Signs of the Times

I love doing this: analyzing from my own skewed perspective the election signs that are inflicted on us for the duration of the election campaign. What I like best is to look at the creative ways that people will alter them. Oh, I'm not talking about the moustaches drawn on them; I usually look for something a little more clever.

First up: the ruling Liberal Party. I feel quite certain that the graphic artist who came up with this design has lost his or her job. As it turns out, the rather empty slogan "Pour le Québec" (For Québec) is easily changed to "Pourrir le Québec" (To Spoil [ruin] Québec). I took this photo across the street from my office and the sign was quickly taken away by the party. Just doing my part to ensure that it lives on on the internet!

Next party: the Parti québécois. I haven't found these defaced in any way so far, but it is notable that the slogan "À nous de choisir" (For us to choose) has revived the nagging question about who is part of the "nous" for the Parti québécois. It isn't always clear that the PQ's "nous" includes anyone other than white Québec-born francophones, although they do have a handful of visible minority candidates (I'm undertaking the laborious process of examining the different parties' candidates and counting the proportions of women and visible minority or anglophone candidates, but this is going to take a while). One comment widely reported in the media went something like "Finally we can say 'nous' again"…from a white francophone voter.

The slogan does morph well to the next level, as the specific candidate signs say "Choose [candidate's name]". Not particularly inventive, but not offensive either.

Our "new" right-wing party, the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) does that thing that I always detest: bets mainly on the recognition factor of the leader. When you name your party after yourself or its slogan is based around your name, it just looks very high school to me. Shouldn't a democracy be about the team? Apart from the "Look at me, it's My team!" message, the CAQ also has a rather complex slogan: "C'est assez, faut que ça change!" (That's enough, it has to change!), which doesn't really roll off the tongue well and has been criticized for being a bit vague. Imagine, politicians being vague! You will also notice that the above poster is also nailed into a tree, which is an excellent indication of their environmental policy, no?

People have had some fun online with the posters, though. After a string of very white star candidates had been announced, I saw the poster for Benoit Lugas (which becomes B. Lugas or beluga), which gave me a chuckle, and then there was speculation about what the candidate poster might look like in the riding where François Legault is running for his own seat:

And, while not particularly clever, I managed to capture this cry from the heart a couple of blocks away from home:

The last party to look at today is Québec solidaire, our new-ish left wing party. I actually saw an online poll (unscientific, I realize) about which party had the best slogan and Québec solidaire was running away with it at about 40%. The slogan? "Debout" (Standing up..although it can also be interpreted as a call to action, as in Stand up!). You will notice side-by-side leader posters here, as the party has co-leaders. It's interesting that this time around they are each on their own posters, as last time they were on the same one, like a two-headed leader. The slogan is fabulous for its simplicity, but also for the way it translates into other versions.

The candidate is "standing up" for the riding, but there is also another series of the party "standing up" for various policy issues (pictured below, Free education).

Another note on this one, particular to the candidate in my riding, Manon Massé. Close up and in person you can see that she has a moustache and has not photoshopped it away or plucked or waxed it. A local cultural magazine did what no one else dared to and asked her about it directly. Her response is a fabulous defence of gender non-conformity and the right to be real. No photoshopping or catering her look to meet your expectations; like the party, what you see is what you get.

(I'm not going to look at posters for the Parti Vert or Option nationale simply because I haven't seen any around.)

A Resignation

Today, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, one of the spokespeople for the student group La CLASSE, resigned from his position. I thought I would mark this occasion by expressing some of my admiration for his integrity.

He is a bright and articulate young man who has stood up to power and not flinched. In the face of derision and vilification by those to whom we have entrusted political power, he has not descended to those levels, but insisted on the arguments he and others in the student movement had developed. This has betrayed a level of maturity we can only hope that our politicians will return to...or develop.

