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Hendrik and J Hock’s thoughts on homelessness in Gastown and inviting J-Hock to be part of AHA MEDIA!!
In this video, Hendrik Beune, Director of AHA MEDIA with J-Hock speak about a fancy furniture store in Gastown where Storeyeum used to be. They recall that Audrey Laferriere, a well known DTES campaigner advocated for 2 years to convert Storeyeum, which was a vacant city-owned building to be turned into a homeless shelter which didn’t happen.
Impressed with J-Hock’s thoughts, April Smith and Hendrik Beune then invite J-Hock to join AHA MEDIA and help in community reporting 🙂
This was filmed by April Smith of AHA MEDIA on a Nokia N95 mobile cameraphone. April is passionate and skilled in making Nokia films by exploring mobile media production through the camera lens of a cellphone. For a better quality version of this video, please DM April Smith @AprilFilms on Twitter.
AHA MEDIA at the scene of a supected thief being tackled in the middle of Main and Hastings in Vancouver Downtown Eastside
The tackler held the other man down in the middle of the street holding up traffic until a group of Vancouver cops came and arrested the man.
The following photographs are of the incident:
Below are two photos of the “thief” being held down in the middle of the Main and Hastings intersection by the tackling man with 2 other private secuity guards looking on as cars drove past.
In the next photo, a passerby watched as a Carnegie Centre security guard looked in on the situation between the two men.
The next three photos show members of the Vancouver Police Dept taking charge of the situation and apprending the suspect.
The next five photos show Skip Everall, Head of Security at Carnegie Centre observing the Vancouver Police Officers question both the suspect and the man who tackled him.
Skip Everall and the rest of the Carnegie Centre Security guards always do a great job in ensuring that members of Carnegie Centre always have the utmost in safety and protection.
The situation resolved with the suspect being herded off toward Vancouver Police Station. When the person in custody is being escorted by Law officers it’s nicknamed the “Walk of Shame” in the Vancouver Downtown Eastside.
AHA MEDIA is delighted to present Vancouver Police Museum’s first contest ever – “Me and a Tommy”
AHA MEDIA is very pleased to present the Vancouver Police Museum located in the heart of the Vancouver Downtown Eastside on Cordova Street right next to Fire Hall theatre
The Vancouver Police Museum is a small non-profit museum dedicated to portraying the history of the Vancouver Police Department. We are located at 240 E. Cordova Street (in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside). We also happen to be housed in a very cool building.
Below are contest details right from http://www.vancouverpolicemuseum.ca/weblog/2009/06/me-and-a-tommy/
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So stoked!
Me and a Tommy. (Image by John Biehler. Some rights reserved.) This morning, we received an email from a big movie studio, asking if we’d be interested in seeing a sneak preview of an upcoming major summer film. As you might imagine, this caught us a little off-guard, since we’ve never received any sneak preview tickets at the Police Museum before. After the shock wore off, we decided to press our luck and see how many tickets we could get. In the end, they gave us 20 (!) pairs of tickets for the screening. (Screening is in the evening of Thursday, June 25th)
We can’t tell you what film this is for yet, but we’re pretty sure you’d enjoy checking this one out before the masses. So, we’ve decided to run a contest or two in the next week to give you a chance to come join us. The first contest, we’re calling… “Me and a Tommy”.
Doesn’t everyone need an Anti-Bandit Gun? As you may know, we’re pretty proud of the eight Thompson Submachine Guns we have in our museum collection. Invented by John T. Thompson in 1919, the Thompson became infamous during the Prohibition era. It was a common sight of the time, being used by both law enforcement officers and criminals. (Vancouver Police bought 42 of them, at $50 a piece!) The Thompson was also known informally as the “Tommy Gun”, the “Trench Broom”, the “Trench Sweeper”, the “Chicago Piano”, the “Chicago Typewriter”, and the “Chopper”. (Thanks for the succinct write-up, Wikipedia!)
To win this contest, you need to take a photograph of yourself with a Tommy; could be a person, an object, a poster, arts-and-crafts, whatever… be creative, as long as it’s clearly a “Tommy’. Once you’ve got the picture, comment on this blog entry with your name and a link to your picture, or post a Twitpic on Twitter with the hashtag “#vpmtommy”. (No photoshops, or digital edits, please!)
To summarize the contest:
1) Take a picture of you and a Tommy
2) Get it online
3) ???
4) PROFIT!!!
All entries must be up before 5pm on Sunday, June 21.
Afterward, our elite panel of judge(s) will pick the most creative, unique or awesome entries and award the selected contributors each a pair of tickets to the screening. We may award as few as one or as many as five sets of tickets for this contest, depending on how much awesomeness we receive. You can submit multiple photos, but you can only win once.
Good luck to you all!
ps. The first person to post a real picture of themselves with Tommy Chong, (no photoshopping!!!) wins automatically!
AHA MEDIA is extremely honored to be mentioned in Derek Moscato’s article of Vancouver ASAHI baseball team in today’s Metro Vancouver News on page 8 ( Monday June 15, 2009)
Hendrik Beune and April Smith of AHA MEDIA are extremely honored to be mentioned in Derek Moscato’s article of Vancouver ASAHI baseball diamond demolition in Oppenheimer Park in the Vancouver Downtown Eastside today ( Monday June 15th) on page 8 of Metro Vancouver News 🙂
We at AHA MEDIA are very thankful to Derek Moscato for reading our original post about the Vancouver ASAHI and THEN writing his own article in the Metro Vancouver News. Thanks to Derek for mentioning us! We appreciate it very much! 🙂
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Below is Derek Moscato’s article in Metro Vancouver News today!
http://www.metronews.ca/vancouver/comment/article/245796–sad-end-for-japantown-s-field-of-memories
Sad end for Japantown’s field of memories
In Transit by Derek Moscato
METRO VANCOUVER
June 15, 2009 5:27 a.m.
