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I met with David Wotherspoon of Faskens the other day and I was telling him about my approach to coming home – how I’m putting it out there in the universe that it is happening and it’ll all work out. That I’ve sold everything or shipped everything home from Halifax, that I’ve bought a car here… And he sent me this:

And, I know it’s been longer than a week since my last update. Oh, how life gets in the way!

In my professional life, I have continued my work with the ALO on the New Forms Festival and meeting artists. Last week, I met Ben Reeves and Faith Moosang. Ben teaches at Emily Carr, and his works mostly focus on. Some pieces are featured on Jessica Bradley’s site (who represents Ben outside of BC) and at the Equinox Gallery in BC. I don’t see my favourite on there (that I saw at his studio), which is too bad. I love the textures and tangibility of his work – it was nearly IMPOSSIBLE not to touch. Cue Friends episode with Joey and the museum.

I don’t yet have a link of Faith’s work, but it’s mostly photography based. She does a lot on rephotography and with found art. I’d love to post a link when I have something, it’s very cool. She has a small series on war representations, which is super powerful.

Also, last weekend, I attended the Northern Voice Personal Blogging and Social Media Conference at UBC on behalf of the ALO. We had a small table during their expo day (Saturday) and we had a chance to talk to a lot of cool artists and photographers who had a lot of questions about how to protect their digital images. That seems to be on everyone’s mind – the balance between increasing exposure to your work and protecting it from appropriation… Something to think about.

In my personal life…Last Friday I attended the ‘Capturing True Emotion’ Photography Workshop and Safari. Obviously, it was a groupon. I thought the workshop was a GREAT review of concepts that I sort of knew but didn’t have a solid grasp on. Val Westover and Stephanie Adriana did a fantastic job of tying it all together. The Safari was disappointing though. I knew that a lot of people had signed up, but the Safari just couldn’t hold that many people. I felt crowded when trying to listen to instructions and found too many other students ‘in the way’ of my shots. I ended up leaving early, but I did feel like the workshop was good enough that it was worth my money.

Also, last weekend Paul and I went to the Epic Vancouver Expo at the Convention Centre. Yes, I had a PACKED weekend. We had a LOT of fun at the expo – but I hear it was better on Saturday. There were some things (like the Epicurean Corner) which was pretty desolate by the time we go there (a lot of the food/wine sampler companies had left), so that was a bit disappointing. I liked how it wasn’t just a bunch of vendors, but the expo devoted some volunteers/employees to educating the public about fair trade through a scavenger/stamp-hunting contest for a raffle. We also took home a some great household cleaning supplies and spices and ingredients. We picked up the Chana Masala and the Butter Chicken Mix from Ace Curries To Go – haven’t tried it yet but I’ll definitely post something when I do. There were a lot of fair trade tea/coffee vendors but I already have so much tea/coffee… In any case. I will DEFINITELY go back next year, but not on the last day of the show.

I also bought my car last week! I’ll have photos soon, but it’s a red 2000 Honda Civic DX Coupe. Great little thing – it was super cheap and I kinda foresee problems by way of some noises, but I’m prepared to pay for it. So far I’m really happy with it – I had really missed driving stick. It’s not as awesome as I thought it was when I first picked it up (occasional noises that I didn’t notice when test driving) but… meh. It was a great price and in my eyes, it’s a fairly temporary car.

This has been a really long post. I’ve been doing some shopping. Metrotown now has Steve Madden, Brown’s and soon H&M!! Canucks are kicking ass in the playoffs – leading the current series 2-1. And, looking forward to starting work at Koffman Kalef in 3 weeks. Nervous, of course! I’ll be orientating new volunteers at the ALO this week, so it’ll be nice to be able to delegate a bit. More to report then…

tumbling tumbling update: too much is happening! so it’s all coming out in one post as a big flowy post.

I met Sonny Assu two weeks ago. Sonny is a multi-disciplinary artist, who merges Aboriginal iconography with the aesthetics of popular culture, to challenge social and historical ideals. We will be featuring some of his art at our exhibition this fall and it’s possible he will be participating in our dialogues. The iHamatsa Rising is my favourites, but it’s likely that we’ll be featuring his breakfast series. I LOVE them, they’re so subtle and raises so many issues as to trademarks and parody.

