ate lettuce like a rabbit, as she worked. This week I took home the zucchini flowers and made zucchini flower and cheese quesadillas. I have a pepper plant at home (Pepe the Pepper, and Knickers has Pancho The Pepper) and eating the peppers from there is amazing, I just go to the living room and get a pepper from Pepe, and in exchange I only have to water him, clean him and love him. I think it's a good deal, so I decided my goal for when I have my own place is to have a garden with lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, potatoes and everything else! Taking care of the garden would definitely require work, but it is so relaxing, rewarding and connected with nature.

Zucchini and flower in LFS Orchard Garden

 Chilli peppers from Pepe The Pepper - he makes (on average) six of these every week

Back in Vancouver

I'm back and I'm extremely happy! I truly realize how much I love UBC, especially after being away for so long.

2011 was a fantastic year for me and this term will be the perfect way to end it. The Christmas holidays will be spent in San Francisco with Leslie & Mike, and then maybe/maybe not I'll go to Singapore.
 
First of all, I absolutely love my courses. One of them is FRST 270 Community Forestry. It used to be taught by Ron Trosper, but now he left and we have a PhD candidate, Reem, and she's just amazing. We are learning what community forestry really entails by analyzing different viewpoints, and through case studies we explore how the broad concept of community forest is applied so many different ways all around the world. What is power? Who determines who gets power over the land? Is there a difference between access and property? How can success be defined in the realm of resource management?  We explore questions like these ones through readings, class discussions, guest lectures and assignements. Plus we are 11 students, smallest class I've had at UBC!

Other two I really love are CONS 210 (Visualizing climate change) with Sarah Burch and Stephen Sheppard,  and FRST 415 (Sustainable Forest Policy) with George Hoberg. We've had very interesting and inspiring lectures for both of these too. For example, we had Valerie Langer from ForestEthics come talk about the success in the Great Bear Rainforest - learning about environmental activism firsthand from and environmental activist was awesome. I have also been introduced to two things I hadn't used before: iClicker and PeerWise. iClickers are like remote controls for answering multiple choice questions and the Prof gets instant feedback as to whether the students are getting the material or not, and it also sparks interesting class discussion. PeerWise is an online tool designed for students to write questions, and then answer, rate and comment other students' questions - great question pool for studying for exams!

My living arrangement is also great. My house is made for someone on a wheelchair, so the corridors are huge and the bathroom is made for dancing with a wheelchair judging by its dimensions. It's first floor, and at first I hated this because I can't leave my windows open when I leave, but I've gotten used to this and my friends come visit my window all the time, which is fun. The residence, Ritsumeikan, is very quiet and organized. We have a tatami room and I was really excited but then Maki my Japanese roomie said she hates to sit there because she gets splinters all over, so I shouldn't wear shorts when I go to the tatami room...

Fun stuff that has been going on:
- I went to Seattle with Sharon for a outlet-shopping-spree (I don't understand brands like Juicy Couture... felt sweat pants with GLAMOUR written on them with gold and Swarovski crystals...really??) and had my first Taco Bell meal
-I went paddleboarding with a bunch of friends to Jericho Beach. Oscar and I decided it would be a good idea to share a paddleboard and stand on it at the same time, so we tried that for quite some time, until I fell on top of some hidden aquatic rocks and scraped my leg.
- We went to the FarmAde at the UBC Farm and watched people square-dancing to the beat and following the instructions coming from the speakers
- I completed one of the unofficial graduation requirements - Day of the Longboat! We were the Shockers and we painted our faces like Kiss, with black and white. So I think every occasion is a good occasion to paint faces, and I especially love it when people let me do their faces! It was a team with random members but we had so much fun and we came fourth, which was good as we were eight instead of ten people. I need an arm and neck massage now, though.

Jason my Longboat Shocker friend looking awesome

OrienTREEing

Sharon and I love trees, but more than anything we love to walk around looking for them and identifying them. Yes, sounds geeky - and it is - but it is also SO much fun. For Forestry Week, the Faculty of Forestry Dean's Office came up with a great idea : a tree scavenger hunt. We got clues (verbal and visual), including riddles, to go around campus looking for trees and locating them on a map for about an hour and a half. We got points for strategy, for speed and for knowledge, and we won first prize ($100) :D It was quite a fresh activity, fresher than what the FUS usually does for Forestry Week, and hopefully they will also do it next year. Below: the two of us with arbutus and coulter pine.

The Spicy Pepper Chronicles

July 23rd, 2011

THE SPICY PEPPER CHRONICLES

50 GB worth of work, 5 hotel rooms, 3 months and many great experiences later, my time in Chile has come to an end! The co-op work term really flew by, and I can’t believe how much things changed throughout the summer, how many things I learnt, how many new people I met, and how many places I visited.

There are many differences in forestry here and in BC. In Chile, forestry is all about intensively managed plantation forestry. Chile's forested land is highly concentrated in the hands of a few major companies, principally those connected with the paper industry. Second growth forests in BC are not strictly considered plantations (although they are), and they are less intensively managed: the plantations try to consider the ecology of the site in terms of choice of species and management. In Chile, it involves mainly two species (radiata pine and eucalyptus), and things like thinning, brushing and fertilizing, spacing, etc. are carried out. These trees grow FAST, so rotation periods are way shorter (14-20 years depending on the species. Nothing compared to the 80-200 years in BC). There is also no conversion of native forests anymore (in terms of the company I was working for), which is where big bucks come from in BC (100-year-old red cedar = $$$). The safety for outside contractors really impressed me as well – there have to be special designated vehicles that meet certain specifications (tools can’t go in the same vehicle, for example, they have to go in a box on top of the brand new van). I also worked for a different level in the hierarchy of the company, not at the forest operation level like I did in BC, so I also got to witness how the big-decision-making process worked and how changes slowly trickled down the veins of the company.

If you are reading this you probably have me on Facebook so that’s were the Chile album will be, it’ll be a pretty fat one...

