Youth Are Awesome, commonly referred to as YAA, is a blog written by youth for youth.
YAA provides the youth of Calgary a place to amplify their voices and perspectives on what is happening around them.
Youth Are Awesome is a program of Youth Central.
Any views or opinions expressed on this blog belong solely to the author and do not represent those of people or organizations that the blog may be associated with, unless explicitly stated. All content is for informational purposes only.
Friday’s charm is printmaking’s charm. When it’s the last day of the work week and you are prepared for a fun weekend adventure, you have more patience to do it! Two Fridays ago, this event was my chance to enjoy Creative Printmaking at the North Pleasant Arts Centre! (And to support Youth Week too!)
Supplies!
It was a pretty quiet night with only two people attending along with our instructor. (Too bad there wasn’t more 🙁 ) To start with the printing block, I first chose an image that I eventually stamped onto backgrounds.
Apparently this is an ancient version of the Chinese character for longevity in Chinese.
To make the stamp, I transferred the sketch to a block of rubber. It smelled so strong when the wrap came off as if there was a pile of erasers in front. Ack!
Of course, printmaking involves ink, and once you roll the paint on the block, it’s time to stamp, stamp again, and stamp more!
This actually share more characteristics with paint than ink.According to our instructor, the texture is perfect when you keep on rolling and the paint produces a “tacky sound. This rolling back and forth is very addicting.
Stamp it on, leave it on for a while, and ta-da!Lots of action going on!
After a few test prints, I started making backgrounds to print some images onto. We used the back of our existing block.
Don’t ask me how that odd particle got there.
Stamp the front with the character, and it looks even better with the black on brighter colours!
I messed up a bit by shifting the stamping block by accident while the ink was “registering” on some of these ones. Oopsies.
At the end of the two and a half hours, we made bags to take home which had the symbols stamped on it. Design, design, design! 😀
I’m still very amateur at this.
Our instructor’s piece was much better:
Even then, I felt I learned quite a lot about printmaking (and now have a stamp to play around with)! In general, this year’s YOUTH WEEK 😀 has benefited me lots! Learning about child soldiers, shopping deals, printmaking, MYC’s Volunteer Fair, the City’s Hiring Fair coming up….quite a package.
In the United States, the Senate has recently been discussing the implementation of an online sales tax –other than how it will work, will it really be beneficial to the economy?
One important argument for the online sales tax is that it will create a fairer base of competition between traditional stores that have a real world shop and online stores. The difference the price that stores can charge online without having a sales tax when compared to stores that have to charge a sales tax can make a major difference in where consumers are buying goods, especially where taxes are over ten percent. Also, many people have begun to abuse these traditional stores, visiting them to try out goods, and then finding the goods online and buying them from there. This leads to increased difficulty on the part of the traditional stores, as they are becoming less of a store and more of a sampler location for other companies at great expense. For many avid users of the internet, this is not a disadvantage, but a benefit. By not placing a sales tax on online sales, many people have called this tax break a subsidization of the internet business, helping to encourage the move to online sales and leading to increased convenience. The playing field isn’t fair – but is that for good or for bad?
This or…this?
With the IRS already lacking the money it needs to run its daily operations, this increased amount of taxation will lead to an increased amount of stress on the organization, making it harder to get all the work required for taxes completed in the same amount of time. This also means that the gains from the taxes may be offset by necessary increases in government bureaucracy to aid these businesses, especially considering the great amount of small business aid that the government offers. This also means more work for these new online businesses, again limiting the development and productivity of these businesses, while also forcing them to get a tax adviser to help them keep their assets organized and their taxes paid as their business grows. In a time of budget cuts and tough decisions, the effects on the economy may be greater than a small boost to the government’s income.
So though the United States is planning on enforcing online sales tax across the entire country, what is the status of a Canadian online sales tax? Canada already has an online sales tax, but the effects of this tax aren’t clear. Canada hasn’t had any major successful online start ups, but that could be contributed to either the sales tax or the lack of success that any company has that is based in Canada (Nortel and Blackberry are some notable examples). Canada applies the sales tax the same way that all GST is applied, with this fair approach being the most advisable option for implementing a sales tax in the United States. The sales tax could lead to a balancing of online and traditional shops, with the economics possibly balancing out, without much of a positive or negative effect. Support for a sales tax will be from those who value traditional stores – should they be saved?
Now now, what is this thing you speak of? – Hunger is an issue that may lead to homelessness, but also wider in scope. Through Food Banks Canada‘s HungerCount 2012 report, 53,512 people received food from Alberta’s food banks in the one-month survey period, 44.1% of those being under 18 years of age. Only 1.1% of those accounted for are living on the streets.
