Thursday – Call for Volunteers – Free Computer!

In the very near future, Toronto Free-Net will be making available very low cost computers packaged with TFN Internet connections and pre-configured for dial-up with a commercial version of Xandros.com Linux.

We have a lot of computers!

We need some volunteers to help to prepare to move about 20 heavy skids of computers, currently stored near Laird and Eglinton (central northeast Toronto.) If you are interested, we will need you from 9:30 am to 2pm on Thursday, Oct 19th. Lunch and transit tickets will be supplied.

Once we have these computers refurbished, each volunteer will receive one.

To volunteer, please apply by emailing execdir@torfree.net using the same subject as this message, stating any relevant experience.

Ken McCracken

Executive Director

Toronto Free-Net

Have yourself a look at this video of yesterday’s Apple Store opening at the Toronto Eaton Centre; at the end of it you may recognize the guy in the orange shirt.

Full story tomorrow!

(A parking sign on Dundas West, undoubtedly trampled to death by pedestrians…)

Each and every holiday weekend that I spend here in Toronto makes me ever more grateful that I don’t work a nine-to-five job, and that I don’t have to drive, eat or shop when the overwhelming majority of the city’s population does the same. And yet yesterday brought with it such a pleasant spring afternoon that I purposely set out to shop the crowded streets of both Chinatown and Kensington Market.

After half a block of Augusta Avenue I was ready to start throwing blind punches at anyone within arm’s length—I tallied no less than five separate occurrences where a group of people walking directly in front of me would spontaneously decide to stop and have a chat about some stupid thing in the middle of an already-congested sidewalk. This was in marked contrast to the hustle and bustle of my local Chinese supermarket, where people, shopping carts and even rolling skids of raw produce all threatened to run me over as I navigated the narrow aisles quick as I could.

At least these Chinatown shoppers moved with a purpose, and when all is said and done I think I’d rather endure their pushing and shoving than the oblivious meanderings of Kensington elite…

Houston, we have a problem…

It’s not that Burrito Boyz isn’t in every way deserving of its massive success—their halibut burrito is good enough to have weaned me from my pre-Conservatory Class slice of pizza at Mamma’s around the corner. It’s just that both of the downtown Toronto locations have become so busy at all hours of the day and night that going in and ordering something is an intimidating affair.

And forget about finding a seat to enjoy your meal; you’ll have to make do with a nearby alleyway or nightclub stoop. But the passers-by won’t mind—they’re likely on their way to Burrito Boyz too!

If you can believe it, a small crowd gathered outside a sushi joint just to watch this cat lick a discarded ice sculpture. And now that moment belongs to the ages…

There goes the neighbourhood…

Drama Program

• Café, directed by Kelvin Sng
  • Cultures collide in a late-night café, and the Japanese guy watching the proceedings seems to get it all wrong. The audience loveed the character with the heavy Singlish accent.
• Parcel, directed by Lu Lu Yang
  • A young postman is haunted by a violent childhood memory. The package that he carries around turns out to be empty. I didn’t get it.
• Strings, directed by Jon Lim
  • A creepy take on the ties that bind, and easily the audience favourite of the afternoon. More than a bit derivative of Ringu and Ju-on: The Grudge but hey, why mess with the classics?
• More Than Words, directed by Kelvin Sng
  • A bitter-sweet gangster romance, set in the ‘70s. Kudos to the costume designer for the bell-bottom pants and platform shoes!

Documentary Program

• Past Tense, directed by Mirabelle Ang
  • A lyrical piece on the narrator’s return to the lion state. A bit too arty for me.
• Singapore Rebel, directed by Martyn See
  • Profiling Dr. Chee Soon Juan‘s ongoing attempts to bring true democracy to Singapore. Pretty disheartening that the government basically bankrupted this guy out of running for office…
• Singapore Ga Ga, directed by Pin Pin Tan
  • Due to technical difficulties we only saw the first few minutes of this film, a look into Singapore’s more colourful local characters. Too bad. It looked very promising.

During the intermission between the two programs the audience was treated a free indigenous buffet—but sadly, no durian.

My sincere thanks and congratulations to Yeow-Tong Chia and all the volunteers who made this event happen. I’d say it was a big success!

(A platter of Singapore Slings served up at the famous Raffles Hotel…)

Apologies for this very last minute heads-up, but if anyone’s interested there’s a Singapore Short Film Festival happening this afternoon at Innis Town Hall. It starts at 12:45pm, so you still have a couple of hours to make it there!

It’s worth making a special trip downtown to see the memorial for Jean Creba, the teenager shot and killed in an exchange of gunfire on Yonge Street this past Boxing Day. If you read the many messages there you’ll see that people are scared and angry, but more than anything else simply grieving for a fellow citizen whose life was so needlessly taken from her.

Local police are calling this the loss of Toronto’s innocence, but it’s heartening to see in this small memorial that we haven’t stopped caring about each other just yet…

Thanks to fellow bruncher and AC.ca lurker Ed Wong for passing on news of a raid on Pacific Mall by police last weekend. Apparently over 150,000 pirate DVDs were seized at the mall and other suburban locations.

I had taken Al Howell up to Pacific Mall for his first visit a couple of weekends ago, and even I was taken aback at the blatant peddling of pirated discs. At least three booths were lined wall to wall with DVDs stacked on spindles, with another stack of empty cases ready and waiting at the cash register.

Still, one sound bite from the CTV story is especially irritating. If police want to “send a message” to DVD bootleggers, then mission accomplished. But by buying such goods, aren’t us common folk also sending the message to the studios that their wares are overpriced?