www.vancouver21.com

January 03, 2013

Dear Mayor Robertson,

Re: NYE Bash for Vancouver for 2014

Vancouver needs a public, outdoor, open-to-all New Year’s Eve (NYE) Party. Not only for all citizens to celebrate the new year but also a perfect opportunity to remind the world of our unique heritage and formidable capabilities in hosting global events like the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Expo 86 and so on.

New Year’s Eve is the single most recognized event in the world among all cultures. That is why all major cities around the globe put on an elaborate show and are competing for attention. Not only should Vancouver be among them, we should shine in our own special way to claim our position as the crown jewel of the Pacific Northwest. Please do not hand Seattle that honor. To not participate in the NYE party tradition and be in tune with the rest of the world is to miss out on one of the best times of the year to promote our city.

Yes, there is a mini-NYE celebration at Robson Square for 2013, but the skating ring area is simply too small to host such a premiere event. Jack Poole Plaza is the right place to do it. We have the Christmas tree there with the Vancouver Convention Center and Canada Place nearby, two buildings that have connections to the city’s glorious past as host to a winter Olympic and world exposition as we look forward to build even better future.

We could further reinforce our international image as a city that is committed to sustainability principles and reducing carbon footprint by only re-lighting the Olympic Cauldron at the moment of count-down. This would be even better than a simple ball-drop to serve notice to the world of our serious intention to become the Greenest City in the World by 2020, a vision of yours, Mr. Mayor, that many of us wholeheartedly support and feel have a role to play in the implementation of the Greenest City 2020 plan.

Vancouver is not only a world-class city but one that many others look upon with admiration and even envy. To be without a NYE bash for a city like ours is like running a global business without an impressionable web site these days. It is not even an option. People won’t take you seriously.

Please Mr. Mayor, allow me to urge City Hall and Council to take action to start the new year right for 2014 and plan a NYE bash for those of us who live here and use that opportunity to tell the world of our many attractive attributes as a global destination for tourists, innovative hub for leading businesses and great place to live.

Thank you very much. My very best wishes to you and your council and have a wonderful 2013!

Sincerely,

Ray Van Eng
Media Professional

__________________________________________________________

To the readers of this blog –

If you believe in having a public outdoor NYE Bash in Vancouver that all can enjoy, please join me in sending a request to Mayor Gregor Robertson at this City of Vancouver Facebook address – https://www.facebook.com/CityofVancouver?fref=ts

Vancouver 2012 Christmas Tree with 2010 Olympic & Paralympic Cauldron [Photo by Ray Van Eng]

Ray Van Eng is a long-time Vancouver media professional, screenwriter and movie & TV producer. One of his videos is currently on view at the Hava Nagila Exhibit, Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust in New York City. from Sep 2012 to May 2013.

Vancouver Convention Center & Jack Poole Plaza

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As one of the featured designers of the Vancouver ECO Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2013 (SS2013) or Season 5 (EFW05), Kim Cathers’s 68 Pound Challenge is certainly unique. The collection is so named because the garments were made entirely from 68 pounds of recycled, thrift clothing and fabric.

After completing a fashion design program at the Blanche Macdonald Centre, Kim choose to work mostly with recycled or natural material for her sustainable women’s wear and accessories which she called her kdon clothing line. She also made leather goods and restyling vintage clothes and enjoyed traveling to music festivals and farmers markets to sell her ware as well.

The soundtrack used for her catwalk runway show at the ECO Fashion Week SS2013 was overwhelmingly country music e.g. Jolene by Dolly Parton, Circle Be Unbroken by John & June Carter Cash, On The Road Again by Willie Nelson, Tennessee Flat-top Box by Roseanne cash among others.

Her fashion designs had drawn praise from around the country and were featured in Project Runway Canada season 2.

[A Video by Ray Van Eng | www.vancouver21.com ]

Robson Square – 800 Robson Street, Vancouver BC

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ECO Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2013 (Oct 16-19, 2012) – ADHESIF by Melissa Ferreira featuring green sustainable clothing design at Robson Square in Vancouver Canada

Vancouver-based green eco-conscious fashion designer Melissa Ferreira’s Adhesif Clothing Company uses new and recycled fabrics to create noticeable and original one-of-a-kind garments. Every garment retains its very own personality. ECO Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2013 (SS2013) Sustainable and environmentally-friendly clothing design catwalk runway show at Robson Square in downtown Vancouver on Oct 18, 2012. (Music by Alex Beroza, Emerge in Love)

[A Video by Ray Van Eng | www.vancouver21.com ]

Robson Square – 800 Robson Street, Vancouver BC

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ECO Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2013 Sustainable Green Clothing Design show in Vancouver @ Robson Square (Oct 16-19, 2012) adheres to a Environmentally-Friendly and Totally No-Waste Principle

The ECO Fashion Week Spring/Summer 2013 (SS2013) line-up of sustainable, earth-loving and environmentally-friendly fashion designers includes Nicole Bridger, Standing Arm, Rise, Mala Imports, Voyou, Ressac, Respecterre, C5H8 and others. Value Village continues to support the event featuring designs by Nicolette Lang-Andersen, Mimi Lauzon and Tony Vu. Kim Cathers offers her unique brand of 68 Pound Challenge with Adhesif Clothing b y Melissa Ferreira closes the runway show on Thursday.