(feednovascotia.ca)
With a 59.4% increase in mind to take care of from the one-month number in 2008 here in our neck of the woods, food banks are always in need of new donations to keep up with the pace. It’s unfortunate that this comes with cutting back on allocations to each client, with 14% of food banks nationally reporting to have ran out of food at one point.
That is why this week, May 6th to 10th, is the Hunger Awareness Week, where food banks are encouraging you to stop just sitting here and gasping at the statistics and pitch in!
(hungerawarenessweek.ca)
Awesome Campaign Stories – Notably, many politicians are participating up in Ottawa on Parliament Hill by fasting for a day on May 8th. Keep an eye on these guys and gals on this list, and of course they better redeem themselves!
Focal Local Highlight –
Shaw TV brings us an interview related to the week this year here in Calgary:
Don’t forget to check the HungerCount report for a case study on Innisfail’s situation that hits home on page 11!
What ACTIONS you may take –
The main initiative of this awareness event is to gather more donations to help our community, so contact the Calgary Inter-Faith Food Bank locally to volunteer and donate to one of their boxes.
Take a quiz on hunger awareness! Email postcards to friends!
If you are a Youth Central volunteer (here comes the shameless plug), head to the database and sign up for the recurring Inter-Faith Food Bank project when it becomes available. 🙂
Make sure you keep in touch with Inter-Faith Food Bank and Food Banks Canada‘s facebook pages! The last time I checked on Monday, Food Banks Canada had a contest for the day where for every like on this image, General Mills will two cans of green beans! I hope they continue with a similar thing.
Tweet with the hashtag #HungerWeek. (My favourite way to take action)
You know my final word – Keep tackling hunger so it doesn’t linger. 🙂
I’ll leave you with a PSA from Food Banks Canada itself uploaded by shamisandhu:
“Are you a cat or dog person?” is a question I’ve been asked so many times its become as commonplace as “how are you” and “beautiful day isn’t it?” From the answers I’ve heard, its pretty clear people prefer the pet they have, grew up with, or have been around more. Personally, I have always been a cat person. Owning two cats myself lead me to the belief that cats are cuddly, loveable, and cute, while dogs are loud, can’t go to the bathroom inside, and need to be walked daily. I’ve never been a big fan of dogs
because of this, and always preferring cats, I never really gave them a chance to be my favourite.
Recently, my cousin came to stay with us, and she brought Daisy, a excitable, friendly, and fairly heavy dog, who had me lunging after her in her pursuit of the exciting smell of the minute on our walks. Like most dogs, she barked, couldn’t be left alone for long
period of time, and was immensely excitable, all characteristics I shied from in my love of cats. Yet strangely, in a dog, I admittedly found these traits fairly cute. Watching the excitement visibly grow on her face as we got ready to go for a walk was adorable, and the playfulness is much more then in a cat. This isn’t saying I’ve turned a complete 360 degrees in my beliefs, rather, I’d prefer to call myself more of an animal person, instead of a dog or cat person.
It doesn’t seem right to divide dog lovers from cat lovers, and in the end they’re both pets that will love you all the same. So, are you a dog or cat person? Or are you an animal person?
Whether you are really bored or actually are intrigued by the topic of creating a perfect messy bun, this is the perfect place for you to be. I believe creating a messy bun that actually looks good is an essential skill all young ladies must learn.From everyday people on the street to celebrities at the grammy’s , the messy bun has always been in style. It will not fade so we might as well establish the basics early! So in today’s blog I am going to write about the seven steps that assist you in making an attractive messy bun? Weird eh? There is a specific way to recreate it, who would’ve known? Now you do!
You’ll need:
Volume Boasting Foam
Hair Brush
Blow Dryer
Bobby Pins
Hairspray
Hair Ties
SEVEN EASY STEPS:
Step 1: Apply Volume Boasting Foam to towel dry.
Step 2: Using a blow-dryer and a hair brush, pull your hair upwards into a pony tail.
Step 3: Begin to tease your hair.
Step 4: Keep out an one-inch section of hair around the front of you face.
Step 5: Twist the ponytail around your fingers, as you would a bun, and secure it with bobby pins.
Step 6: WIth the remaining front hair bring it towards the bun and twist it around your ears.
Step 7: Set in place with hair-spray.
Here are so pictures regarding messy buns that I truly admire! 🙂
Optical illusions for the eye are always mind boggling, but this audio clip is just as interesting. Experience a very cool (and very real) haircut created from binaural technology. Remember to use headphones though!
