Burj Khalifa, originally named Burj Dubai, has officially become the tallest building as of January 4, 2010 when the world welcomed its opening.  It stands 828m tall with 160(162) floors, almost twice as tall as the Empire State Building, and is able to swing back and forth for 1.5m at its tallest point when strong wind hits.  It is no doubt an engineering marvel of the 21 century.  It consist of five different cross sections from bottom to top, with Y shape floor plan that maximum sky viewing. Professionals say that this building would maintain its status of tallest building for at least a decade.

We’ve mentioned it before, but we have some pretty cool young people who blog for Youth Are Awesome.

They have all different interests, and over the past few months have covered almost every topic you could think of: music, film, art, cool websites, funny videos, hilarious sites, volunteering, education issues, environmental issues, sports, science, events happening in Calgary, cool facts, and so much more.  Basically, we write about the things YOU(th) are interested in.

Youth Are Awesome is here to give you a voice – so…come have a voice!  Right now, we have 17 wicked bloggers who write for the site, and we’re looking for more.

The committee meets once a month for about an hour…Our next meeting is January 12^th and if you want to become a Youth Are Awesome blogger, this is the meeting for you.

If you’re interested and want more info, contact Kaitlin at yoda@cyfc.ca.

Since we’re on the topic of Harry Potter, CTV news has quite an interesting article about something related…

That’s right, Canada’s McGill University is the first university in Canada to have an official Quidditch team!  (Shame on you if you had to click the Wiki link for Quidditch. 😉 )  Two months ago, they competed in the 2009 Intercollegiate Quidditch Association World Cup that took place at Middlebury College in Vermont.  Unfortunately, they didn’t win, but that’s okay!

Twenty-two teams competed in the Cup this time, all of them being American teams aside from McGill.  The 2009 Cup was actually the third time the event was taking place.  I definitely had no idea that Quidditch actually existed in the ‘real world’ up until this article was brought to my attention.  I hope you watched the video in the CTV article, you get to see muggle Quidditch in action!  Neat stuff, no?

I am not reviewing a book called Love Stories; I am simply expressing my thoughts on the role of romance in the modern day youth novels.

The way I see it, when we were young, the guys and the girls read the same amount.  But as we matured, so did the books we read.  Soon it becomes difficult to find a novel that does not include romance.  At this point, girls tend to keep reading, but most guys stop reading and search for other hobbies (video games, etc.).  This is what happened to me, that is until 2008 when my English teacher made everyone read this novel for a novel study.  That novel is what renewed my faith in youth novels and stories that involve romance.

The novel we read is a brand new novel called The Hunger Games.  That is when I realized that a story involving love is not a love story, and that romance can be really important in the plot of a good story.  So, that is when I started becoming a fan of reading, but the more I read the more I wondered, why does 95% of youth novel involve romance?

There is no universal answer to that question, but I believe that the authors of young adult novels are always looking for a way to connect with the audience, to find something they can relate to and the only thing almost every teenager has experienced is love (to some extent).

That is why such novels like Twilight have become so popular (I mean, it can’t be because of the plot, or literature…). The only problem with novels involving love is that sometimes the author focuses more on that one emotion than they do on the plot or theme.  That creates a cheesy love story that should not be read by anyone (I’m thinking of one that’s starts with “T”…)

But all in all, guys experience feelings of love too, so there are obviously love stories for guys too.  And I believe that teenage guys should read more (so I don’t feel like a loner).

We’re off to catch up on our year-end/decade-end countdowns and to ring in 2010!  We will see you Monday with new posts for a new year!

We hope that you have an AWESOME and safe New Year’s Eve.

Happy New Year!

– The Youth Are Awesome Team

Officially, the city isn’t actually doing much. But with these new Idling Reduction Signs, YOU can do something!

There are currently two signs you can put up (as long as they’re not installed on City right-of-way…I actually have no idea what this means, would anyone like to clarify?).  One of them reads Idle Free Zone, while the other reads Fresh Air Intake.

In addition to just printing those PDF files, you can pick up green plastic versions of these signs from the Traffic Engineering Service Counter at no cost to put up in your community. If the green isn’t your thing, you can also purchase white metal versions instead.

I think this is a great way to raise awareness about our idling issue. Turn your engine off and help stop idling now! 🙂

I’ve been a member of DeviantArt for about 5 years now, though I’ve never really used it religiously.  But like any social networking site, it hasn’t failed to reward many of those who have.  DA recently celebrated its 100 Millionth Deviation by listing a few Deviations that have earned their creators a great deal in both the online and offline worlds.