Pre-summer days: last days in The Van

Today Sunday makes it two weeks since I arrived in Chile! I will write all about it in a bit, but I remembered I had written this stuff below while I was on the plane two weeks ago, but had forgotten to post it:

Kiki getting her tattoo!

Here I am on another plane. Going to Chile now, though.  Wow, the entertainment on planes has improved considerably in the last couple years. Now we all have an individual TV where we can select movies, TV shows and music as we please. You can even make playlists with the songs you like from the different albums. This is LAN airlines, which apparently travels all around South America. Very exciting to be in my first South America trip. This particular flight goes from Los Angeles, to Lima, to Santiago, to Buenos Aires.  From LA to Santiago it’s 13 hours, so it’s like going to Europe.

Seeing how I won't be going back to Vancouver for a year (sigh) I will write about some fun things we did our last days there. So these are eating chocolate and live music. In terms of eating chocolate, we went to an all-you-can eat chocolate fondue place, Capstone Tea in Robson Street (which, unless you’re a huge person that eats a LOT, is actually cheaper if you buy individual platters…) For our live music of the month we went to 560 to Five Alarm Funk. They were not as good as the band before them but the night was so much fun! Anyway back to now---> The last 48 hours were so intense… I had my last final on the last possible day, Thursday. Finishing the exam, I had several things to take care of before leaving for a year, and we also had a magic show to go to, so we didn’t start pacing until 11pm. Ok, so just a quick note on the magic show (which I had already mentioned in another post). It’s this guy from Colombia called Camilo The Magician, and he does mostly card tricks, which are crazy! He has a song written after him, Camilo the Magician by Said the Whale. So the trick that blew my mind was one where a guy picked a card, a girl picked a card, they showed them to audience, cards back in the deck, shuffle shuffle, Camilo took one card from the deck, tore it in two, and it was half and half the two cards the guy and the girl had picked! All of this with intensive shuffling involved in between. No idea how he did it. 

So after the show we came home to pack , and we packed and packed and packed all night long! We watched the Royal Wedding, of course. I watched because I was up anyway, but it’s not like I would have woken up at 2 am to watch the live streaming, unlike my mum and sister who did do that. I thought the dress was beautiful, and that the cameras shouldn’t have filmed William’s head from the top that much, focusing on his bald spots. It’s weird that we still have royalty now… a king, seriously??

I hate packing. It’s so stressful, especially getting rid of stuff. I never want to get rid of anything, what if I will ever, maybe, potentially need that thing I’m throwing out one day. This is stupid, but I can’t help it. Especially books. Plus I had a keyboard and the stand and a Christmas tree and the drying racks…  so much stuff. After an all-nighter packing, I transferred all the boxes to my neighbours’ place, because they were scheduled to leave the next day while I was scheduled to leave at noon. I went to work, to give my last tour. So the other day Vale and I got sick at the same time, and lost our voices at the exact same time too, so I had no voice for the tour But I did it with Quinn which was awesome. It was sad saying bye to my Friday team mates, our Friday tour groups were so much fun.

After I got back, there were already people in our place. Housing didn’t clean before the new residents moved in, so they got a mess of a house, ew, I sure wouldn’t want to be them. On the plus side, though, they got all the cool stuff we left, such as an awesome NY poster on the stairs oh yeaahhh and food and shampoo (unopened). I spent all afternoon with my neighbours and then Nicki let me store ALL of my boxes in her storage space in her Marine Drive apartment, so I transferred everything from Fairview to MD in a taxi van at 11 pm when Nicki got home. Then we slept for like 2 hours and the taxi came at 3 am to take me to the airport as my flight left at 6 am. And Sharon went to the airport at 3am to say goodbye too, she's such a sweetie. 

Now that I have like 5 hours until we get to Peru I will go to sleep. 

Halfway there!

Something interesting that happened the last week of classes: a guy proposed to a girl in class! So it was the last day of our FNH 355 class, and everyone was there (like 350 people?) and the prof was like, oh my god i'm so excited. no one leave at the end, ok? there is something really special happening!!

So the lecture went on as normal, but she finished 15 minutes earlier than usual, and then she started a slide presentation with music and pictures of this korean girl drinking tea and doing 'cute' stuff. And then a guy in a suit came out of the door at the bottom of the lecture hall, like 30 seconds before the end of the video, and he said like, [whateverthegirl's name was] can you stand up please? OHHAAHHH!! everyone woot wooting!

Anyway, everyone was going crazy, and the girl came down the steps and then the guy proposed in english (so that the audience, us, would get what he was saying) and in korean saying something like, I only follow Jesus in this life, do you want to follow him with me? or something like that. And she said yes. I mean it was a bit of pressure, imagine if she had said no in front of all those people. But it was a great show! For us. 

I had my first (almost) all-nighter the night before the last day of classes. I was writing two term papers that were due on Thursday so sleeping was not an option (I slept for 30 minutes, which was a BIG mistake). Here at UBC we have the AMS-organized Block Party, which happens the last day of classes and EVERYONE loves. I didn't go last year, but I did go this year. I hate to say this but I didn't have THAT much fun, but I think it was because I was not in the mood, it was cold and I had headache.

BUT YEYYYYY!! I'm done with my SECOND YEAR OF UNIVERSITY!!!! Now exam time, and then Chile and Singapore here I come :D

One exciting thing I'm looking forward to before I leave is Camilo The Magician!!! This deserves a post on its own, I'll talk more about it later.

Oh yes, and here is UBC LIPDUB! I appear for 0.5 seconds. I'm so glad UBC has a lipdub now and that I'm part of it.

I was disappointed by the video when I first saw it, but it gets better every time you watch it. And after 1.5 days it has like 80 thousand views. Some things I didn't like: the girl at the beginning (this is a reference to the Old Spice commercial), the length of the clip, the use of two songs (should've been just Pink, with more people in less space so it didn't look as empty as it did), more lip synching with more focus on individual people.  But overall it's good!!