On Friday (Oct 19), the last day of the ECO Fashion Week SS2013 is a series of seminars covering a range of industry subjects such as labor, manufacturing, trends, upcycling, consumer awareness etc. with ECO Fashion Week CEO & Founder Myriam Laroche and other industry experts like Martin Hojsik (Greenpeace), Tara Sawatsky (Canopy) and others.

Eco fashion designers mostly use recycled, reclaimed and vintage fabrics for their clothing creation. As a result, a lot of the clothing designs are one-of-a-kind, or as designer Myco Anna describes hers, ‘every piece is unique in the way it combines new and recycled fabrics and fibers like a kaleidoscope.’ Some designers also give away scrap or surplus fabrics to other textile artists to utilize and work with, adhering to a totally no-waste and everything-recycled principle.

[Photos by Ray Van Eng | www.vancouver21.com ]

































Robson Square, 800 Robson Street, Vancouver BC

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October 18-24, 2010 is Canada’s national Waste Reduction Week 2010. Thirteen provinces and territories are participating in this annual event which is organized by a coalition of recycling councils such as RCBC, the Recycling Council of British Columbia. Recycling Council of Ontario and other similar non-profit organizations across the country.

This year, two new programs are introduced. The Ease My Load campaign which is an effort to encourage Canadians to reduce waste and recycle more. Those who take part can post their stories and photos online at the Ease My Load web site – http://www.wrwcanada.com/ease_my_load . You can also upload videos to your Youtube account and embedded in your submission to the Ease My Load web site as well.

Got an old cell phone you are dying to get rid of but don’t know how? No, don’t throw it in the garbage bin, recycle it.


Recycle My Cell is another new program launched this year by Waste Reduction Week in Canada. http://www.recyclemycell.ca/

Before you take your cell phone to the recycling depot though, here is a checklist of things to paid attention to.

1) Make sure the charges on the phones are paid and the device itself is actually deactivated.
2) Remove the SIM card if there is one.
3) Bring the headset, charger and extra batteries along and dispose (or donate) them at the same time.
4) Erase any data in the phone, including messages, text etc. especially data that contains your personal information.

Cell Phone recycle drop-off locations
Free Cell Phone Data Eraser – Erase Cell Phone Data Safely.

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Once again Vancouver is taking a leadership role in sustainability practices, this time with electronic toy recycling. The Canadian Toy Association and Waste Management pioneered an electronic toy recycling collection service to encourage consumers to bring in their used, wasted, unwanted, obsolete or damaged electronic toys to a depot for recycling and get rewards points that are redeemable at participating stores. A self-serve and interactive Greenopolis Recycle and Reward vending machine allows the public to scan in their toys, calculates the reward points and prints out receipts for redeeming. Electronic toys are defined by toys that use batteries or require electricity to run. Non-electronic toys are not accepted at this time.

The one day event was held on October 02, 2010 at the Walmart Supercentre at 3585 Grandview Highway in Vancouver. This is a developing pilot project supported by Recycling Council of British Columbia (RCBC) and will be implemented as a long-term project so people can dispose their electronic toys responsibly in an environmentally–friendly fashion that can help in recouping valuable resources and keep them out of landfills and reducing our carbon footprint as well.

On hand to help launch this North America first pilot program were Mary Polak, Minister of Children and Family Development, Richard Lee, MLA Burnaby North, BC, Phil Murphy, Waste Management, Brock Macdonald, Executive Director, Recycling Council of B.C. among others.

VIDEO – Vancouver Electronic Toy Recycling depot

3585 Grandview Highway, Vancouver BC

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Japan fisherman dance depicts the hardship of a young fisherman’s life. The performance is part of All Over The Map dance series, a summer festival of multicultural arts and culture at Vancouver’s Granville Island in July & August, 2010.


For more than 30 years, the Powell Street Festival has always been in the Japantown area of Oppenheimer Park on Powell Street near downtown Vancouver. Because of renovation plans at Oppenheimer last year, the event was relocated to Woodland Park, not quite the same neighborhood but nearby. This year the 34th annual Powell Street Festival, one of the oldest community arts festival in Vancouver, is back and calling it a homecoming return to Oppenheimer Park.

Without the Powell Street Festival, many tourists or even long-time Vancouver residents wouldn’t think of or realize that there was a Japantown in Vancouver. That’s because Vancouver’s Japanese community has seen its decline since the Japanese internment during WWII (an injustice done to the Japanese Canadians) and the post-war boom of the Japanese economy which has also lured many Japanese Canadians back to their home country.