This drawing, entitled “Prisoner of my own”, is reminiscent of Eschers’ “Drawing Hands” lithograph, and found its way onto the ribcage of Shia LaBeouf. I’m no fan of his, but I imagine it’s kind of neat as an artist to receive that kind of  “fan support” from a celebrity.  Or annoying and possibly illegal, who knows. 🙂

A sort of ‘manga-nized’ Simpson’s spinoff landed “spacecoyote“, a Japanese-Canadian comic book artist and illustrator, job offers from Matt Groening himself.

This kind of internet fame is an interesting phenomenon to chew on. How much of it has to do with being in the right place at the right time, and how much of it is more formulaic? Either way, the results for those who achieve it are life-changing, for better or for worse.

This was so awesome that I obviously had to share.

One Track Mind is a site that features a new indie music track every day to share and to review.  Even if you don’t listen to “indie” music, you’ll probably still enjoy this site.  I know that we’re all always looking for new music to listen to, and One Track Mind covers everything from traditional indie, to Brit-pop, to dance punk, to soul, to hip hop.  Something for pretty much everyone.

My favourite part about this site is the way they review the music – aside from a detailed review, each track is rated in “Originality,” “Repeat Listen Potential,” and “Overall Verdict,” making it easy to see what the site thinks of the song if you don’t feel like reading a full review.

Happy music hunting!

For your last Wednesday of 2009, I thought I would share a video that will make you say “wow.”

I came across this video a couple months ago and found it super entertaining (I’m hoping you will feel the same).  Check it out below.  It’s by an artist named Evelien Lohbeck, and is actually somewhat of a compilation of a bunch of different films she has made.

It’s definitely one of the most interesting videos I’ve seen this year.  Enjoy!

Noteboek from Evelien Lohbeck on Vimeo.

My latest book review is of Chris Wooding’s The Fade.  This story takes place on the moon of some uninhabitable planet.  The people of that moon must live underground due to the fact that they would die a very painful death if they were to be caught on the surface when both their suns were up.  This novel explores subterranean life to its full extent and brings a realistic edge to it.  It is a world where massive civilizations flourish, and despite the lack of subterranean resources, the inhabitants still found ways to live full lives.

There is a war in this world, a war involving the two major nations- the Gurta and the Eskaran.  But it’s not just any outright war; there are a lot of political aspects to it.  This novel takes part in the recent trend of discussing the idea of “war economy” in stories.  War economy is the idea of using war to fuel a nation’s economy, and in this story, corrupted leaders have kept the war going for this purpose.

The story follows an Eskaran soldier who’s been trained from childhood to kill, she is imprisoned and must find a way to escape or face a certain death.  On her quest to freedom, she uncovers unimaginable horrors and is faced with extremely tough decisions.

This novel explores the themes of war, violence, contradicting belief systems, prejudice, politics, corruption, and death.

This realistic interpretation of warfare makes this one of the most depressing books I’ve ever read, and I would only recommend it for the more mature readers.

Every year after Christmas, there comes New Year’s Day – the first day of the first month has always been celebrated, or for as long as we know that it has been.

Although almost everyone in  the world celebrates the new year on the first day of the first month, January 1st, many cultures celebrate the new year on other days.  The reason for this is that many cultures use different calendars.  There are calendars based on start of spring, end or middle of fall, lunar year, or solar year.

For instance, in the Eastern Orthodox Church, the civil New Year falls on Gregorian January 14  which would be January 1 in the Julian calendar.

The Chinese New Year, also known as the Lunar New Year, occurs every year on the new moon of the first lunar month, which can fall anytime between January 21 and February 21 of the Gregorian Calendar.

The Iranian New Year, called Nowruz, is the day containing the exact moment of the vernal equinox, which usually occurs on the 20th or 21st of March, commencing the start of the spring season.

Well, these are just some examples.  There are “New Years” all year round!

Now you know that there are other new years out there and I hope you can spread the spirit of New Year’s all year long, whether it’s the start of spring, the harvest of fall or the twelfth full of moon.

On behalf of YouthAreAwesome.com, I wish all you out there a Happy New Year!

For all you contemporary, pop, rock and hip hop lovers, check out CKMP-FM, branded as AMP Radio Calgary, as an alternative to your usual radio station. They play the newest hits for you to listen to. It’s a fairly new radio station, airing earlier this year. Previously, it was known as Fuel 90.3.

Click here to visit their site!

If you want to learn a bit more about the station, check out their Wiki page here.