Marry the man today!

So this week was great. Well, except for the fact that I dropped my phone. Dropped it in water. In a toilet. A dirty toilet. Dirty as in not flushed. In the guys bathroom. Yeah... Gross.
...I can explain. So with Nichster we started this project called Bathroom Stall Musings. Check it out here www.bathroomstallmusings.tumblr.com So I was taking pictures in the girls' bathroom at The Beanery (those are the ones of the basilisc!) I finished with that bathroom and then went outside. My friend was there and I was like, hey I'm taking pictures! Do you think I can go in the guys' bathroom? He was like, yeah sure why not! So we go inside and I go have a look at the stall to see if the writings on the wall are nice. The toilet was gross with everything you can imagine in it and I was like, ewwww this is disgusting, I'm not taking pictures right now, I'll come back when they have flushed this, god are guys gross... So I turn to leave, and as I do so, my phone slips from my jacket pocket INTO THE TOILET. It's so so so so gross and so so so random that I can't believe it happened... like, what was I doing there, and why, oh why did my phone have to fall right in the centre with a splash? I ran outside screaming and laughing so hard my stomach was hurting. I was really rolling on the floor laughing. hahah Even if this was no laughing matter! My phone, in the meantime, was just drowning in terrible terrible things in that dimly-lit smelly boys' bathroom. We went downstairs to get some gloves from the Beanery people, and then my friend was like, ok you stay here, I'll get your phone (I was laughing/throwing up). Anyway, to make a long story short, a lot of disinfectant, 260 dollars and 3 hours getting to the Apple Store later, I got a new phone (my 4th iPhone in the last 10 months). No, the warranty doesn't cover water (or should I say liquid) damage. And the worse thing is that the last time I changed my phone (3 months ago) it was because I had dropped it in a toilet as well. But it was my toilet and it was clean, so it was like a million times better/less worse.

These last few days have been great because I went to watch Guys and Dolls Suite Style Musical (upper year residences do this) it was GREAT!! My friends Keirstyn and Emil were in it and I was just blown away. Here is a random youtube clip of a song I loved, Marry the man today!

Adelaide was Keirstyn. She's smart, beautiful, sings amazingly well, and is also a great tour guide (we give tours together on fridays and I love giving them with her). Emil was Harry the Horse!  He's such a fantastic person as well and soooo funny!! He's always in musicals and I just love him :D emilio. That's one thing about UBC, you're always meeting people that are passionate in many different things but they are all so interesting. I guess that's the beauty of the college experience.

Also, today was UBC LIP DUB!!! woot woot!! It was aaaaaaweeeesommmEEEE!!! If you don't know what that is, check out the webpage and look at the previous lip dubs. Ours was INCREDIBLE!! There were trampolines, horses, a Translink bus, Josh Ramsey from Marianas Trench (who the f..??), sheepdogs...!! and more things I can't remember. I was in section 15 with an amazing group of people including the lovelies Amelie and Vale! We were all forest nymphs hehe we also did a flashmob behind the MOA which was pretty cool, filmed by a helicopter. And we also had a final party scene at the pool. Pretty sweet!! I was in the part were the underwater camera was filming and we jumped in the pool one by one. I was wearing strapless bikini and of course it fell off the second I jumped. I hope that won't show on the film... or I hope the group of scuba divers drinking tea in an underwater living room didn't see anything. Besides this little bikini incident, the lip dub was EPIC. Can't wait to see the finished video, should come out April 8th or something. I'll post it for sureeeee!!


UPDATE: this just in! So the other day my friend Martino came to visit at 1 am because he was passing by. He was kinda drunk and we were hanging out in my living room. Then a couple other friends came, including the one that had fished my phone from the toilet (ew) so we told Marts the story. Then they left at like 2am. And I tried contacting Marty all week-end and his phone was dead, sent me to voice mail. Anyway today when I asked why his phone was dead he was like, yeahh I lost my phone... And I was like, really oh no! where? And then he's like, well, actually, I didn't loose it... I dropped it... in your toilet. HAHAHA yeah so apparently when he was at my place he went to the bathroom and dropped it somehow, and then was too embarrassed to say anything so he just didn't and put it in his pocket instead. SOO LISTEN UP EVERYBODY. This is a curse. Marty will tell the story to the next person at his place, and that person will also drop the phone, and so on. I would suggest you never go near a body of water with your phone.

I'm on a plane right now

I’m on a plane right now, sitting next to a sleeping guy that smells of cheap aftershave and keeps coming closer to me as his head leans to the side in his sleep... No, I don’t have Internet here, but I’m writing in a Word document and will copypaste this later. I’m on my way to Mexico City (woot woot!) to do the same thing as last year with Student Recruitment. Together with an International Recruiter and Advisor and another Mexican student from UBC Okanagan, we’ll have an informal presentation and Q&A session with prospective students and their families. But this is a more targeted recruitment, you may say, than going to high schools or university fairs, as these students have already applied to UBC and are waiting to be accepted, or they have been accepted and are going to make a decision soon, or have made a decision and want to get excited about their future university. This will be on Saturday so I’m flying Thursday night to have the Friday to hang out at home.

I’m feeling pretty comfortable: I decided to dress normally with tight jeans, boots, blazer and nice coat, when usually it’s like, ok I’m going to the airport, I’m going to be moving and carrying stuff, so I’ll wear ‘comfy’ clothes like sweatpants, a hoodie, and sneakers, oh and I will wear glasses instead of contacts and tie my unwashed hair into a bun… NO. This, ladies and gentlemen, is not the way to fly. If you’re hoping not to meet someone you know at the airport because you’re feeling self-conscious of how you look, then you’re not comfortable.

