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.
May 2nd was an important time in Canada. It was either the repeat of the Conservatives, or a change in government. As I stepped up to the polling booth, I returned to the ballot box in five seconds (or so) and was greeted by “wow, you were fast.” You see, I knew who I wanted to vote for. Why? Because the Student Vote gave me a great experience on voting! That’s why I believe that educating the youth (especially about politics) is key. So the next time a federal election happens, get on board and sign your school up.
So without further ado, I give you a comparison chart of both the student vote results, and the actual election‘s results.
Also, here’s a general map of what each province voted for. It’s not 100% accurate, but it’s really interesting to see what each of the provinces and territories voted! Oh yeah, NDP won a riding in Edmonton (that’s the little speck of orange you see in Alberta).
Are you satisfied with the results? Comment below! I’ve decided to give you a little food for thought:
Out of 23.6 million electors in the last election, only 5.2 million voted for Harper’s Conservatives. That’s 22% of eligible voters, and 16.2% of the total population. There are 5.65 million Canadians aged 18-29. In the past, this age group has voted so little that politicians don’t bother with them. If all of Canada’s youth voted, they would rock the whole political system!
Johnny Clegg, Photo Courtesy of BD& P World Music Series
An African Pardi Gras made its way to Calgary! The BD&P World Music Series at the Epcor Centre presented the incredible Johnny Clegg Band. With exhilarating and upbeat music that borrow the many distinct rhythms and sound from across Africa, the Johnny Clegg Band concert was truly a feast of music and sound to the senses! Like many, George of the Jungle was among one of my favourite childhood movies, which included Johnny Clegg’s upbeat song Dela (I Know Why The Dog Howls At Moon).
Dancing in the aisles…
Or in this concert, everywhere – from your own seat, the stage, the balconies above, or in front of the stage – the electrifying and moving music of Johnny Clegg had the whole audience dance up and on their feet. Amazingly, as the thought of myself dancing in public (much less a concert hall, of all places) is inconceivable, by the end of the concert the fever of African music eventually coursed through me as well. It all started with the lone cowgirl up in front of the stage, dancing her heart out in a frenzy of hands and feet. Then an old man, then a couple of children grooving along, joined with several teenagers, until the whole audience rushed either to the front of the stage, or was standing up and clapping with roars of delight. By the end of their performance, the audience started to stamp their feet and pound on the concert stage for an encore perf0rmance, nearly bringing down the whole concert hall for an encore! If you ask me, now that’s a concert!
Courtesy of BD&P World Music Series
The Man
Johnny Clegg, sometimes called “The White Zulu, is a international renowned musician from South Africa that mixes English lyrics with Zulu and African with various Western European styles in his popular music. Also he is notably a dynamic dancer, Anthropologist, academic, and French Knight. He also an inspirational humanitarian, as an important and passionate figure in the movement against apartheid in South Africa.
Eyes tired? This program uses your GPS location to determine what your current light levels are outside, and dims/tints the screen according to the time. Hello marathon gaming!
In a nutshell, wizmouse fixes your scroll wheel to make it work the way scroll wheels should. With wizmouse installed, the scroll wheel will affect any window underneath your mouse, even if the window is in the background. Perfect for research projects or if you’re like me and have some six hundred thousand windows open all at the same time.
CCleaner removes unwanted files from your system by clearing various browser caches and emptying the recycling bin. It also contains a fully featured registry cleaner and an uninstall wizard (for uninstalling other programs). I’ve probably gotten rid of over 100 GB worth of stuff over the past half year using this.
Autohotkey basically allows you to make custom hotkeys for just about anything on windows. It does require a little bit of basic coding but there are free premade hotkey packs all over the internet available for download and built in tutorials. Using Autohotkey, you can launch a browser, open your mail, send an email, switch songs, and much more, all with hotkeys.
You’re still interested in reading, I suppose? If you haven’t read the first part of this article, then I highly suggest to click here!
5. The Little Mermaid
You want to know my name? Nah, my fish friends can tell you that. I'm so lucky they're always there for me!
“Before giving up her legs forever in order to live with humans, the Little Mermaid knows exactly two things about them. Some of them pose attractively on boats, and, oh, yes, they eat fish. In Ariel’s world, fish can talk, swim and stage elaborate musical numbers, and yet she completely fails to run for the beach in horror when Prince Eric attempts to eat her mentor and friend. By film’s end, she’s fully converted, standing around and chuckling while her best friend races madly to escape being murdered.”
That’s point number one in this wonderful movie we like to call The Little Mermaid. Interestingly enough, Ariel is not really “little” in this movie–she is quite beautiful and apparently old enough to decide that she no longer wants to be a mermaid! So what does she do? She goes to Ursula and makes a deal with “the devil” and essentially sells her “soul,” or voice in this case, in return for human legs. And that’s fine and dandy, except she forgot one thing: she needs to talk to the Prince before making him fall in love with her.