Another artist who I’ve met and will be featured at our exhibition is Diyan Achjadi. Diyan teaches print at Emily Carr University – super lovely. We haven’t decided which of her works we will be exhibiting, but she has some really cool stuff and I’d be excited to have any of it. Check out her website.

I’ve just finished reading Lullabies for Little Criminals, by Heather O’Neill. I liked it for what it was – being a heartbreaking coming of age story of a child who grew up with a lot of unfortunate circumstances and in a terrible environment. At times, I didn’t feel as though I was reading it through the voice and eyes of the narrator (the voice seemed too mature) and at times, I felt so drawn by the character and her naivety – almost protective against where she shouldn’t be going. The characters themselves are interesting, but the writing isn’t always. Worthwhile read, though.

Today, I attended “But What Can I Say?”, a social media workshop presented by the Greater Vancouver Professional Theatre Alliance. I really enjoyed it and found it quite interesting from a personal perspective. Angela Crocker of Beachcomber Communications conducted the workshop and was a wonderful presenter (as she will now find my amateur blog through Google Alerts). It was great to hear some of the issues that theatre groups/companies deal with in terms of curating content. I knew prior to signing onto this workshop that it wasn’t legally focused, but as a social media fan, I definitely was exposed to more methods of dissemination and it brought me up to speed on some of the services available one Web 2.0. I would have liked to hear a bit more emphasis on reviewing terms of use and some talk on the importance of attribution when ‘borrowing’ content but that’s such an anal-retentive-legal-mind point… The workshop has definitely kicked my butt into gear on promising updates to this almost-self-directed-blog.

I met Amanda Maharaj in Latin 100, and we took Ancient History, Classical Comedy, and Greek and Roman Art and Architecture together. This week, she is leaving Vancouver for an archaeological dig in Prince George for a few months, so we spent last Sunday being tourists in Vancouver!

This wasn’t just a whim – Amanda currently works for Science World, and is participating in the 2011 Tourism Challenge Adventure! The point is to visit participating attractions and collect stamps, towards being entered into a draw to win things. It’s kind of a scavenger hunt towards a raffle? Anyways – not just any Joe can participate – it’s only for employees of these attractions, and Amanda graciously took  me along!

We met up at Waterfront Skytrain Station, did our hugs and greetings, and promptly headed to Bonchaz for brunch! Amanda really enjoyed her french toast, whereas I found my omelette only mediocre. I realized afterwards (through Yelp!) that Bonchaz was known for their bread! Such is life.

Then we went back to Waterfront Station to catch the Vancouver Trolley. I didn’t get a picture of it, but it’s a San Francisco style trolley that goes through touristy areas of Vancouver! We took this trolley down towards Stanley Park, where we caught the horse-drawn carriage tour. Our horses were named Barry and Pepper.

The carriage tour turned out to be SUPER slow, so we hopped off at the next stop and bolted to the Vancouver Aquarium! I hadn’t been to the aquarium in several years – it has changed A LOT. Highly recommended, now. We watched a shark feeding and a dolphin show, and the most beautiful displays of jellyfish.

Our day ended with a walk back downtown on the seawall… And I’d like to throw some pictures up here, but I’m experiencing some technical difficulties… I had a lovely photo of our horses, as well as of the dolphins and jellyfish. Hum.

Update May 28th: PHOTOS! I fixed the permissions with the help of Malloreigh.

Day five, and I still haven’t had an opportunity to explain why this is going to be the best summer ever.