Anyway. Yesterday I was told I will be GOING TO SINGAPORE ON EXCHANGE NEXT YEAR! Well well isn’t that great. More about the Singapore thing in the next post. Right now on the plane I’m trying to make a life-changing decision for my summer right now and deciding whether I should accept an amazing job in Chile, accept an awesome internship in Germany, or go to Indonesia to film an incredible nature documentary. Here are the options:

1. Borneo, Indonesia

5 months, from June to November

PROS

·      The project is AMAZING and really epitomizes everything I wanted to experience when getting into the conservation field (this is exactly what I say in my video!) The winners will be part of a team of 10 young people that will be restoring a full forest ecosystem, save thousands of orangutans and work with renowned conservationist Dr. Willie Smitts! It’s really hands-on conservation work in South East Asia.
HERE ARE THE INSTRUCTIONS TO VOTE, BY THE WAY!!
1. VOTE here http://gg.tigweb.org/tig/deforestaction/judge/ Sign up with new account (takes 30 seconds) or use your facebook account. VOTE! I'm the one with the 3D glasses (~5th row bottom-up) 
2. VIEW&RATE! here http://gg.tigweb.org/tig/deforestaction/48895/ by clicking on the 5 stars

·      This will be filmed and converted into a TV series and 3D action movie documentary by Virgo Productions and National Geographic Entertainment. These will be directed by Cathy Henkel and filmed by the same person that shot Wolverine, Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge.

·      Viewed all over the world! The movie is meant to raise awareness, and the 10 young people will be telling youth around the world how the project is coming along. Really exciting stuff!!!

·      Would count as Co-op!!

CONS

·      This option is not certain. The 10 selected candidates will be chosen based on votes, views, ratings and media attention. I currently have the 2^nd most views and ratings, so I’m doing pretty good considering they will pick 10. Voting closes March 18^th, but I’m not sure if they’ll pick the 10 then or if there are other stages to come. I need to make a decision for the Chile option by the 18^th…

·      There is not much information available, as the project is being created as participants keep applying. I don’t know what the terms and conditions are.

·      I will be going on exchange to Singapore next year, so I could go to Borneo when I’m there and volunteer at an orangutan sanctuary (although I wouldn’t be filming an amazing documentary).

2. Santiago, Chile (co-op)

3 months, from May to August

PROS

·      The job sounds quite awesome: coming up with a strategic plan for one of largest forest products companies in the world to give value to the assets the company holds in its 500 000 ha of conservation forests in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay and Brazil in order to increase public awareness of the company's efforts in conservation and sustainability, and therefore increase the value of the company’s shares.

·      All expenses paid: airfare to and from Vancouver, trips in Chile to and from conservation forests, furnished apartment, meals in the company’s canteen.

·      I will finally visit South America, and Santiago looks awesome.

·      I don’t know if I will have this job opportunity next year.

CONS

·      Net salary. Not as much as you'd make in a Forestry job in BC, but still something!

·      Fear. This opportunity sounds really exciting, but challenging at the same time, and sounds like I will be in charge of my own project and will have a lot of responsibility (this is good I guess, but kind of frightening!)

·      I don’t know what a typical day will be like, or if there are other students in the office, or young people around.

3. Düsseldorf, Germany (co-op)

2.5 months, from mid-August to June

PROS:

·      Research internship assisting PhD student in molecular biology work related to peroxisomes in plants. Sounds super interesting and I love lab work!

·      I’d gain lab skills and I’d really experience all aspects of a research project. I will create connections in Germany if I ever want to go back there.

·      Benefits: 1625 euros stipend for the duration of the internship, which will cover living expenses. 150 euro three day rail pass to travel in Germany (so I’m assuming there will be opportunity to move around Germany and other countries). 3 day trip to Heidelberg where all the interns all over Germany will meet.

·      Will be able to see my family, as they will be in Italy.

·      Will become fluent in German (I hope!) and practice what I’ve been learning these past 2 terms.

·      Düsseldorf looks amazing, and there are a lot of students there.

·      The lab team consists of 25 researchers and students, so this is bound to be a fun summer.

CONS

·      I already know Europe, although never been to Germany.

·      Europe is expensive.

·      I can apply to the RISE internships again next summer (although the knowledge I’ve gained in my 2 terms of German will probably be gone by then)

I need to accept/reject the Germany thing tomorrow Friday. So right now it’s either Germany or Chile/Borneo. If I choose Chile/Borneo, by the 18^th I have to pick if I want Chile or Borneo, and I probably won’t know by then the outcome of the Borneo competition. 

Ski & Snowboard...

Vale and I have been here for 3 terms, almost 4, and we hadn't gone skiing/snowboarding until yesterday, despite the fact that everyone here loves doing it and some people even come to Vancouver and to UBC just to be close to the mountains. It took us quite some time because we had never had the occasion to do it or to go with someone that would teach us how to do it properly. Yesterday, however, was different. Vale's friend from Guatemala had told us he would be in Grouse all day with his friends, plus we are in the middle of Reading Week so we had free time. So at 3pm, when we finished work, we got some food from the Village and jumped on the 44, headed towards Grouse. We were starving so we ate on the bus, annoying the rest of the passengers with our food.

We arrived downtown, took the Seabus, and after getting to North Vancouver, took a bus to the base of the mountain. Of course by this time, Vale's friend had texted us that they were too tired and they were not going to stay on Grouse any longer... We considered turning back but decided that enough was enough and we had to do it, now or never. On this last bus we had a group of fully-equipped high school students from Mexico, all with new snowboards, gloves, jackets, the whole thing. Vale and I were dressed normally, and I hadn't even taken my snow jacket or my gloves (bad bad planning!) So, we got to Grouse, bought our entrance pass and took the Gondola up the mountain. This is an 8 minute trip in a lift that fits like 50 people and you go up up up to the very top, passing really tall hemlocks and cedars completely covered in snow. The visibility was poor and everything was super foggy. At the very top we got off the lift, and proceeded to rent our equipment. We didn't have anything so we had to rent everything... Vale got skis and I got a snowboard (our plan was to exchange them when we got bored so we could both try them. Of course we had no idea how the boots for skis were completely different from the ones from snowboarding, so we ended up just using the ones we had).

