J'aime ma bicyclette

Well it hasn't been a particularity long or hard winter, but still it is over and I am happy. The best thing about spring, for me, is that I finally get to say goodbye to public transit for eight long months. That's right time to bring out the bike again. Unfortunately for me, my bike has been out of commission since November :( and like I already said it has been a mild winter and I probably could have been riding for a good chunk of it. I was going to wait for my tax refund to get my bike fixed, as I'm a student and poor, but the recent teacher strike by my profs allowed me to do some extra work. Sooooo . . . My bike is fixed!!! I have yet to pick it up though so I will have to travel VIA public transit for a while longer.

Don't fence me in

Taking the subway this morning, even though it is a beautiful day, reminded me of why I love biking so much. Being trapped underground when I know that the sun is shining aboveground is my idea of torture. I also hate the idea of sitting, waiting and giving someone else control over my journey. On my bike I can change up my route, giving me variety and allowing me to get to know my city outside of it's dark tunnels. I also love that the very nature of riding a bike is social. Unlike driving a car, where your boxed in, on a bike there is opportunity to interact with others. I can't tell you how many times I've been out on my bike and someone has stopped me to compliment my helmet. Or how many times I've rolled my eyes with fellow cyclists at the inconsiderate things that drivers do. Yes, you can talk to people on the TTC and yes it is something that I encourage. But cyclists in Toronto tend to have a solidarity and tend to be very friendly to other cyclists. I'm not saying that I would instantly get along with someone just because they happen to ride a bike, but cyclists will always have one fundamental point on which they can unite and that is, that they all have a love for those two wheeled, self propelled and, dare I say, socially progressive things we call bicycles.

Update: I got my bike back yesterday, Thursday. The ride to school was GLOR-I-OUS! It was sunny but cool, the birds were chirping and traffic was light so I made great time. The ride home was not as great, shortly after I left school it started drizzling, traffic along Bloor was a nightmare (come on Tooker Bike Path) and then, about 10 meters from my house I got a flat. I swear the amount of flat tires I get, I think it's all the broken glass in Parkdale. No matter though, the endorphins are still a-flowing, I'll go get the flat fixed tomorrow and be back out there in no time.

World Water Day

We plan our cities near water; we bathe in water; we play in water; we work with water. Our economies are built on the strength of water transportation - and the products we buy and sell are all partly water, in one way or another. Our daily lives are built on water, and shaped by it. Without the water that surrounds us - the humidity of the air, the roughness of the river's current, the flow from the kitchen tap - our lives would be impossible.

In recent decades, water has fallen in our esteem. No longer an element to be revered and protected, it is a consumer product that we have shamefully neglected. Eighty percent of our bodies are formed of water, and two thirds of the planet's surface is covered by water: water is our culture, our life.

The theme 'Water and Culture' of WWD 2006 draws attention to the fact that there are as many ways of viewing, using, and celebrating water as there are cultural traditions across the world. Sacred, water is at the heart of many religions and is used in different rites and ceremonies. Fascinating and ephemeral, water has been represented in art for centuries - in music, painting, writing, cinema - and it is an essential factor in many scientific endeavours as well.

Each region of the world has a different way of holding water sacred, but each recognizes its value, and its central place in human lives. Cultural traditions, indigenous practices, and societal values determine how people perceive and manage water in the world's different regions.

I find it very depressing how we treat water in North America. Everyday I see people running water from the taps much longer than is nessicary, taking too long showers or drinking bottled water. THAT'S the worst! I remember having a conversation once with a friend of mine, who is a wonderful person and very progressive, but she would not let her son drink anything other than bottled water!?!?! She actually said to me "Does anyone really drink tap water these days?" I felt like shaking her and yelling "Do you know how many mothers, in how many countrys would give up their first born child just so the other eight could have access to the clean drinking water that we take for granted?" But seeing as we were in a semi-professional situation at the time, I just smiled and nodded. Fact of the matter is though North Americans are a very small percentage of human beings that have acess to safe drinking water simply by turning a tap handle. Although not all of them do. Never mind this.

It just aggravates me that people in Toronto, where the water is safe, would use up energy in the manufactureing and recyling of plastic bottles just so they don't have to drink tap water.