He has steadfastly respected and insisted on the limits of the role accorded to him by his movement. When politicians and members of the media have attempted to characterize him as the "leader" of his group, he has reminded them that he is a spokesperson, that he does not make decisions for the group, that the group has structures for decision-making that he respects. An individual with a less clear sense of the democratic values of his organization might have tried to arrogate those powers and that status to himself or herself. Not he and not his co-spokespeople. Not even when pushed by those who seemed to fail to understand the structure. A respect for the democratic principles of his group's collectivity that seems to have slipped from the view of our politicians in their practices.

We have been witness this year to the most important mobilization of our youth in generations, this in a context where we have decried the apathy of the young for a long time. I have been proud to see them in their idealism, with all their energy and creativity, as they set out to change a government decision with which they (and I) continue to disagree. They have been mobilized for months in the face of rejection and derision from our political authorities and they have not backed down.

So now one face of this movement steps away from his role as one of the spokespeople of his group, not to disappear, but to continue as a part of the movement and maybe to focus on his own goals. I have every confidence that he will do everything he needs to do to pursue his goals. I just want now to express my gratitude for the example that he and his colleagues have set for the rest of us.

Making Facebook Meaner

When I first opened my Facebook account, about 689 format changes ago, there was something very polite about some of the interactions. If someone declined your friend request, you didn't necessarily find out unless you checked up on it, and if you turned down an invitation to an event, your name would show up on the "no" list, but that is all.

Imagine my surprise recently when, after sending an invitation to a couple hundred of my closest personal friends, I started getting notifications that this friend or that had refused my invitation! It sounds so cold and nasty! It made me realize that I could no longer just click the "no" button without consequence. I now actually find myself not responding to these requests in order to not offend the person or organization that has invited me. At worst, if my inviter or other invitees get chatty on the event page, I have to say "maybe" just so I can turn off the notifications. I even had to say "maybe" to an event that was already over recently because someone started posting a lot of comments on the event page and it was giving me too many notifications!

Now I'm worried that if I defriend someone or refuse a friend request from someone I only marginally know or don't personally know that the person will get a notification that mean old me has taken this action. I wonder how many friend requests I can accumulate without responding to them. I may be about to find out!

And while we're ranting about the site that occupies so much of my time (talk about voting with your feet — must not be so terrible after all!), I am getting quite tired of having my preferences reset when new changes come about, or having the site decide that I might no longer wish to see all of my friends' posts and switching me back to a select few it has decided I am more likely to want to see. Once I've made my choice, please leave it to me to change my mind: I don't need to be challenged to reaffirm my choices from time to time by undoing something the site does surreptitiously.

Still the best place to share photos and brief news, however, so I'm still sold, or at least rented, on it.

An Exercise in Democracy?

So here we go, off to the polls in a provincial election called for September 4. This time around, a few new factors: a background of the student strike that has been a huge and sustained mobilization of people who tend to vote less than other age groups; a "new" party that is looking increasingly like the old party it swallowed in the last few months (oh yeah, except for those members who were just scooped up by the Liberals); a long-awaited inquiry into corruption in the construction industry, with many connections to politics…oh wait, this last thing shouldn't be a factor because our open and honest premier has happened to call the election for a date almost two weeks before the inquiry resumes its hearings in September.

You think I might be cynical about this process? We have a ruling party that has insisted, through months of student demonstrations, that the only place that democracy takes place is at the ballot box. This party then decides to have a short election campaign* during the dog days of summer when fewer people will be interested in politics and voting. Interestingly, the election call also fell on the date of the 100th consecutive night demonstration, prompting a larger than usual turnout, estimated at around 10,000.

There is something interesting about the ideas the parties seem to have about the democratic process. There is some recruiting of "star" candidates, presumably by-passing the usual process of the party members in a particular riding choosing their candidate. This likely explains how mystified the government was during its farcical negotiations with the students in the spring: they just don't understand that the people who have been designated as spokespeople for a movement don't necessarily assume all the power of decision-making. Some democratic structures actually have more participatory procedures for making decisions.