We were learning the Vietnam War in social class the other day, and we learnt about how average American citizens strongly opposed the war at that time, because of the unnecessary damage that would be done to all the victims and their families & friends. A couple of days later, I came across this poem written by the wife of a soldier who went to the Viet Nam War and died. There is no complicated language or beautiful literary devices used in this poem, but the strong emotions expressed in these simple words bring tears to my eyes every time I read it.
Remember the time you lent me your car and I dented it?
I thought you’d kill me…
But you didn’t.
Remember the time I forgot to tell you the dance was
formal, and you came in jeans?
I thought you’d hate me…
But you didn’t.
Remember the times I’d flirt with
other boys just to make you jealous, and
you were?
I thought you’d drop me…
But you didn’t.
There were plenty of things you did to put up with me,
to keep me happy, to love me, and there are
so many things I wanted to tell
you when you returned from
Vietnam…
But you didn’t.
Yann Tierson is probably one of my favorite contemporary pianists. He has a way of conveying emotions through the simplicity of his work, proving that complex sheet music is not essential to writing a breathtaking song. The 2001 film Amelie contains a collection of his works, so beautiful and moving that the movie would be colorless without it. However, my personal favorite from him is the piece below, ‘comptine d’un autre ete l’apres midi’. I really like this particular version because the animation suits so well to the tempo and mood of the song. I hope you enjoy it as well.
The “Draw My Life” video trend has been growing for a while, and I recently watched a few of them. It’s no wonder they are so popular, because I think these videos are really worth watching and have good morals (I sound like I’m preaching, but it’s true!)
This week I wanted to just provide a comprehensive page with my favourite draw my life videos. It’s so interesting to see these carefree and humorous YouTubers get serious and talk about their lives and share what they learned from life.
1. Ryan Higa (nigahiga)
I think this one is the best. Watch it – it’s wonderful, enough said.
2. bubzbeauty
This one is kind of sad and it really made me appreciate how cheerful she is in all of her tutorials. It’s great to see someone who genuinely wants others to be happy, especially when they have been victims of bullying in the past or something else of the sort.
I’m not sure if its spring or not. The weather can’t seem to make up its mind. Either way, when I’m feeling down about the cold and the fluffy white stuff, I look back to my memories from December and January. Why? Because I was nice and warm in Hawaii. Yesterday I took some time to look back, and stumbled upon one of the best pictures from my trip! The sunrise from atop Haleakala (huge crater that makes up half of Maui)! To get there in time, we had to walk up around 4 I think. It was early. But in the end, it was worth it.
Anyways, to warm you inside and out, here’s one of the pictures my dad took with his fancy camera that takes pictures that are a million times better than mine!
So welcome a new day, and always remember: The sun will keep on rising, and you always have a chance to try again and become what you want 🙂
Visualization is a difficult concept to define; there are several types as Wikipedia outlines them. Essentially there are three minimal criteria for visualization:
Based on (non-visual) data. A visualization’s purpose is the communication of data. That means that the data must come from something that is abstract or at least not immediately visible (like the inside of the human body). This rules out photography and image processing. Visualization transforms from the invisible to the visible.
Produce an image. It may seem obvious that a visualization has to produce an image, but that is not always so clear. Also, the visual must be the primary means of communication, other modalities can only provide additional information. If the image is only a small part of the process, it is not visualization.
The result must be readable and recognizable. The most important criteria is that the visualization must provide a way to learn something about the data. Any transformation of non-trivial data into an image will leave out information, but there must be at least some relevant aspects of the data that can be read. The visualization must also be recognizable as one and not pretend to be something else (see the discussion of Informative Art).
Today’s cool visualization that a friend sent to me is the “Here is Today” visualization. Essentially it displays information regarding time period in an aesthetically pleasing way. I hope you enjoy!
I had the honour of seeing Dr. Biruté Galdikas talk on Sunday April 28th about her experiences in Indonesia and with orangutans during her presentation Curious Orange in partnership with Kids Up Front. Not only is she part of the OFI (Orangutan Foundation International), but was also a part of Dr.Leaky’s ground breaking research program studying different apes alongside Jane Goodall and Diane Fossey.
Dr. Galdikas talked about her experiences in her 40 plus years in Indonesia. She is part of the organization OFI that helps take in orphan orangutans to teach them all the things their mothers would normally teach them.
The one subject she talked about that I feel is the most important to share, is about the devastation caused by the Palm Oil plantations being grown.