Everything was so beautiful there, the landscape completely covered in a blanket of soft white snow. After going outside the rental place, we just experimented a bit in the mini hills, and went down the 'Bunny Hill' (because it's so easy) run a couple times, falling a lot of course. I didn't get how to put the snowboard on without sitting down, or how to stop when I was moving. So even if I had no problem balancing and going where I wanted to go, when I gained too much speed I panicked and I had to use my hands and roll on the snow to stop. We would get to the base (a good distance from the top) and take the lift back up. After this, we decided to go where everyone else was going, to one of the main runs, and this is when the nightmare started.

First of all, this run was a never-ending run. It was sooooo long, and my fears with gaining too much speed and dying were made worse by the fact that this was steeper and it went on forever so there wasn't like a flat landing in the middle where you could slowly come to a stop and then resume the descent. No, it was steep and went on forever. Here we fell again but this time we did get hurt. One time, Vale got off track and crashed against a some small trees covered in snow and then she couldn't find one of her skis, which was buried in the snow. Our faces started to get super cold with all the snow being pushed in our faces by the furious wind and we saw people with facemasks and goggles flying by. Our hair was already frozen and stiff with snow. And then the thunder started, while we were about halfway. The lift stopped moving above us, and after a few more minutes of going down we met people that were going up the hill carrying their gear. We were stuck between stopping right there and strarting to walk up (we would have died) or keep going down and wait for the lift to work. We decided to go down, but the last part had to be done walking, as we just couldn't do it anymore.

So, we get to the base of the hill, and there are toooons of people waiting for the lift to work. Thunder was still going on, and the lifts don't get started until 20 minutes have passed from the last thunder. So we sat there and waited, and waited, and waited. The lift started, 5 minutes later there was thunder and it stopped again. We waited some more, and finally the lift started again and we managed to get on. By then we had been separated and we were each placed with 3 strangers. After 1 minute on the lift, there was this HUGE flash and crazy thunder right in front of our eyes, and the lifts stopped. Again. Completely. The thunderstorm intensified, and we would reach 15 minutes, and then another thunder. So we were stuck there for ages. After 40 minutes there was another huge thunder and the power went off. Every light turned off and we were left in complete darkeness. The fog closed in and we could no longer see the ground below us or the lift in front of us. The snow was covering us and my hands and feet were freezing because my gloves are basically a piece of fabric, they're not snow gloves.. The 3 strangers I was with were good fun, so I had a good time while hoping not to get electrocuted by a thunder. I didn't want to touch any metal and I was pressed against the guy next to me. When the lights went off after the thunder, I automatically grabbed his arm. One of them was all about preventing hypothermia, so every 5 minutes she'd check to see that we were not freezing our limbs off and she would repeat that we had to keep moving our fingers and toes etc. Then she wanted to document the moment so she got her phone out and we took a picture of the four of us, all smiling stuck in the lift in the darkness. Lady at the cafe later on that night: 'Woa! I've been coming here for the past 15 years and this had never happened to me!' Those kinds of things never happen, but they had to happen on the they we went there, obviously.

After 1 hour and a half, the power came back up, the lifts started, and we got to the top. By then Vale and I were freezing and just wanted to leave. We returned our equipment, took the Gondola back down, and then waited 30 minutes in the freezing cold for a bus. Then changed bus a couple times, ate a burger, and got home at 1.30 am all soaked. So this was our experience snowboarding/skiing.

Estimated time to get there: 2 hours
Estimated time skiing/snowboarding: 1 hour
Estimated time falling/walking/rolling: 1 hour
Estimated time waiting for the lift to work: 1 hour
Estimated time stuck on the lift: 1 hour 30 minutes
Estimated time to get home: 2 hours 30 minutes
Estimated cost: $50 (snowboard+showes), $30 (pants+jacket), $40 (entrance cost) = $120

Did we have fun? Yes! (Well, I say this now, while I write this from the comfort of my bed. They say there are two things you never remember: bad weather and pain. Which, coincidentally, were both there yesterday!) Good anecdote to tell and to laugh at once it's over.

Also, something interesting is how snowboarders and skiers are either hardcore snowboarders or hardcore skiers, never both. I've just tried snowboarding so I still don't know which one I'll pick, if I ever pick one. For now, it will be some time until I repeat this thing again. I'll stick to ice-skating.

Message in a bottle

If I lived by the ocean I'd be up for messaging with bottles, but since that's not the case, I decided I will start a small project to send random messages to the world using money bills. Today Kia got a 10 dollar bill back as change and on it she found a message hand-written with pink ink: 'Wonder where this bill has been? Go to whereswilly.com and register this bill's location!' So we did, and it's an amazing thing! You basically log in, write the serial number of the bill and the postal code where you got it. Then you can see all the places that bill has been, how many days it took to get to the location where you found it, and the speed of the bill. Our bill was quite the runner. It moved 37km in two days! I will write that message on all the 10 dollar bills I find, so everybody registers their bills.

4 summers ago, when I was in Florence with Caro, Vallie and Adrie, we threw a couple paper airplanes from the top of the torrazzo. We had written a message, but we forget what it said. We left our emails and signed it with semi-aliases (Adrian = Adria, Valeria = Val, Carolina = Carlos, Olivia = Bob. I must say, mine was the most original semi-alias hehe...) On January 23rd (Adria's b'day!), 6 months later, we received the following email:

Adria, Val, Carlos and Bob,

  Howdy. My name is Dan and I'm from Santa Barbara, California. I was backpacking Europe this summer and found a paper airplane on the ground with "Read me" written all over it. Inside was your addresses and names. Apparently you chucked it off the roof of Giorro's Tower at 10:13am on 22/07/07, about 2 minutes before I found it.

..and you thought you'd never hear about it again.

 Sorry for the delay. I placed the not in my backpack and then my pack was stored away until recently. I like this sort of thing, so I thought it would be fun to say hello.

