My Cheap Trip to Venice

Yesterday’s Eye Magazine had a neat little section in their travel section about “Five Trips Under $100” for the cash-strapped adventurer, and it made me think of a little low-budget traveling I did a few years ago.

A few years ago for Valentine’s Day, I decided to go out on a limb and take someone special to Venice on a very limited budget. Here’s how it went:

• First, I borrowed a canoe from my friend (yes, I have friends that own canoes), set it up in my apartment, and decorated it like a gondola, complete with cardboard cutout oarsman. Around the canoe, I created a canal with kraft paper painted blue (with some fish thrown in) and a dock leading up to the canoe.
• Next, I hopped on the Internet, grabbed a whole bunch of photos of Venice and set them up in a slideshow, which I then projected onto the wall in front of the canoe.
• In the corner of the living room, I then set up a faux-restaurant, with Italian decor and candles and all, where I set up a pasta dinner that I had just made in the kitchen.
• Finally, I set up a music mix of sounds from the Venetian canals, Italian classics, and that music they always play with fireworks (which I timed to coincide with fireworks being projected onto the wall after dinner).

Sure, it took some work and preparation — and a whole lot of imagination — but it wasn’t all too expensive, and it was definitely an experience never to forget. If you’re cash-strapped but still want to take a special someone on a memorable trip, this just might be the way to do it.

Eye’s list of five low-budget trips is Toronto-specific, but equally as interesting:

1. ALL-NIGHT SAFARI: Stay up with a friend, midnight to dawn, and watch the weird rhythms of our mean streets like a Martian scientist. Check out sunrise from a clear vantage point and reward yourselves with a huge buffet breakfast at a four-star hotel. High and low never looked so good together.
2. CHINATOWN AS A PRIVATE EXPERIMENT: Chinatown, Little India, mini-Hanoi — whatever. Smell the smells, ask big questions, buy fat purple things and cook them up to an imported CD of the culture’s music. If they kill you, too bad. At least you didn’t die of boredom.
3. URBAN CAMPING: Surprisingly, most Canadian cities have real campgrounds in adjacent suburbs, charging $22 for a tent site, $8 for firewood, etc. The raccoon-screeching comes free. Those white things in the sky are called stars.
4. LONG HIKE ON A SHORT PIER: People now windsurf out in Hamilton Bay in late winter and early spring, against the background of Steeltown’s skyward flame-throwers. For the price of a GO Train ticket, you too can make friends with global warming, one blue toe at a time.
5. SPECIALIZED CITY TOURS: Everybody’s an expert on something very focused these days: 19th-century ghost houses, Mafia hitman sites, Modernist architecture. Find the guide and you’ll find the weirdness that Gran and Gramp knew as daily life.

Each of those ideas above are great, and I’ve done all of them (some of them regularly) except for number 4, which I’m going to have to try out as soon as exams are done in two weeks.

Book Censorship Hurts Students

After receiving glowing praise from reviewers including the American Library Association, and being nominated for the Ontario Library Association’s prestigious Silver Birch Award, I’m sure Deborah Ellis was as surprised as I was when various school boards across Ontario, including the large Toronto District School Board, decided to restrict access to her recent book Three Wishes: Palestinian and Israeli Children Speak to a number of Ontario students.

Responding to a complaint by the Canadian Jewish Congress, the Toronto District School Board decided to pull Three Wishes — which tells the honest and poignant stories of children caught in a conflict that is beyond their control — off the shelves of all libraries serving students under the seventh grade. While the CJC claims that the book “demonizes both sides” of the conflict, I believe more harm is being done by hiding Ellis’ book from students than allowing them to read it and understand how other people their own age live.

In a special statement by Deborah Ellis published in the Toronto Star entitled Kids are tough enough for the truth, Ellis states that “anything we subject children to should be reflected in our literature for young people, limited only by the skills of the writer to present these crimes in a sensitive, respectful way. Otherwise, we are adding to the silence and the disappearance of the victims.” Indeed, censorship is no way to handle a situation like this: instead, we should be allowing children to read this book and then ask questions. When Ontario’s students read books like Three Wishes, they are engaging in a process of learning and questioning that will only help increase dialogue and understanding, rather than “demonize” anyone.