I'm not sure how I should mark this day. I thought about the idea of not using any water at all except to drink, but then I realized that I was badly in need of a shower. So instead I have decided to meditate on all that water means to me. I grew up on the water, I have spent a great many days in canoes in northern Ontario and I love no other sound more than the gentle lapping of water on the shore.

There is a great song by K'naan in which he incoperates the sound of water played on a loop. The lyrics are all about how vital a part of life water was to him growing up in Somalia. The songs ends with the chant:

My people drum on water, drink on water
live on water, die for water.

Talking to strangers

A couple of weeks ago as I was walking down the street in my Parkdale neighborhood first thing in the morning a elderly women smiled at me and said good morning. I was so busy looking around to see who she was talking to that I almost didn't respond. When I did realize that she was talking to me, I mumbled a quick hello and walked off.

This made me start to think about my jadedness. The women who wished me a good morning probably grew up in a time very different from our own. A time when strangers were not things to be feared, when people would strike up conversations with others on the bus, whether or not they knew them. Sure enough, in the past couple of weeks I've watched interactions between strangers in public. On the King Street car I watched as a young girl gave up her seat to a man, as she was getting off in a few stops, and then she tried to start a conversation with him. All he really had to do was keep a conversation going with a nice, young girl for less than 10 minutes. All he could muster was a few short and curt responses to what she was saying.

For my part I don't think I have ever started a conversation with a stranger but whenever a conversation is started with me I try my best to keep up my end.

There is a wonderful story here about what can happen when we do talk to strangers.

Harper Harping

Before decideing to go back to school, to presue an education in Journalism, I was an ECE at a daycare in the East end of Toronto. I was at this daycare for five years and, in fact, now that I have been locked out of my college by the faculty, I have gone back to pick up some supply work. Having been an ECE for a number of years I know a thing or two about regulated child care in this country.

One of the most lasting lessons I learned from this work was that children don't see eachother in terms of income. The child of a low-income family will happily play with the child of a more wealthy family. If only adults, especially those who currently helm this nation, could see the world through the eyes of a child.

According to Harper's child care plan parents will recieve $1200 per year for every child under the age of six, which, Harper says, will give parents a choice about what kind of care parents want to provide for their children.

Lets break this down. $1200 per year equals $100 per month, weekly that breaks down to $25. This is about enough for about two and a half hours of babysitting (and yes, babysitting one child these days does cost about $10 per hour). Why that's just enough for a stay-at-home house wife to do her weekly grocery shopping, surprise, surprise. What a joke. I'm not nieve enough to assume that Harper does not relize that not every parent has the financial means to choose to stay at home, I think he just doesn't care. This is just another example of politicos helping only those who don't need it.

While it is true that many higher income familys may have a choice for one parent to stay home with the kids, many choose not to and these parents don't want to be demonized for this choice, nor do they want to pay out the entirety of their second income towards daycare. To the rest, $1200 a year is simply laughable.

Regulated, reliable and safe childcare in Ontario can cost as much as $1200 per month, in other words parents who choose not too keep their kids at home or those who have no choice will have a whole month of child care paid for by Harper. Never mind that this plan does not adress the extream lack of regulated childcare spaces, that the daycares that are out there are badly in need of more funding or the fact that ECEs are underpaid for the work that they do.

Advertising: Offensive to men?

I often wonder if men are as offended by "lifestyle" advertising as I, as a woman, am.

I just saw an ad for Swiss Chalet in which the mother, just returning from a trip of some sort, asks her two children what they ate while she was away. They responded by saying that they ate great food, inplying that their father is perfectly competent. Of course in the end it turns out that the kids were just eating at Swiss Chalet, so dad is not so competent after all.

At first I find this, as I have my whole life, to be offensive to me as a woman. It firmly implies that in the perfect two parent (that is a man and a women by the way, never a family with two moms or two dads) family, the women does all the housework, rearing of children, cooking, etc. etc. As horribly opressive as this is to me, it must also be offensive to men. Ads like these portray men as being completly incompetent as fathers or partners in an equal marriage. It is horrible and if I were a man I would be just as offended as I am as a women.