Cheers,
  Dan


 Well isn't that nice... So I want to start writing quotes and messages and funny stuff on bills, because I'd love to get a bill with something that would make me smile. I'll think more about how to solidify this project but it's just an idea.

Reading Week Week-end

The first week-end of the Reading Week is coming to an end! I will probably stay here due to too much homework, catching-up and random stuff that needs to be done. Vale left for the Okanagan on Saturday, but the house is not less occupied, as one of her friends from UBC-O came to visit and she's staying in Vale's room with a friend of hers. Kiks is here. Yaku are in Iceland right now, they couldn't pick something more far away than that.

I just came back from Ricky's place and my stomach is so full, I just want to lie on the floor (yes, the floor, not the bed) and fall asleep. I ate at 4 and then left at 6.30 with Kia to go to Ricky's place for Popusas (which are similar to Mexican tlacoyos I find). It was a lot of fun as Ricko's family is super welcoming and everyone is really nice. They're from El Salvador and the dad, Nelson, always wants you to be drinking something (better if it's alcohol, but things like milk are okay as long as you're having a large piece of chocolate cake with it) and eating something. We watched the Grammys and it was really weird watching TV, as I'm so not used to it. Fairview events always have things like PlayStations and TVs for prizes, which just shows how much budget they have to put on events. We should go more to these kinds of things and win a TV. Well, anyway, watching the Grammys with them and commenting on everything was a lot of fun. Then the sister's husband had his android phone and kept taking pictures of Ricky and Nelson and making them look as if Brad Pitt was signing posters of their faces. And the dog, Pacha, is a pug that considers humans to be part of the furniture, so she just walks on your lap like if you weren't there and finds it comfortable to sit and lie on people's legs without their consent. She's so funny because she's a compacted fat pug.

On Saturday I went with Oscar, Nichy, Jessie and Manuel to a really cool party. It was a 20-30s themed party and everyone was dressed up really nicely. It was in the Waldorf Hotel, in East Hastings (and there was a positive correlation between the distance from UBC and the number of people of questionable character that got on the bus). Stepping through the entrance was like going back in time... the carpeted floor and the dim lights of the locale from the brass candleholders, combined with the wooden dance floor, flowery wall paper and deep-red velvet curtains, created an atmosphere which is in line with what I had imagined a party in the 30s would be like. Everyone was dressed up, guys wearing suits and dancing shoes, vests and suspenders, hair parted to the side. Girls with flowery dresses and dancing shoes (the swing dancers), long silk dresses, pearls and buns made with ondulating curls and peach-coloured fabric roses (the fancy-party goers), corsets, red lipstick and tattoos (the cabaretty-looking girls), beads, sequins and feathers (the flappers).

At the beginning swing music was playing, but then we had two really good live bands. One of them was called Maria in The Shower, and one thing that I thought awesome was how the vocalist stood on top of a leaning chelo while playing the trumpet (and while the chelo guy kept playing the chelo). Really cool. I was next to the stage getting a good view and filming, and was really happy because I got some good shots with good music, and today I checked and the sound quality is terrible because of the closeness to the huge speakers. Speaking of which, there also was a baby too close to the speakers. The baby was a HUGE baby - looked 2 years old but was 10 months - and his mom was tiny, which made the baby look even bigger. But seriously, this was the biggest 10 month old I've seen in my life. He was also super cute, but apathic, like if this sort of scene was normal for him. He was wearing sound mufflers around his ears, but still, he was literally next to the speakers. The mom had like a pouch kind of thing attached to her back and she would carry him around that way, breast-feeding him while drinking beer. I'm guessing he was the kid of one of the band members..

oh-my-god-i've-never-had-that potluck extravaganza

We just had our first dinner of the term! We love having people over and doing things like potlucks, and that's one of the many things that made last term so awesome. And we still have the Christmas lights (and tree...) which makes our house even prettier.

Oscar and I came up with the idea of this extravagant food potluck, inspired by his mom's idea of sweet sushi. Originally we were going to make sushi with gummy bears and fruit roll-ups. Then we decided to colour the rice with food colouring. And then Ricko suggested using natural dyes, such as beet, to colour the rice (because he says you can die if you eat artificial food colouring, which is probably true if you drink like a bottle each day, but in any case we decided to follow his advice). So the sushi idea morphed completely, but we built the potluck around it. Here's the Facebook event description:

we will be having the first-ever oh-my-god-i've-never-tried

-that potluck extravaganza! everyone will bring a CRAZY dish made with unusual ingredient combinations, or something that looks really unique and exotic! the purpose of this is to have many things people have never tried before, so you could even make something really special from your country. the conditions for the dish: has to be edible, has to be original-looking or original-tasting, and it would be better if it was vegetarian so we all can try everything. AND there will be awesome prizes for the most extravagant dish so be creative.

SO what did people bring? Here's the list of awesome and extravagant food:

strawberries for the happy island sushi

pre-blend blueberries

- HAPPY ISLAND SUSHI - by oscar and olivia. 4 types of rice: coconut rice, carrot rice (orange colour), beet rice (bright red colour), and blueberry rice (purple colour). 5 fillings: umeboshi, cream cheese, mango, banana and strawberry. Endless combinations! Oh yeah, and in addition to this we had special 'wasabi' made from mashed carrot and beet, lemon, salt and chilli pepper. And for people that didn't like seaweed, aka Vale, we made seaweedless sushi using coconut rice, filled with melted chocolate and fresh strawberries, and coconut shavings sprinkled on top. And a chocolate sauce at the side, of course.

carrot, beet and blueberry rice

Try-it-yourself part: to make the rice you first have to make the juices. Blend the carrots, blueberries and beets (separately) with water. Then sieve the mixes to get the water with the intense colouring. Cook the rice normally, using 1:1 rice to colour water ratio. For the coconut rice just use coconut milk instead of water. 