Democracy isn't something distasteful that you sneak by when people are on vacation once every four or five years, it is something that you live every day. I just hope that those who have been demonstrating their point of view on the tarification of government services as exemplified by the proposed tuition increases will also participate in the "once every four or five years" version of democracy by voting and voting against the neoliberal agenda.

*The length of a campaign is spelled out by article 131 of the Loi Électorale: the 5th Monday following a decree issued on a Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday, the 6th Monday following a decree issued on another day; if voting day falls on a statutory holiday, the vote is the following day.

Cirque-ing My Wagons

Well, if we didn't know before now, this is the true reason that I will never make official "reviewer" status with all its attendant free tickets to things: I am doing a round-up of my circus experiences in the recent Festival Montréal Complètement Cirque after it's over, too late for you to be inspired by my glowing review to attend something or by my "meh" to avoid one. You might, however, be inspired to take a more serious look at this, my favourite Montréal festival, when it comes back around next year for the fourth edition.

With last year's experience still echoing pleasantly in our heads and between-festival delights like the Cirque Éloize's "Rain" and the lovely and entertaining shows of the graduating students of the École nationale de cirque freshly inspiring us, we set ourselves an ambitious program of six performances in nine days, not counting the kick-off parade and the odd exposure to the free performances in the evenings. Shall we dive right in?

Our very first show was local: Séquence 8 by Les 7 Doigts de la Main, at the Tohu. Now, if you have never been to the Tohu, you must go. It is really the best venue for the circus, which is not really surprising, considering that it was built for that. At various performances there, we have sat everywhere from front row to up in the rafters and there really are no bad seats. The seats could be a tad more comfortable, but that might be just me.

The show? A real showcase of a variety of talents, including a little faux talk show comedy routine that might not have been the strongest part of the show, but made for a good thread tying things together. What really stood out for me were two particular performances. Eric Bates' cigar box routine was quite enjoyable, despite maybe one slip-up (well-recovered), and was made especially enjoyable by the comedy bit where the rest of the cast propped him up with cigar boxes at the beginning, then with much larger cubes that I believe they call banquine at the end. The visual contrast of that was quite amusing. My other favourite performance was Ugo Dario and Maxim Laurin on the Korean plank. This, for the uninitiated, is the teeter-totter-like device, and these two do some real innovating on the apparatus instead of just making each other go high enough to do acrobatics. Oh, they do that, too, but the added creativity makes it even more enjoyable.

Have a look at the promotional clip:


Next up, something much more cabaret-like with La Soirée, a showcase of a number of different British performers (I don't think all of them were actually British, but we'll let that go). This was at the Théâtre Olympia and the stage was a very tiny circular platform set in the middle of the seats! Now, if you haven't been there before, you should know that this is the kind of theatre with conventional row seating on the balcony, but tables on the floor, with the addition of some circular rows of seats around the little stage for this performance. There were also tables up on what would otherwise be the stage.

I have three favourites from this one to mention. No, not David O'Mer, who is very pretty and you can easily find his bathtub routine on YouTube. The opening act, Gateau au Chocolat, was a big black drag queen who made no attempt to hide his beard, all part of the act. Between the motorboating of a woman in the audience and some rather forward activity with a few of the men (sitting on, groping, a little light ravaging), he was most entertaining indeed. So, too, was Ursula Martinez. She did a fabulous act combining a striptease with a magically disappearing and reappearing hanky. She made the red square disappear so many times Jean Charest might have wanted to make her a member of his cabinet, but she also kept bringing it back from the most unlikely of places. I can't say from where it emerged at the end when she only wearing heels and a smile!

For me, the best circus act of the Soirée was Nate Cooper, who emerged on roller skates and did such a marvelous job of being on the edge of falling across the main stage, down the stairs and up onto the little circular stage — without actually falling, mind you — that we were all a little concerned when he picked up the rather large knives to juggle them. Those were dropped at this point without actually harming anyone in the front rows. It wasn't until he had done a costume change in front of us, shedding pants and skates for a slinky gown and very high platform shoes, that he got onto the pogo stick fitted with bull horns up top and truly juggled those knives while jumping around the stage. Very nice.