Palm Oil plantations can take over hectares and hectares of the orangutans habitat. The orangutans spend 95 percent of their lives up in the trees that are being burnt down to make these plantations. The higher paml oil is in demand the larger area of land they burn down. The OFI has been teaching the workers with a zero tolerance of harming or killing these orangutans but they are still being negatively impacted.
So the primary message from OFI is to try and stop using products with palm oil in them! Palm Oil is in pretty much anything including, cosmetics, food, cleaning ingredients, EVERYTHING! The sad truth is that it is close to impossible to stop using palm oil and impossible to close the plants for good. However that does not mean we cannot try to reduce our palm oil intake to try to cut down the demand for and size of these plants.
Although our individual choices are an important step, we cannot and should not just keep this to ourselves. If you believe in the importance of this innocent endangered species, that this is truly a matter to take a part in, tell others and spread the word!
Thank you very much for the tickets Kids Up Front and to the Epcor Centre for this opportunity! Also a huge thank you to Dr. Biruté Galdikas for coming to Calgary and the great presentation!
For more information about this problem and how you can participate visit:
But that’s what happened one Friday afternoon at Hot Point Fusion Cafe. You can’t argue with hungry Asian teenagers, you know? (Especially a bunch of them)
This sign is a bit ambiguous as it says “cafe” in English but “restaurant” (餐廳) in Chinese…
Although the streetscape on this stretch of Macleod isn’t exactly pedestrian-friendly, the relatively short walk (5 minutes) to the 39 Avenue C-Train station aids with the navigation to this place.
Not exactly impressive….
The front doesn’t offer much of a hint of the décor inside, but thankfully that’s about the point where the lack of descriptions for this place stopped.
In Hong Kong, people have nicknamed 3:15PM as 3:3 when afternoon tea customarily begins.
A neat sign acknowledging their mini hot pot selections 😀
I wonder if these jars of sweets are for display.
Like many Asian cafes in Calgary, Hot Point offers the usual mix of blended bubble tea drinks, “afternoon snacks” such as chicken wings, Taiwanese salt and pepper chicken (too bad I didn’t try it this time), curry fish balls, and noodles. Interestingly, this place also offers mini hot pot where each person gets their own individual pot with ingredients already cooked for you (and only for $9.99 per pot!). A small a-la-carte extra ingredients menu is also available as well.
Watch out for the fire!
This time around, we ordered three hot pots and three bubble tea drinks. Since this place had a minimum purchase policy, the ordering process led to annoyance; somehow we had not noticed the policy written on the menu and the waitress did not make it too clear at first. After the food arrived, the displeased reaction we had did not seem to affect our opinions as much though.
My milk hot soup gave all the ingredients inside a creamy after-taste especially with the pieces of meat, which I enjoyed. This type of light base in your hot pot doesn’t tend to overpower the original flavor of the ingredients.This was my friend’s curry fish ball soup. I “stole” a corn out of her pot which was pretty flavourful from boiling in the soup.Indistinguishable from the other spicy pot, the Tom Yum Goong soup was the one I didn’t have a chance to get a taste of. The spicy flavor was evidently strong though from the aroma.RICE! Oh-nom-nom…
With the boiling food that we ate, we had some drinks by our sides to cool down slightly….. or else we may have started to sweat!
Bubble Tea to the rescue! My friends chose pearls in their drinks, but the options include coconut jelly, agar, aiyu jelly, and grass jelly, which are popular alternatives in Taiwan. I had a sip of the green tea one on the right hand side which infused the brew well into the drink.Ooo La La…. Colour-changing signs about “BBT”!
The décor photos came before the food photos in this post, but I actually started to take more notice of the décor after the food rush worn off. Our dining environment was simplistic and the food was very yummy… and most of all, cheap!
Ratings
Service – 6-7/10 – I felt like we could have been served better, but we were too focused on the food anyways to be bothered by this.
FOOOOOOD – 9/10 – As in the intro, Hot Pot is Hot Pot, so forget aesthetics. It’s heat that attracts, and this hot pot has done well at engaging us hungry fellows. Portions could be bigger though, but that probably will come at a higher cost.
Value – 10/10 – The Bubble Tea were priced at the average price point (around $3 to $4) but the Hot Pots are definitely bang for the buck!
Location – 7-8/10 – This rating has to sustain a hit of sorts due to the heavy car traffic outside that led to the narrow side walk in places. Transit is the best way to access this location since the C-Train station is 5 minutes away while Route 10 runs right on this stretch of Macleod.
Next time, take a closer look at this art display!Bye bye to you too!