SO GOOD! The coconut rice and blueberry rice are really delicious, they really taste like coconut and blueberries. Possible ideas for other coloured sushi (which I'll get around to when we finish all the rice we now have in the already-exploding fridge..): using spinach extract to make rice green; using orange juice to make rice taste like oranges; using coffee and milk to make coffee rice...

- PEPPERY BLOODY ORANGE SALAD A LA MINT - by vale. A delicious salad made with pepper, bloody oranges and mint! But it doesn't stop here. The pepper comes from the Himalayas, the oranges are rare because of their bright red colour, and the mint was hand-picked by Vale... She also made ate de membrillo with cheese.

- EGGS A LA VAMPIRE - by emil. Eggs cut in half and filled with eggs, yougurt, celery and pepper.

green eggs & ham

- GREEN EGGS AND HAM - by nichole. Inspired by Dr. Seuss, Knickers made (scrambled) green eggs and (vegetarian) ham! Awesome idea.

- COMPOST SALAD - by nancy. Salad with gummy worms! Just like a compost.

- FRIED CHEESE - by paula. Authentic mexican fried cheese, like the one they sell outside of clubs. Tomas claims he was the brains behind the whole frying cheese operation, but Paula denies this.

- JAMAICA WATER. Which apparently is Jamaica tea... we had a discussion about this and it was decided it will now be referred to as Jamaica iced tea.

- COCONUT SOUP - by ricky. This is one of the best soups I've ever tried and I'm not even kidding. Made with many secret ingredients, I know Ricko used like 5 cans of coconut milk, a bag of coconut shavings, mini corns, palmitos, pepper, onions, and tomato, and mixed everything in the HUGE pot Yaku (Taku+Yasu) use for making a month's supply of curry. It is truly delicious. Thanks El Salvador.

- CURRY SOBA - by yasu & taku. Mmmm authentic japanese food. Noodles with japanese curry, which is completely different to indian curry by the way.

- FRIED PLANTAINS - by tomi. Patties made with plantains, fried and sprinkled with salt.'

the feast

- BREAKFAST MUESLI - by manuel. A yummy mix of yogurt, muesli, apples and many fruits. I can see how this could be a very good breakfast.

- NESTEA and DR. PEPPER - by ceci and susan. When all else fails, bring something to drink!

- CAVIAR AND SHRIMP SOBA - by julie.

- POPPY SEED BREAD - by phoebe ('s mom). A delicious imported (came directly from Oregon!) bread and a bar of butter.

- MEXICAN CANDY PLATE. Bomvasos, Dedos Indi, Picafresas and Rellerindos.

Best Job @ UBC : Student Ambassador

Being a Student Ambassador is a pretty sweet on-campus job to have. So what exactly is a Student Ambassador, you may ask. Here's how it works:

Student Recruitment and Advising UBC is the office in charge of, basically, recruiting and advising new students! The office does a variety of things, including sending Recruiters off to University/College Fairs all over the world, and receiving students from all over the world here at UBC. Even before becoming an Ambassador I got to work with the Office when I went to Mexico to give a presentation about my UBC experience. How could I have rejected a free plane ticket home? I didn't, of course, and being part of that event actually made me aware of the existence of the Campus Tours. Many of the Ambassadors travel with Recruiters like that, especially if the Recruiter is going to their home town. It's so prospective students hear from an actual UBC student, makes it more real.

Touring the University of your choice as a prospective students was somewhat of a novel concept to me, and I never thought going to visit universities was such a big deal. Everyone says "What? So you didn't even visit before coming here?" Nope. The webpage pictures were enough (my goal, by the way, is to appear on a student handbook or the webpage or something, just like laughing and hanging out with 'friends' wearing a UBC hoodie. Someday) I hadn't even been to Canada. But apparently touring around is a hugely popular thing to do here and in the States. I mean, you will be spending the next four years of your life here, so you might as well...

So imagine you're a prospective student. You want to know everything about UBC, the webpage is just not enough and you want to see the real thing. So you go to you.ubc.ca and register for one of the completely-free offered-every-single-day-of-the-week tours (if you register for Friday tours I could potentially be your tour guide!) and then come to UBC on that day. You get a 15 min presentation by an Advisor and, after that, the lovely SAs take the groups on a 1 hour 45 minute tour of the University. We showcase the best of our University, cover everything you wanted to know about the school, and are honest about the more negative aspects too.

The cool thing about being an Ambassador is also the slow transition that's incorporated into the training process. It's not like you start doing tours right away. You slowly ease into the tour vibe through the training process. Vale and I were hired at the same time (Vale and I do everything together. This deserves its own post later on...) and we spent like one whole term training. So that means we go on other tours, see what they're like, and then Tag-team, which means giving every other stop in a tour, the other half being given by a more experienced SA. We also reviewed the Wiki, or the online portal where all the documents pertaining to the tours are stored. This contains everything you could possibly ever want to know about UBC. Really.

The average tour: Brock Hall>Student Recreation Centre>Student Union Building>Bookstore>Main Mall & University Blvd.> Trek Cairn> LS Klink> Longhouse> Place Vanier> Nitobe Gardens> Asian Centre> International House> Flag Pole> Chan Centre> Libraries. Wheeeew! Now that's what I call a tour.

My favourite things about being an Ambassador (not ranked in order of importance):

1. Having a badge with my name! Yes, a real badge. Not like a sticker, but a metal badge.

2. The Student Ambassador meetings. They are quite awesome. We have meetings every two weeks. We do things such as, but not limited to: get updates on tour information, talk about the upcoming weeks, play games related to things such as time management, each delicious snacks prepared by the Seniors, get to know each other better, go over the tour routes, FatQs (Frequently Asked Tough Questions), practice avoiding the 'likes' and 'ums', ambassador of the week. Things planned for this term (can't wait!): Visit the Beaty Biodiversity Museum, visit Triumf, visit the MOA. Last meeting we got a tour of the First Nations House of Learning, which is one of the tour stops, to get a better idea of the things that go on here. And meeting before last we got a tour or the CSI (not Crime Scene Investigation, Brock Hall has no place for crimes, only for construction.)
[Some interesting updates on what's happening at UBC (which only UBC people will understand): now every single first year student is guaranteed housing provided they accept the offer of admission before the deadline, regardless of their place of origin. Previously, anyone living within the Lower Mainland, even if three hours away, had to find alternate housing, so this is great news. Rits will now become part of Totem, and besides that ~500 new beds will be added to Totem from the new constructions, which by the way look pretty cool - they're suite style residences with two rooms sharing a common bathroom (versus 35 people sharing a bathroom in the other Totem Houses) AND another thing: no one above first year will be allowed to live in Rits, Totem or Vanier now, except for Residence Advisors, Residence Life Managers, etc.]