But that’s okay, because he ended up taking the bait despite Ariel’s naive attempts at becoming human (using a fork as a comb is so attractive to men!) And in the end, Ariel gets her voice back because Prince Eric saves the day and kills Ursula. Then they lived happily ever after! The end (let’s ignore for a second all of the sequels that Disney decided to make and move on to the article).
The Supposed Lesson: True love really can conquer all.
The Interpreted Lesson: Giving up an important part of your soul is a-okay, as long as the person who took it is out of the picture and you get everything back. Oh, and it’s totally fine to betray our own race and allow humans to eat them, as long as you’ve used them up in your ploy of getting the prince to kiss/fall in love with you. Yep, no worries!
4. The Hunchback of Notre Dame
You're so sweet Quasimodo, you're just not my...type.
Remember this movie? Probably not; a lot of people aren’t too familiar with this epic Disney movie. Quasimodo, a man who is supposed to be the ‘ugly’ hunchback of Notre Dame, has basically lived his entire life in the bell tower of a cathedral. Early you see the main villain, Frollo (a creepy man who lusts over the gypsy fyi) murdering Frollo’s mother. Terrible, right?
But that’s not all to Quasimodo’s life. When he meets the beautiful Esmeralda, he is immediately love stricken. And you know that Frollo guy? He decides that if he can’t have Esmeralda, then no one can. So he does the only logical thing any man in love would do: burn her at the stake. So the damsel in distress gets saved by Quasimodo and they all live happily ever–wait, what?
She kisses some other guy in the movie. You know, the handsome guy who is totally chivalrous and better than Quasimodo. Captain Phoebus, a man who did some great deeds throughout the movie, is still the type of person that a lot of girls choose over the “nice guy.” Sure, Quasimodo gained the respect of their peers, but it’s a Disney movie and the main characters are supposed to get together! Not the main girl and some random other-guy. Oh well Disney, you can have it your way.
The Supposed Lesson: Appearances don’t matter if you’ve gained the respect from your peers by just being yourself!
The Interpreted Lesson: Nice guys never win, especially when they don’t look as good as that other guy.
I love Disney! Even if they don’t really emulate real life situations, they make for really nice references about love and romance. And it’s nice to take a break from watching action movies, and just watch a good (even cheesy) romantic film. Oh, and if awesome cinematography and animation is included, then all the better to watch! We’re aware of the lessons that Disney is trying to show us, but as we grow up we get a bigger picture of what Disney really wanted to teach us. Here is a compiled list of the supposed and interpreted lessons of a variety of Disney movies.
Warning: The following is completely sarcastic and might be offensive to Disney fans. Sorry, but reality’s gotta hit you some time!
Note: Inspired by articles on Cracked.com (disclaimer: there’s some crude language and content on the site)
10. Sleeping Beauty
Romantic or totally inappropriate?
Ah yes, Sleeping Beauty. A timeless classic where an uninvited guest comes and puts a curse on the princess! What happened to the security around the castle? And all that the fairies can do is make sure that she falls asleep instead of dying. I don’t know, if the fairies have enough power to change the color of a dress (blue… red… blue, so indecisive!) then I’m pretty sure they have enough power to dis-spell Magnificent’s curse.
And on top of that, Aurora ends up being stalked in the forest while singing her tune. Sure, that might seem sweet to some people…but I would be truly creeped out! And it’s nice that he killed the dragon and saved her life, but the two were never formally on a date. Just saying!
The Supposed Lesson: True love can break any spell
The Interpreted Lesson: Marry the first guy who saves (but stalked) you!
9. Snow White
Free apples? You look trustworthy enough
You can never forget that pretty face with “skin white as snow, lips red as blood, and hair black as ebony,” can you? Well, the Queen definitely can’t. She basically holds a grudge against a little kid (in the original tale, Snow White’s a small kid of around 7-10) and wants to, well, kill her. And so Snow White hides in the woods where she crashes into a strangers’ house and forces the woodland creatures to do her chores. Erm. That’s nice of them.
But you know the rest of the story! She listens to an old, untrustworthy hag and eats an apple that she has no idea where it came from. Delightful! And to finish it off, she wakes up from a kiss. Awwww. I’m going to forget about the same argument I used for Sleeping Beauty and add a new one. Oh, silly Disney Princesses.
The Supposed Lesson: Everyone is good, trustworthy and hospitable.
The Interpreted Lesson: It’s okay to trust a gang of men, listen to strangers and eat food that came from a basket…someone’s bound to put you in a glass coffin and save you!
I know that I have made a blog about scarves in the past; but this video gives great examples of ways to wear scarves during the spring. With the rainy and unpredictable weather, light-weight scarves will not only make the perfect transitional piece, but will let you stay fashionable and comfortable.
