mackdown - Residents of the Exchange District

Winnipeg Free Press SundayXTRA 05/01/2011Copy Reduced to 49% from original to fit letter page
LIVING
WORKING
PLAYING
DOWNTOWN
ACKDOWN
Manitoba and biblical Egypt
and
ans
inst
ring
VES
s.mb.ca
I
N the Book of Exodus, the people of Egypt
suffer through 10 miserable plagues before
their leader, Pharoah, agrees to release the
Israelite slaves.
Over the centuries, biblical scholars have tried to
figure out whether this Old Testament tale has
any basis in actual history. They haven’t had very
much luck.
KEN GIGLIOTTI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS
For starters, Exodus doesn’t attach any specific
name attached to Pharoah, which is a problem when
you consider ancient Egypt had more leaders over
the millennia than modern Italy has had prime
ministers.
More importantly, there is very little mention of
Israel in the considerable Egyptian archeological
record — and no mention whatsoever of the Israelite
slaves. Given the propensity for greedy little human
beings to keep track of all their property, you would
think there would be all kinds of hieroglyphiccovered tablets scattered around Egypt, noting how
many sheep, goats, geese and slaves belonged to
minor pyramid-building functionaries or papyrusfactory workers.
For people of faith, this lack of evidence behind
the historicity of the Exodus tale is not a problem.
Those who believe in the divine don’t require empirical proof to back their beliefs.
Secular scholars aren’t overly concerned, either,
as the Judaeo-Christian Bible still serves as a form
of allegory and a fascinating work of literature.
And Manitobans simply see Exodus as a source of
competition.
Yes, there are those among us who genuinely
custs. Big grasshoppers descended from the
eat up biblical Egyptian crops.
ar events transpire in southwestern Manitoba
ime to time.
Manitoba’s cattle industry has not yet
recovered from BSE.
believe this corner of the continent is plagued with a
range of problems that are biblical in scale.
In the grand scheme of things, this is preposterous. Manitoba doesn’t have wars or famines. We
don’t have earthquakes or tsunamis. We don’t have
leaky nuclear reactors, despotic leaders who gun
down protestors or ugly men who aren’t ashamed to
wear combovers and demand U.S. presidents prove
where they were born.
But we are addled with a lot of minor annoyances.
Right now, we have a flood. We will soon have mosquitoes. We will then be forced to endure Folk Fest
hippies, busloads of tracksuit-wearing Folklorama
tourists and a horde of provincial politicians of
mediocre quality.
In an effort to compare how our trials and tribulations match up against the plagues unleashed upon
biblical Egypt, I’ve devised a comparison.
In short: Our plagues come close, but we aren’t
quite ready to rename Portage & Main the corner of
“Pithom and Ramses.”
9. DARKNESS.
The Egyptians
had three days of
darkness. Winnipeggers travel to
work and back in
complete darkness for two solid
months. Again,
the Old Testament
Egyptians were a
bunch of wimps.
10. DEATH OF THE
FIRSTBORN. In
Exodus, the Angel of
Death descends upon
the homes of Egyptians and smites all
the first-born males.
This leads Pharoah to
despair. Winnipeggers
reacted pretty much
the same way when
the Jets left town in
1996. This means we
are, in fact, a bunch of
whiners.
THE WINNER:
Biblical Egypt,
by a landslide.
OF TOWN AUTHORS: ROBERT J. SAWYER
hat a WONDER-ful world
iter posits future where creativity is prized
By Ariel Gordon
T
HE best gift for a writer launching
his 20th book isn’t a china placesetting or platinum cufflinks. It’s
attending his reading and paying attention to what he or she is thinking and
feeling, 20 books in…
Buying the book doesn’t hurt either.
Missisauga-based science-fiction
writer Robert J. Sawyer will be reading
from Wonder, his 20th novel and the
conclusion to the WWW trilogy, this
Thursday at McNally Robinson.
❚ ❚ ❚
1) As a writer (i.e. someone whose
artistic practice is predicated on time
spent alone) how do you approach performance? What do you get out of it?
I love reading my work in public because
the audience reaction is immediate. I
wrote the chapter I will be reading at
McNally Robinson almost eighteen
months ago; to finally hear the audience
respond to it, in real time as I present it,
is wonderful. I approach public readings
as performance; you’ll never see me do
one sitting down with my head buried in
a copy of my book — I act the scene out,
doing different voices for each character,
and engaging with the audience; it’s as
much theatre as it is a reading.
JIM ROSS / THE CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
ce fiction author Robert Sawyer
ad from his 20th book.