3.  Gaining so many transferable skills! Public speaking, check. Organizational skills, check. Time management, check. Communication skills, check. Peer-to-peer interaction, check.

4. The other Student Ambassadors, the Seniors and our Bosses. We're talking here about a pretty diverse and fun group of people that make the job interesting, engaging and flexible.

5. Walking around campus (exercise of the week when all else fails) answering students' questions and really making a difference in helping them decide whether UBC's the right place for them by sharing personal insights and experiences.

6. Having a flexible, well-paid job (this is a Work Learn/Work Study position, which means the wages are subsidized by student fees, making them higher than the minimum wage. If you become part of Work Learn/Work Study you make between $13 and $21 dollars an hour, usually ~ $16) that doesn't conflict with excelling at everything else we're involved in, such as academics and extracurriculars.

UBC's Got Talent!

Real entry number 1!

One of the events I have been waiting for for a loooong time, UBC's Got Talent, finally happened last night. It will apparently be a yearly thing now, seeing the great success the event had. The Chan's 1,200 seats were claimed, which meant we got to enjoy some Toope and Bijan talent (Stephen Toope is the President of UBC, and Bijan is the President of the Alma Matter Society, which is 'like a high school council except with an operating budget of over $12 million dollars' as we like to say on tours...) So it was a pretty popular event and tickets sold out (not sure if this term applies when the tickets are free...) days before the event, causing a huuuuge line-up outside the Chan before the show of people hoping to get in.

Being an enthousiast of America's Got Talent and Britain's Got Talent, the whole idea of UBC's Got Talent greatly appealed to me. The 15 acts, selected from 124 submissions, were good. UBC certainly has got some great talent, and you can look at a lot of the audition videos on YouTube. The thing is it not only included students, but also faculty, staff and University Neighbourhood Association people, which made UGT (abbreviation will be used from now on) showcase a variety of talents but also a variety of ages (no kids with angelic voices, though.)

So I'll refrain from talking about the ones I didn't find particularly interesting, but I will say which ones I enjoyed. And I'll upload some videos later too.

-I liked Pentactonics, a chinese band that performed with chinese traditional instruments (craazy! I had never seen those instruments before) some cool songs, one from Bond.
- I liked the guy that could solve a Rubik's cube. Without breaking it and putting it back together (aka cheating). Without sweating. With ONE hand. While eating a banana. In less than 24 seconds. Phew. Pretty amazing! The shortest act of the evening, he actually got a standing ovation from the public. {Which is ironic considering this guy spent like two years practicing, whereas the people in other acts, like the ones playing the piano and violin, have spent all of their lives mastering those skills. AND also, if you youtube 'rubiks one hand' you'll see how people do it a) without looking at the cube for more than a couple seconds before the timer starts (this guy had like all the time in the world planning the strategy in his head), and b) in way less time. I'm not saying I'm not super impressed, I mean I have zero talents, but lets put things in context}
- I liked the beat boxing guys. They made some incredible sound effects and I just enjoyed every second of the presentation. pr pr rp rp r p JJJJ isisije
- I liked the piano and violin duo. Unfortunately, I didn't fully enjoy this act because a couple in front of me thought it would be okay to whisper and have a long conversation during the one act when the Chan was dead quiet.
- The dance group. They were pretty good and performed a story of how men should not trust women (ehm...) using three songs, different choreographies, and ending with Don't Trust a Ho by Oh!3... The theme was not the greatest but anyway.

Wish list of what I'd like to see in the future: acrobatics, MAGIC, more/better a Capella singers (the ones we got sucked), stand up comedy!

I thought it interesting that the Got Talent franchise (yes, it is a franchise! Just like the Idol and the Dancing With the Stars franchise) is one of the fastest growing international franchises. People just love seeing talent, and personally I think what I like the most about the whole Talent Show idea is the feeling of awe and amazement looking at what other people can do with their bodies.

And by the way, the whole idea of applying the term franchise to a concept, when I'm usually accustomed to associating it with tangible things such as fast food or retail chains , is pretty crazy. Franchises exist for a bunch of media, including characters and plots from movies, books, tv shows. And soap operas! Mexico's Televisa, known from all around the world for it's soap operas (dubbed in more than 50 languages apparently) exports them all over the world (check out this link, it's pretty interesting 'The Global Pandemic of the Telenovela - Mexico's Biggest Export to the World is and Endless, Gushing Fount of Insane Television')

And, finally, one of the best things of the night for me was finding out about UBC LIP DUB! I'm so excited for it already. It's a growing YouTube phenomena and Universities around the world are doing it. It's basically one single shot of thousands of people lip singing (lip dubbing I guess...) to a song, doing crazy things and dancing. Check it out and do the dub!

First post

This is my first blog post ever. I've been postponing this blog project for some time now (7 months, to be precise), but finally I found the inspiration/time to do it when I was unable to concentrate on my GIS notes (final exam on Wednesday!) What better way to procrastinate than to create the long-awaited blog...

With this comes the excitement and uncertainty related to learning how to make the most out of this virtual space that I now have available to share my thoughts, opinions and experiences for friends and family to read. I'm not sure if I will be able to change the name of the blog later on. Probably not. Will have to stay Olivia's Awesome Blog... ha