A little taste of La Soirée:


On to Scandanavia! First up on this front was Undermän by Cirkus Cirkör from Sweden at the Théâtre National. I chose this one for the butchness of the look (beefy guys in plaid shirts) and they rounded out their performance with some personal stories of how they came to work together (stories of lost loves who were also acrobatic partners), music (they were all quite talented on this account), tossing around some rather heavy kettle bell weights and then tossing around each other. They also did some good juggling and Mattias Andersson is very graceful on the Cyr Wheel. In a butch way, of course. We were a little worried about the advertised brief concert with the fourth guy when it was announced, but he really sold his own comedic performance, so we stayed and enjoyed the concert, too. We even found ourselves buying the CD on the way out!

I give you a little Undermän:


Now we move more specifically into the Finnish part of our program (can you believe that our three last persormances were Finnish?!). Ro-Pu by Circo Aereo was up first, at Usine C, and I have to say it left us wanting more…of something else, maybe. There were some very clever moments — I especially enjoyed the playing with dimensions, as they were lying on the floor "tightrope walking" on that plane while a video projected the same stunts performed upright — but I think I need some kind of danger element or feats of agility in my circus that I just didn't get here. So I won't drag this out.

A glimpse of Ro-Pu:


My favourite circus of all redeemed the Finns in my eyes. I was compelled to tweet this as we wandered through the lovely little park close to the Théâtre Outremont post-show:

I have to say from the start that the Théâtre Outremont was the most comfortable of the venues (recently renovated, we think), and what a lovely neighbourhood! I am used to seeing Outremont from the side (up Parc) or along Van Horne, and the heart of it is much nicer. Did I forget to include the name? Petit Mal by Race Horse Company. Write that down! Now!

My friend referred to this as the "Jackass" of circuses, and when they came out and carried out a number of actions that could have hurt each other it seemed to be coming true. A couple of parts of this show merit special mention. The "horse" which splits into two when the Mountie tries to jump on it, each part continuing its cavorting, is terribly funny, and I can only imagine the degree of difficulty of flipping from one mini-trampoline to another while wearing a giant horse head. The use of a whole lot of exercise balls is quite brilliant: Rauli Kosonen executes a repetitive bounce through four positions (and over and over, without losing momentum) that I found fascinating to watch and then all three performers did some horizontal travelling across multiple balls from one side of the stage to the other, and back again. Mr. Kosonen was at his best, however, on the trampoline, where he demonstrated great creativity, making a trampoline performance new for our eyes. All of that wonder and I haven't even talked about the two Elvises, the pink feathers, the tires… Just take a look at the preview and then track them down wherever they might be performing and pay what you must to see them!



It was almost a shame after my favourite circus to wrap up this year's experience with another one on the same day and one which didn't quite hold up to the afternoon delight we had with Petit Mal. Now, Odotustila by WHS at Espace Libre was not bad. It just didn't have the kick of Petit Mal. But let me be a little fairer to them than that.

Two elements to this show, or maybe I ought to say three, including the video with which both performers interact quite expertly. Ville Walo is the juggling expert, and quite an expert he is, with everything from traditional balls and pins to his shoes and a set of picture frames. There is even some clever juggling interaction with the images projected on the backdrop which must involve some rather quick moving behind the scenes for him. We were a little worried about what kind of show we would get from the magician, Kalle Hakkarainen, but it was fresh and entertaining and he, too did a lot of creative interacting with the projected videos. I have to say that video kind of takes the mystery out of magic, and I'm not sure I understood the whole train motif, but he did some amazing things with a ball that seemed to have a mind of its own that I will likely never figure out. You'll get a taste of that in the video:



So a very long post to say that I have once again enjoyed this festival immensely, but it is too late for you to go. Maybe next year you will learn from this experience and plan on attending yourself instead of waiting for my rather tardy recommendations and assessments! ;-)

Ready, Set, Cirque!