2) What do you want people to know
about Wonder?
It’s the concluding volume of my WWW
trilogy about Webmind, a consciousness that spontaneously emerged in the
background of the World Wide Web; the
three novels (the other two are Wake
and Watch) explore whether humans can
survive with our essential liberty, dignity,
and individuality intact once we cease
to be the most intelligent things on the
planet.
3) Will this your first time in Winnipeg?
What have you heard?
I come to Winnipeg a few times each
year; this is my third trip so far in 2011.
The first was to speak at TEDxManitoba,
and the second was just to hang out with
some of the local science-fiction and fantasy writers, including Sherry Peters, Bev
Geddes, and Chadwick Ginther. Winnipeg
is a wonderful city and I’m always happy
to return (and not just because McNally
Robinson has a nice big photo of me on
the wall).
4) What are you reading right now?
What are you writing right now?
I’m reading Trauma and Recovery: The
Aftermath of Violence — from Domestic Abuse to Political Terror by Judith
Herman, as research for the novel I’m
currently writing — my 21st — which is
called Triggers, and deals with the nature
of memory.
5) How long would science-fiction writers survive in a world where Webmind
existed?
A very long time. The thing Webmind values the most is creativity: the
spontaneous generation of the new and
unpredictable; he prizes this because he’s
incapable of it himself. And so human
artists of all types are cherished by him,
and those who take the longest imaginative leaps — including science-fiction
writers — are valued most of all.
Ariel Gordon is a Winnipeg writer.
Copyright (c)2011 Winnipeg Free Press, Edition $$edition
MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS ARCHIVES
John Giavedoni is chair of the Residents of the Exchange
District organization.
You don’t know
DOWNTOWN
until you
LIVE THERE
J
OHN Giavedoni is doing his best to paint the downtown R:ED.
He’s the president of the Residents of the Exchange District.
He started the organization three years ago, right
after moving from the suburbs into a condo on Bannatyne Avenue.
The name makes it sound like a serious organization — and sometimes it is. During the recent civic
election, Giavedoni arranged to have both Sam Katz
and Judy Wasylicia-Leis come down to the Exchange
Café to chat with the residents. Other events featured
Q-and-As with then-city parking guru Dave Hill, the
Free Press’s own Bartley Kives, and an architect
from Qualico who talked about the company’s condo
conversion on James Avenue and then gave a tour of
the building.
Chances are, though, it’s the Brazilian feast at
Hermanos Restaurant that
stands out most prominently in
‘One young
R:ED members’ minds. Or the
wine and appetizer tasting even- woman
ing at the former Oui Bistro. Or who moved
even the mixology course at the
Exchange Café.
here... her
“My No. 1 goal is to help make
friend gave
the downtown a better, more
vibrant place to live,” Giavedoni
her a can of
says.
It’s an uphill battle — not bemace as a
cause of anything in the downhousewarmtown, but because of people’s
attitudes toward it.
ing gift’
“One young woman who
moved here... her friend gave
— John Giavedoni,
her a can of mace as a housepresident of R:ED
warming gift.”
People who move downtown
soon learn to scoff at such attitudes, Giavedoni says.
“A while ago, R:ED hosted a discussion at the King’s
Head (because we could drink). We had representatives from the police there to discuss safety in the
area, as well as other discussion groups about downtown issues. When I asked who wanted to go to the
safety discussion group, nobody wanted to go. Safety
is not an issue for people who live downtown.”
In fact, Giavedoni says, many people find the downtown to be more friendly than the suburbs.
One couple he knows who moved downtown a short
while ago told him they found it hard to get to know
their neighbours in the suburbs — especially the ones
who come home from work, drive into their attached
garage with the automatic door and that’s the last you
see of them.
“They told me they already know more people downtown than they ever did in the suburbs.”
There are about 200 members of R:ED, ranging
from struggling artists living in their own studios to
penthouse dwellers on Waterfront Drive.
“It’s a great mix. Here I am, a chartered accountant
getting to hang out with a creative artist — and we are
two residents who met thanks to R:ED.”
Giavedoni’s condo overlooks Alive Nightclub. He’s
got a table and chairs set up so he can enjoy the activity on the street below.
“Sure, there’s noise. That is part of what living
downtown is all about. The suburbs are as quiet as a
tomb.
“I could never go back to living in the suburbs.”
If you are interested in joining R:ED, its website
is www.ResidentsOfTheExchangeDistrict.ca. Giavedoni’s email is [email protected]. Membership is free, but there are fees for
some of the activities.
May 1, 2011 9:34 pm / Powered by TECNAVIA