Now that the Powell Street Festival is back and shall continue its tradition of celebrating the arts and culture of Japanese Canadians which like many multicultural groups in Canada is undergoing some major changes the longer they have set foot in Canada or for many of the newer generations are actually born in this country. From this year’s programmes and schedules, a large majority of the performances are a mix of different cultures. Even their names and descriptions indicate a melting of some sort is going on. Paris in Tokyo, Shout!WhiteDragon and Haagen & Ryuzen. Others such as Coração Boêmio, a Portuguese-Japanese act, Katari Taiko with Mario Zetina, ancient Asia drumming act with a Latin influence etc. all feature a mating of opposite polarities of different forces at work to achieve a yin-yang harmony.

The Powell Street Festival is actually too large and diverse to be contained in one single-block long public park. There are ticketed theatre acts, night performances, walking tours, museum exhibits, movie screenings, community and special events etc. happening in different venues around town. For sustainability, the Powell Street Festival has introduced the Zero Waste Challenge and Free Bike Valet service for the last three years. The idea is to encourage recycling, ride the bike, use public transportation to come to the festival and other green initiatives.

Something old and something new. There are plenty of traditions to appreciate though. For example, Sa-do (Tea Way or Tea Service) will be presented by Urasenke Foundation of Vancouver. Ikebana, the art of Japanese flower arranging, Bonsai, the art of miniature trees growing, Origami, Sumo, Karate, Aikido demos etc. are all things Japan. Last but not least will be the Omikoshi which is an ancient traditional ceremonial ritual of carrying a portable shrine by a group of carriers who are believed to be possessed by a divine spirit. They will rock the omikoshi, make noises to bring good fortune to those who happen to be nearby. Don’t miss it.

Oppenheimer Park, 400 Powell Street, Vancouver BC

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The fountain outside the Vancouver Planetarium is on parkland and is maintained by City of Vancouver. According to Paul Shu, Manager of Engineering Services, fresh waters at the pond are being recycled throughout the day to jet them from underneath the Crab sculpture to provide a spectacular sight for visitors. However, the tap is turned off periodically to conserve energy and to carry out maintenance services for the motor and the filter. The city does recognize that water is a precious resource and citizens are asked to conserve it whenever they can especially during the warm summer months when rainfall is scare in Vancouver and snowmelts up on nearby mountain have mostly depleted until the fall and winter.

Water jetting below The Crab sculpture by George Norris at the Vancouver Planetarium

Vancouver Planetarium front view with water fountain turned off

Two ladies having an animate conversation in front of The Crab sculpture


Vancouver Planetarium, 1100 Chestnut Street, Vancouver BC

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As the City of Vancouver web site points out, only 3% of the fresh water in the world is fresh water and less than 1% is available for human consumption. So water is a very precious resource and we shall conserve it whenever we can. There are 3 reservoirs in the Vancouver area: Capilano, Seymour and Coquitlam. These reservoirs collect rain water and snow melts. Especially in the dry summer months, water level at these reservoirs can run quite low and citizens are advised to save water. Some of the water in your home is heated, knowing how to conserve water cuts your energy bill as well. Visit the Water Conservation web page for details.

Sustainable water use
Vancouver Lawn sprinkling regulations

Water Conservation Hot line #: (604) 873-7000

Vancouver’s Capilano Reservoir holds fresh water collected from rain and snow-melt



Capilano Reservoir and Cleveland Dam in North Vancouver


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Garbage is what we throw out and never want to see again but when Vancouver’s Delta Landfill had an open house, thousands of Vancouver area residents and out-of-town tourists flocked to visit the garbage dump. Calling Delta’s site a landfill is just a nicer way to label it really because you don’t spent so much energy and manpower to create just little bit of land. There are much better ways to do that if real estate is what you have in mind. Some call it a solid waste management facility and that is the right term though, because a lot of effort goes into the proper disposal and burial of garbage that people no longer want. Anyway at the open house, the public (many came with their kids) get to ride the monster bulldozers and experienced what was like being in the driver’s seat of a landfill CAT operator. But most of them did not know or bother to check out the real garbage dump site just a short distance away where ’land’ is supposed to be ’filled’. And that is really where the action is. See my Youtube report of Landfill Solid Waste Management in Vancouver’s Delta Dump Site. OK, let the journey begin.




You go through a narrow tunnel to get to the Delta Landfill site.


A bird scarer is hopeless in trying to drive away so many gulls

Gulls and other birds feed on garbage at the Delta Landfill

A truck came out of the landfill site after dumping a load of garbage

Asbestos bin and the landfill site behind the slope

CAT bulldozer works the recycling site.

Whole family helps themselves with some free composts.

Plenty of monster bulldozers to check out.

The bulldozer controls are very much like those for video games.

Teeth on the wheel helps flatten garbage into moles at the dump site.

In case of fire, pull locking pin and strike down hard on Actuator Knob.

Kid at bulldozer driver’s seat.

5400, 72nd Street, Delta, BC

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