Good morning 🌄
Fantastic news to start this fab Friday with 😀
I got into a new para #dragonboating#PilotProgram. It's a 7-week program starting April 6, leading to the Super Sprints Festival May 26, on the Gorge waterway. Training with head coach of the Canadian Para Dragon Boat team.
Do you have any nifty ideas for what we can possibly use as our first para dragon boating team name? We have no team name ATM & need to submit one before our first race at end of May.
@msquebanh@tezoatlipoca Here in New Zealand the harbour cities do dragon boat racing for one special day in January or February and pretend to be "Chinese" about it. It shits me off that, when the Dragon Boat Festival actually arrives, they're completely silent.
It'd be much better if they normalised it as a sport rather than as a faux festival.
They've turned the Festival into unwitting self-critique – one of its ideas is to hold firm to principles even when a crappy government doesn't.
@libroraptor@tezoatlipoca My Chinese friends here are heavily involved in both the Summer festival & year round dragon boating tasks/activities. One longtime friend owns/runs oldest kung-fu club on island & they do the lion dancing & martial arts demos at festival, at races & other supportive events. It's both a sport & it has helped bring our communities closer together.
I don't know what it's like in other places so can't speak about that.
@msquebanh@tezoatlipoca A bit of that happens here, too, but it's just one day at the wrong time of year – a special event largely where businesses do "team building" stuff and call it "the Dragon Boat Festival".
The appetite for celebrating the actual festival is low in New Zealand because (a) the cultural significance has been suppressed and (b) it's not in the New Zealand summer – here it's more about summer despite its name. You've got seasonal and cultural advantage in Vancouver!
@libroraptor@tezoatlipoca I understand what you're talking about. There's that corporate element here too - for the large Summer festival - they're not very involved the rest of the year. I support the local grassroots community teams - there are several of those teams here & some paddle year round 😊
I'm actually in Victoria, on Vancouver Island. Across the strait from Vancouver.
@msquebanh@tezoatlipoca I'm starting to get the impression that the next generation's going to get a lot of this back into the framing where it needs to be. I thought that it was my generation's job but it's dawning that our work might have been just to open the way back to the humanities (which we were forbidden from in the same breath as "tradition", but a few of us did it anyway), not necessarily to enact them. The current generation are now allowed to pursue humanities and art. It's good!
It's only natural – creative arts and humanities were previously supported because only the rich, politically dominant minority had access to university. People studied those to be at leisure, to decorate themselves with another layer of prestige and cultural legitimacy. Now that we riff-raff constitute the student majority, tertiary education has to find ways to put us back in our place.
@libroraptor@tezoatlipoca We also have longtime arts & humanities education longtime donors to schools pass away & very little people without many selfish ulterior motives have stepped up to take their places. So, we have more shady folks, being overtly shady, while working to strip even more funding from arts & humanities education & using their status/political influences to strip even more educational opportunities from the common folks.
@msquebanh@tezoatlipoca Cultural donation is something that we lack over here, at least on the North American scale. Returning here made me all the more conscious of how important they have been not only in North America, but across the northern hemisphere in general. And increasingly in Australia (like the new museum at Sydney University). But not yet here.
I benefitted immensely from Paul Mellon's anglophilia legacy in particular. He was one of the Pittsburgh steel Mellons.
2nd good news piece is I'm able to get back to #DisabledSailing lessons this year too. I was with DSA several years ago. I need to start anew again because it's been too long since I got my White Sails certification levels. DSA lost our homebase when Naden expanded navy infrastructure. We'd shared dock with Canadian Forces #sailing assn for years prior to covid. They kicked us out, during covid. I'll be taking lessons from Able Sail Victoria, running out of Oak Bay marina.
Able Sail Victoria was created on March 1, 2023, and its existence can be credited to the proud 34-year history of accessible sailing achievements of its predecessor, the Disabled Sailing Association of British Columbia, Victoria Branch.
Really pleased that the disabled sports & recreational opportunities that I've been seeking out, applying for & waiting to hear back about (for months) are bringing some great results. I am always looking & actively seek out more local opportunities to be more active, meet new likeminded folks in safe outdoor settings & enjoy some friendly sporting competitions too 🙂
@SallyStrange I'm stoked! I've been missing my other parasports. Covid had stopped my former parasports opportunities. I haven't participated in any para team sports since 2019 & eager to get back into that.
I will document my experience in this new dragon boating pilot program adventure, with photos & videos 😊
Add comment