James Ehnes is a violinist of extraordinary dynamism, serene lyricism and astonishing virtuosity. He has performed in over 30 countries on five continents, a guest of many of the world’s renowned orchestras and conductors, including, amongst others, the London Symphony, New York, BBC Philharmonic, and the DS Berlin Orchestras.
An exciting and award winning discography, which includes his recording of Korngold, Barber, and Walton violin concertos directed under Bramwell Tovey and with Vancouver Symphony Orchestra won a 2008 JUNO award for Best Classical Album of the Year and a 2008 Grammy Award for best Instrumental Soloist Performance.
Beginning violin studies at the age of four, he made his orchestral debut at 13, and graduated from The Julliard School in 1997.
While visiting Calgary, performing his award winning rendition of Korngold’s Violin Concert in D Major with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, Ehnes was able to give a few words on the “Ex Marsick” Stradivarius that he plays and his personal career.
For Ehnes, the Stradivarius is a special instrument that is compares to that of an artist’s palette, with the Stradivarius possessing more colours. “Marsick”, the name given to the violin, was a very prominent Belgian violinist in the early 20th century, however, sold the violin for money after just owning it for a year. However, the “Marsick” has had many unknown clouds in its history, for instance it’s time spent in the Soviet Union is quite a mystery. But being such “a high profile work of art,” Ehnes chuckles, when being asked how he cares for the Stradivarius, “there not much you could do with it if you were able to steal it… no one is going to buy it because they are all so identifiable… or turns up in a pretty quick fashion.”
How often do you sit down to ponder what you love about culture in Calgary? Well most people never dwell on the subject at all, but on Oct. 3 and 4, 2010, 100 Calgarians gathered to do just that.
The group of panelists itself was very diverse, ranging from authors, poets, singers, playwrights, filmmakers and artists to businessmen, lawyers, art/heritage enthusiasts, seniors and youth; just to name a few. What was very exciting to see was that the group was from a diverse and pluralistic background; very much a representation of a Canadian culture and society. They all gathered in the Boyce Theatre at Stampede Park to talk about themes surrounding “Calgary 2012.” Although no one in this very diverse group knew each other, they all shared a love for Calgary’s spirit and a passion for the arts.
www.calgary2012.com
So what’s so special about 2012? No, these esteemed people didn’t spend two days talking about the world ending. Calgary is entering a bid between others cities to become the Culture Capital of Canada in 2012. This coincides with the fact that 2012 is a key year in Calgary’s Cultural history as some of the city’s cornerstones including the Calgary Stampede, City of Calgary Recreation, the Calgary Public Library, the Pumphouse and GRAND Theatre all celebrate their one hundredth year anniversaries. The idea of the symposium was to generate ideas about what culture in Calgary should look like in 2012, which proved to be no small feat. After all, everyone’s idea of culture was different and no one wasted any time expressing their ideas concerning art, music, sports, education, technology and a plethora of other subjects.
The weekend started out with some the opportunity to listen to a few amazing guest speakers including the Honourable Lindsay Blackett, Minister of Culture and Community Spirit, David Pierce, recent Emmy Award winner, and a performance by the Calgary artist Michael Bernard Fitzgerald. The rest of the weekend was spent sitting in small groups and discussing “World Café Style” the main goals of the weekend. The questions discussed included: “What do we want to achieve as a city for Calgary in 2012,” “What does the spirit of Calgary in 2012 look and feel like” and “What is Calgary’s story in 2012 – themes and ideas to define Calgary”. Everyone headed on home, minds buzzing with thoughts of the weekend conference, and already looking forward to changes they might see to Calgary in 2012.
On April 18 2011, the Calgary City Council, after much deliberation, announced an increase in funding to Calgary’s 2012 Cultural Capital of Canada bid – municipal support has now been brought to $2 million. Calgary hopes to receive additional funding by winning the Cultural Capital award (the winner is announced in October and will receive up to $2 million dollars in matching federal funds). The bid has already been sent in. Regardless of whether Calgary is coined the winning city; expect to see energy and excitement in 2012 when the celebrations begin!
Join Teens all over Calgary at the Village Square Library as teens take the stage! It’s not what you’d expect at a library. There will be many games and events for you to enjoy!
Who: Teens ages 13-17 What: Teen Takeover where teens take the centre stage and participate in events and games for free! Where: The Village Square Public Library: 2623-56 St. N.E. When: On Friday April 29 from 2 p.m. – 5 p.m. Why: To have a great time with teens from different schools, as well as your friends!
Come on over to the Village Square Library to celebrate Youth Week!
Did you know that democracy doesn’t really work when you don’t vote?
On May 2, it’s your chance to take a stand by simply crossing a small X on a paper.
Check out elections.ca for your polling station and don’t forget to vote.
There are millions of young people all around the world who long to have the opportunities we do here in Canada and who go to great lengths to fight for democracy. Let’s show the world we are proud of ours by voting.
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