Later this week, the Vancouver Canadians baseball team will play its much-anticipated season opener at Nat Bailey Stadium.
Expect the scene to be an upbeat one — from the singing of Take Me Out To The Ball Game to Little Leaguers cheerfully chasing foul balls in the bleachers.
But not far away, in the Downtown Eastside, a far less happy baseball story is being played out.
At Oppenheimer Park, in Vancouver’s old Japantown neighbourhood, the historic playing field of the Asahi baseball team is being demolished. The City of Vancouver is removing the ball diamond as part of its renovation of the park.
The Asahi team, formed in 1914 and comprised of Japanese-Canadian players, was a premier baseball team in the Pacific Northwest, having won numerous championships. In contrast to the home-run heroes of the modern era, their winning style was marked by stolen bases, bunts and deft fielding — all of it steroid-free.
Tragically, with the internment of Japanese-Canadians during the Second World War — and players forced to scatter across the province and the country — the team disbanded.
Forever, it turned out.
But the Asahi baseball legend lived on. The team, after all, was the touchstone for a community that had been ravaged by racism and, ultimately, forced relocation.
All of this made their home turf on Powell Street less a field of dreams, and more a field of memories — memories steeped in glory and melancholy.
Which is why the demolition of the diamond has some folks, including Downtown Eastside activists and citizen journalists Hendrick Beune and April Smith, fuming.
They note that in recent years, the Japantown community had resumed a baseball tournament on the grounds to honour the team.
But Beune tells me his pleas to save the diamond have been met with silence or even resistance. Which is a shame, since there is no turning back now.
The news isn’t all bad. According to the Vancouver Park Board, the team will be remembered at Oppenheimer, and a reference to the team will be interwoven in the mesh of a commemorative backstop.
But the diamond, the bleachers and the original backstop will all be gone.
In the city’s defence, it is dealing with numerous stakeholders at a site that has been under siege for decades. This is the Downtown Eastside we are talking about.
But that doesn’t make the demise of the historic Asahi grounds any less tragic.
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AHA MEDIA’s original post is here 🙂
AHA MEDIA attended BOB’s Green Inner-City event at Japanese Language School on June 10, 2009
Peter Davies of AHA MEDIA attended the following event by BOB 🙂 http://www.bobics.org
Below is text from BOB’s new blog at http://greeningtheinnercity.ca/
Join the Greening the Inner-city team for the kickoff event for BOB’s Green Inner-city Cluster. Learn from local green business leaders such as Toby Barazzuol of Eclipse Awards
and Louise Schwarz of the Recycling Alternative on how being green can be a competitive advantage for your organization.
Topics covered will include:
- Marketing Sustainability
- Greening Your Organization
- Green Buildings and Green Roofs
- Recycling and Waste Reduction
- Collaborating to increase efficiency
- Urban Agriculture
There will be presentations but also peer learning opportunities where attendees can share what has worked most successfully at their own organization. We are pleased to have Councilor Andrea Reimer giving the opening address. She is a leader in BC’s environmental movement and a member of the Mayor’s Greenest City Action Team.
Schedule:
| Time | Craft Room 3rd Floor w/ Projector | Tatami Room 5th Floor |
|---|---|---|
| 10:00 -10:15 | Welcome Address – Andrea Reimer – roof top patio weather permitting | |
| 10:15-10:30 | TBA | |
| 10:30 – 11:30 | How can being sustainable give you a competitive advantage? How to market your sustainability practices for maximum benefit? – Marketing Green with Toby Barazzuol, Saul Good, and Andrew “Muskie” McKay | What we are doing now that is green in our organization? – Sharing and learning about greening an organization with Kristina Welch and Maureen Cureton |
| 11:30 – 12:00 | <!– What current policies are in place in Vancouver to promote the green economy? What changes is the Greenest City Action Team considering to make Vancouver the Greenest City in the World? – Green Policy with Kristina Welch and Kira Gerwing –> TBD | How can you reduce and recycle inputs to your products and services? How can we take control of the complete full circle product lifecycle? – Wasted – The Shift from Recycling to Zero Waste with Louise Schwarz and Seann Dory |
| 12:00 – 12:30 | Lunch | |
| 12:30 – 1:00 | How can you grow your own food? How can the inner-city increase its food security and create green jobs? – Urban Agriculture with Kristina Welch and Chris Hild | What is a green building? Where can I see green architechtural design locally? How can green buildings benefit my organization and the inner-city community? – Green Buildings, Green Roofs, and Energy Efficiency with Toby Barazzuol, Morgan McDonald, and Doug Horn |
| 1:00 – 1:30 | How can you play a part in creating green jobs in our community and greening the inner-city? – Brainstorming Sessions led by Shirley Chan, Andrew “Muskie” McKay and TBA | |
| 1:30 – 2:00 | Closing Address – Toby Barazzuol and TBD | |
Toby, the cluster, and Strathcona BIA’s efforts were recently profiled in the Vancouver Courier.
To see 37 photos, please see our Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ahamedia/sets/72157619651861120/
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