What a lovely little taste of a week and a half to come we had today! A small parade to kick off the festival Montréal Complètement Cirque, my very favourite festival among the many dozens that Montréal hosts each year. Shall we have a look at the parade and the short show that followed?



A giant group of people dressed in red at this intersection?! (This is the infamous intersection of St-Denis and Ontario, site of a couple of standoffs in the nighttime student demonstrations.) This time, no beatings by the police, no pepper spray and no arrests! But I digress…we speculate that these are likely students from the École nationale de cirque, who will also perform nightly shows in Place Émilie-Gamelin during the festival.

On another side note, how much have we become accustomed to photographers just horning in on the scene and becoming part of the scene that everyone else gets to film? A bit annoying, I have to say. Back to the parade…

Some traditional Montréal calêches carrying members of the various participating circuses. The British contingent really looked the part! We'll be seeing them on Saturday 7 July.

This guy was from the Cirque Carpe Diem. Certainly wanted to carpe something here, if you know what I mean! ;-)

Cirque Alfonse was one of my favourite circuses from last year and I was really glad to see them in the parade, even though I don't see them on the schedule. There's nothing like juggling axes in a crowd to get your adrenaline pumping, but the real show-stealer here is the kid. Totally adorable in his outfit, loving the attention (or oblivious to it…couldn't decide which) and discovering the Cyr Wheel (actually just a hoop he walked through). Here's a still photo with daddy lifting him high in the air with one hand:

The wrap-up portion of the parade had a huge variety of characters executing a variety of disciplines. I'm really starting to appreciate the multi-tasking my little mind has to do when confronted by so many different things all going on at the same time. Good thing I'm adjusting, as this seems to be a hallmark of the new circus I love.

When we got to Place Émilie-Gamelin, it was time for a couple of very short speeches and a show! The kids in red took over the square, first with a little Chinese Pole-climbing (I like to call the above the Totem Pole Chinois, for obvious reasons). I also didn't want to cut out the low man on the totem pole, or maybe I just wanted to exploit him shamelessly!

I didn't really get any good shots of the show on the silks, but I did get a reasonable picture of the teams of silk-hoisters. This human element in supporting various circus apparatuses is another thing I love to see. They who are for the moment not the centres of attention have a very practical role in supporting the performances of those who are. Gotta love the synergy.



I did manage to get a short clip of the larger performance they did on the ground. So many! So enthusiastic! Such outfits!

I can tell that our planned six shows in nine days will be anything but tiring. Yay Cirque!

Albino?

I had a fascinating experience a couple of weeks ago that just becomes more amusing with time and reflection.

I was on my way to meet friends for a light dinner on our way to see one of the shows of the finishing class of the National Circus School. (I subsequently returned to see the other one and loved them both! But I digress…) I knew that I was completely out of orange juice at home, so I stopped at the nearby store of a small local chain of supermarkets to pick some up.

I got a bit of a surprise when I got to the cash. The woman at the cash, who I presume to be recently arrived from Africa (given subsequent events), look at me, a little unnerved and maybe a bit afraid, and asked me if I was an albino. At the time, I didn't think much of the question and told her that, while I am pretty pale, I would be even more pale and without colour in my hair (which is red) if I were actually an albino. I'm not sure I really convinced her.

It was discussing this at work around our very entertaining lunch table that some other aspects of this encounter that would help me interpret it came out. If she was really from a certain part or Africa, I, the albino-like creature before her, might have been seen as something scary, even some kind of sorcerer. Perhaps I should be relieved that, restrained by the protocol of her role as cashier at the supermarket, she did not leap across the counter to harm me!

Now, I am not given to mocking others, unless of course that mocking is well-deserved by some crazy belief in supernatural beings (yes, all religions fall into this category for me). Now I'm holding myself back from pacing on the sidewalk outside the supermarket, in view of the cashiers, and possibly stopping from time to time to strike my best spell-casting pose in their general direction.

The other cashiers will think I'm a crazy person. The one who doesn't will actually be a crazy person herself. Hmmm…maybe I should also bleach my hair….