A press release issued by PEN Canada (see pdf here) applauds the Ontario Library Association for recognizing Ellis’ book, and urges the Toronto District School Board to reconsider their decision to censor an important piece of children’s literature:

Indeed, Deborah Ellis has provided age-appropriate commentary that is both balanced and nuanced in her introduction and in prefaces to each child’s story. While in a number of instances children express extreme views — for example a Palestinian girl talks about wishing to see her suicide-bomber sister in paradise, and an Israeli boy describes Palestinians as “sneaky, full of tricks” and wishes they would all just leave and live somewhere else — it is very clear that these are among the range of voices sounding within the sad context of a bitter and intractable dispute. Other children express a desire to be able to get to know the other side and criticize both the suicide bombings and the excesses of the Israeli Defence Force.

Censorship of this kind will not ‘protect’ children from the real issues that envelop our globe. Instead, it will hurt Ontario’s students, as they will not be equipped with the understanding necessary to learn more about these pressing issues. I hope that the Toronto District School Board, along with other school boards across Ontario, reconsider and allow Ellis’ wonderful exposé about a difficult topic be shared with the people who need to read it the most: our country’s future.

Maisonneuve Goes Local

Maisonneuve, my favorite magazine in Canada, recently announced that it will be shedding its current incarnation and become a Montreal-based city magazine. I must admit that I’m saddened by the news, but I can fully understand why this move needed to be made in order for Maisonneuve to remain not only relevant, but financially viable.

I currently read Maisonneuve because it represents everything that an educated and cultured magazine should be: the writing is excellent, the visual design is above par, and the content as a whole is perfectly geared towards urban culture and the country’s vibrant art scene. The magazine is an excellent compendium of the untold stories from the streets, lofts, theatres, concert halls, galleries, and parking lots of Canada, and it offers a fresh and critical perspective to the goings-on in all spheres of this country’s political, social, and cultural structures.

Maisonneuve becoming a Montreal-centered magazine will necessarily mean a shift in perspective and outlook to stay in line with the shift in the target demographic. It will also mean a loss of an avenue for aspiring writers and urban chroniclers (like myself) outside the Montreal area to get published, as our content will be less relevant to the magazine’s new audience. I will still keeping reading Maisonneuve, as I am sure the writing will continue to be topical and interest-piquing, but I rue the fact that the new region-centricism of the magazine will lead to a loss of opportunity for artists, photographers, and writers that aspired to contribute to a national magazine that challenged ordinary thinking.

Of course, in the end, I’m just jealous that Montreal is getting Maisonneuve and we’re still stuck with Toronto Life here.

Jason Reitman Talks Cigarettes

When director Jason Reitman sat down on the couch for our interview at the Park Hyatt, he was visibly tired. After spending the previous day in Miami and then attending a dinner in Washington DC, Reitman took the red-eye to Toronto an proceeded to spend the entire day fielding questions from reporters. Yet, despite his exhaustion, Reitman was quite enthusiastic to answer questions about his soon-to-be-released movie Thank You for Smoking. Jason Reitman definitely has a right to be enthusiastic. The 29-year old’s first full-length feature film — which premiered at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival and has been gathering critical acclaim in the months since then — is a wonderfully-crafted satirical look at the world of political lobbying. Reitman himself doesn’t smoke, and admits that though “cigarettes are the sexiest topic,” Thank You for Smoking could have been about any of the large lobby groups that yield influential control in the American political system.

The Montreal-born director admits that though Stanley Kubrick was his idol, it was films such as Linklater’s Slacker, Smith’s Clerks and Anderson’s Bottle Rocket that showed him “what a comedy could be.” Having a film-maker father (the celebrated Ivan Reitman, who spent much of his early life in Toronto and directed classics like Ghost Busters) allowed Jason to get familiar with being on a movie set, which he claims can be extremely daunting for a first-time director: “It’s a circus. It’s actually no place to make a movie.”

Unlike other film directors, Reitman is in close contact with his audience. He maintains a weblog (set up by Fox Searchlight on Typepad) where he shares his experiences as the travels the continent promoting his film, even detailing his Oscar choices (which weren’t as astute as he had hoped) for this year’s Academy Awards. Yet, despite having this outlet, Reitman still found it difficult to effectively communicate through the blog, until he found another tool: “My little sister told me about MySpace […] I’ve got 80 friends or so already.”

Before I had to let him go for a screening of his movie and a Q&A session with college and university students from across the city, Reitman shared his reasons for focusing his Thank You for Smoking promotion tour on today’s young people. Growing up, Reitman was “infuriated” by being constantly told how to live, whether it was through people around him or the media, and was optimistic about the slightly younger generation than his own: “I feel you have a bullshit detector, and that’s what makes you battle-ready in the world of spin.” And what’s next from Reitman after this? “I like small movies: comedies that don’t have to apologize for themselves.” I know I’m already anxiously anticipating his next movie, but Jason, make sure you get some rest first.