The short answer is that I’ve ALMOST bitten off more than I can chew, which means that if I make it through this summer, then I’m going to have accomplished some amazing things. But for the long answer…these are some of the projects I intend on embarking on, both personal and professional:

1. Artists’ Legal Outreach. I will be interning with them as their Summer Coordinator – this position is near-full-time, and involves administrative tasks for their legal aid clinics, as well as research for various projects, and organizing a exhibition/symposium taking place at SFU in the beginning at September. I imagine most of these posts will be about what I’m doing with them, because I think this is really rad.
2. Photography. I am HELLBENT on learning to use my DSLR camera. I will be enrolling in various workshops and photowalks/safaris, as well as learning from my very dear friend, ex-roommate, and soon (hopefully) new roommate, Joslynn. I want to keep my flickr active and post it all.
3. Adventures. As usual, I want adventures! I want to immortalize my adventures with photography! It’s all coming together! But, no. I mean it. So far, I have a weekend trip to Salt Spring Island planned with the girls at the Bullock Lake Farm Guest Cottage, and an overnight trip to Seattle with Paul to watch Aladdin the Musical at Fifth Avenue Theatres for my birthday. Depending on what else I get up to, I’d like to visit Toronto for the first time, and visit some friends in Calgary at some point. Also, as per tradition, I’ll probably take Paul somewhere for his birthday… but that hasn’t been determined yet.
4. Reading. I need to catch up on my reads. I don’t want to restrict myself by a list, but I will keep track of them. It will happen. It will be awesome.
5. Articles. This is kind of a no-brainer, and in ways, inevitable. Applications are due June 30th. Interviews are mid August. I need to get one.
6. The Bay. I can’t seem to ever get away from this place. I’ve been with them since 2003 and I just can’t seem to break away. This summer, I’ll be working in the back of the Gift Registry at the Bay Vancouver Downtown. Just a few hours a week to supplement my income, get my customer service fix and hang out with some awesome people.

I started with the Artists’ Legal Outreach this week already. I’m currently working on research for a project on developing ‘best practices for employment’ for dancers and dance companies. It’s basically research on the norms and how it’s been treated legally. Our next clinic is not until May 18th, but I have been trained for setting it up and am super excited for it. We are also doing a lot of prep work for the symposium. At this point, it is primarily arranging to meet with artists to discuss the exhibition of their art. I’m going to meet my first symposium artist later today/tomorrow, Sonny Assu, and I’m very excited!

I landed in Vancouver last night at around 10:40 (40 minutes delayed). I felt pretty off about the whole thing – this was supposed to be my last flight back from Halifax and I was feeling pretty nostalgic. Here I was, moving my life home. Big steps, in a sense.

I quite literally bumped into Paul at the baggage claim – this is quite unusual, as he usually just gets me at the pickup spot. I think it’s something about the final journey home. A few nights ago, I attempted to instigate our usual pre-Vancouver conversation about what I’m going to eat once I get home. His response was ‘no need, it’s taken care of.’ SO! I was super excited for the surprise-meal. Anyhow – at the airport, he had brought me bubble tea, as per tradition. As for the meal – we went home and he cooked lettuce wraps! (using this recipe, but substituting ground pork for chicken). AMAZING! Lettuce wraps is one of our traditional meals that we try for, but we’ve never found one good enough that we liked. So this was pretty awesome. This morning, he made me a toasted blueberry bagel with egg and bacon. Also something that he had started making while I was away and I’ve been dying to share…

So, it’s been a pretty good welcome home so far. Now – groceries, hockey game, and my reunion korean bbq dinner with the girls!

And here we are, the last night in Halifax.

I handed my paper in yesterday at 2:00pm, spent most of yesterday afternoon packing, and spent last night at the frigate for the end-of-exams party as my last Dal-law event. The Frigate is where Domus was for most of last year, so it was great to be back there – great memories there. All in all, it was a hell of a good night (minus the Canucks game) – just so many people there that I loved and will miss dearly.

Most of the packing is done now. I think I need one more box for my duvet and dishes, and I’ll send everything off tomorrow afternoon. I have 10 boxes to ship through Canada Post, two large pieces of luggage and two carry-ons.

Tomorrow is my last day in the ‘fax. On the agenda: packing, post office, farmer’s market with Em, and cleaning cleaning cleaning. Airport pick up at 4:30pm.

At 3:00 pm AST on April 21st 2011, I will hand in my last paper of 2L entitled ‘Babar In Da House: The Presence of User-Generated Content in Bill C-32′ and thus begin my summer.

This blog begins then.