Christmas Eve

Took Monty dog to the kennel this morning so that Jim and I could go out of town for the weekend.He was incredulous and not at all happy with the arrangement. After work we packed up and headed to Chilliwack for the vesper service. Scriptures of Christ's birth were read by some of the children in the congregation and I played the piano. Now we are all tucked it at the Harrison Hot Springs Resort and are looking forward to tomorrow.

Pastor Janine McCulley

Fellow Musicians

Bonnie, myself, and Shonnet

BLISS!

I spent a few hours of glorious bliss today in my new favorite store, Choices Market, a wonderful health food store in White Rock. I wept at so many, dare I say, choices of tofu: garlic and herb or sundried tomato, crackers: how about baked sesame and rice, cheeses: tomato and basil feta and paneer, boysenberry spritzers, chai tea, 2 different kinds...just because, and the special "Barista Blend" soy beverage to give it that Starbucks Soy Chai Tea Latte touch. I even looked longingly at the huge selection of salt lamps and salt candle holders ( yes, I know, I already have one and I even brought it with me, but one can never have too much health and happiness!). http://www.saltlamp.ca/ I was so deliriously happy that it was all I could do to not hug all the employees and tell them thank you so much for being here, your store is so beautiful,everything looks so good...I feel so at home ( those 7 years at Rainbow Natural Foods never really leaves, I guess) and what's more I no longer have to have my mom send me things from the health food store in Independence!



To cap off my wonderful day at the market I decided to go to the ocean.Why? you ask...because I can. I live in British Columbia,snow-draped mountains are snuggled around me, it's December 16, it is only 25 minutes away, my first semester is done and I got A's in my classes...just because I can!






Houses, in particular the "castle", across from the beach

By some strange fate I have been dropped off in the middle of this beautiful landscape.......I wish you all were here to enjoy it with me!

End of the semester

It has been a crazy ride since school started in September, but the first semester has come to an end. My tutorials were done last Wednesday, my classes last Friday, and I finished grading papers today. Looking back over the past 4 months,I enjoyed my tutorials for CRIM 315, Restorative Justice, the most. The students...for the most part were terrific and I knew that no matter how gritty and exhausting my own classes were at the moment, Wednesday was coming and I was going to have a fun day.

















Jana and Julliana

Dr. Glackman








Gordon and Alysha







Krynn and Viktoria

I'm amazed at the strong bonds that have formed between everyone in my classes(akin to trench warfare relationships I would imagine). Everyone rallies behind the one who at the moment is ready to pack it in and go home...and we all have been in that spot at one point or another this semester. " I absolutely hate my life. I can't do this!" "I haven't been to sleep for 2 days, I'm so exhausted and I'm still not done with my papers/projects/readings/quizzes, grading." "I miss my family/boyfriend/friends/dog and I want to go home." And this was just the first week! :)

The chorous of "Yes you can, just hang on, it will get better" "Don't give up...we're all miserable too!" rings out and everyone takes a deep breath and presses on. Shared smiles, grimaces, pats on the back, and hugs makes all the difference.

Jim and I will be going to Harrrison Hot Springs for Christmas. It will be very strange not being with all our family and friends for the holidays, but we will take the laptop with us and Skype everyone.

This is the part I'm looking forward to.........







http://http//www.harrisonresort.com/default.aspx

We will leave after the Christmas Eve service at church and stay until Monday.






Now that I have had five minutes to lift my head up from the books, papers, and grading I stand amazed at the beauty all around me and I wonder how I got here. Surely this must be someone elses life that I am living at the moment, it certainly doesn't resemble the one I have known.


The scene out my front door a few weeks ago








And now, the end of the first semester calls for a celebration! After 4 hours under the expert of hands of Lisa...wahla! A whole new me.

Well, really it's the same old me, just with cool new hair!

Jim said he feels like he's cheating on his wife, I take that as a compliment.

Restorative Justice Conference at Ferndale

"An over-reliance on incarceration and punitive outcomes drys up the soul of a nation" Rev. Dr. Pierre Allard keynote speaker.

Yesterday, I attended the 14th Annual Restorative Justice Conference at Ferndale Insititution, a minimum security federal prison about an hour and a half east of Vancouver. The event is facilitated by the RJ Day organizing committee which is comprised of community volunteers and inmates or, as they are called at Ferndale, residents.


Ferndale houses approximately 137 male residents serving sentences ranging from a few months to life. The men live in 6 or 8 man residential-style units seperated from each other by winding cobbletone paths. The well manicured lawns and shrubbery gives the institution a very homey, pleasant feel.

I attended the conference with Teresa, my "co-TA" for our restorative justice class and 8 of our students. We gathered in a large and cheerful meeting hall that I believe was used for visitations. The walls were hand painted with coloring renderings of fish and other First Nations symbology. Rev. Dr. Pierre Allard, a Corrections Service Canada chaplain for over 30 years, was the morning's keynote speaker. Though he was a prison chaplain it wasn't until the murder of his brother in 1980 that he found his way to the principles of restorative justice.

For lunch the group was divided among the diferent residences and it was there that we ate our meal. Our group consisted of myself and four students, a victim-service provider,a prison volunteer, and our resident "hosts" who bustled around waiting on us hand and foot. They obviously don't get much company, so an event like this is a big deal.During our meal we continued our circle process and discussed the effect that resorative justice had in their lives.
Numerous thoughts kept running through my mind as I ate and visited with these men,both convicted murders; never in a million years would this be happening at the camp in Leavenworth and the Unites States should be ashamed that it doesn't.

Our incarceration policies are barbaric and it fails me how it could ever be thought that positive, lasting changes in the lives of offenders can be achieved through the use of more punitive sentences. The correctional policies of the United States are lifted up by Canadians as examples of what not to do if you want the successful reintegration of offenders. They have watched us and learned by our failures, if only we would do the same.

LOOK WHO CAME TO VISIT!!

Jim and I have welcomed our first guests to Vancouver, Dr. Ken Christopher, from Park University, and his wonderful wife Jeanne. It was so exciting to see friendly faces from home! Ken is giving a presentation at a port security conference in Seattle this week and they decided since they were this close to Vancouver they would come up to see us.





After we picked them up at the bus station we went to Granville Island. This is the first "touristy" outing that we have had since we arrived. School work and TA responsibilities have kept me hopping so it was very fun to spend the aftenoon with friends






We ate our lunch out on the heated( very heated) patio of the Sandbar Restaraunt.







Jorge entertains visitors with his panflute and guitar















Overlooking the ocean and Lion's Gate Bridge at Stanley Park








The afternoon came to an end too soon. I think Ken and Jeanne need to make this trip more often. I happen to know that the Western Society of Criminology Conference is in Vancouver this February. Sure, it's not port security but who cares? :)

My Tutorials

In today's tutorial the students worked on exercise that allowed them to plan and carry out a cooperative effort that would help them develop verbal and non-verbal communication skills needed to work together on common goal (CRIM 315). Each group had 5 minutes to discuss their project and plan how to coordinate the building. After 5 minutes they could open the tinker toys and begin to build, but they could no longer talk, Only signally was allowed.



All-purpose craft

Railroad crossing

Person pushing a dolly

A "vehicle"

A car accident

Notice the destroyed car and casualty in the forefront.

A wheelbarrow

A land and amphibious craft

A lawnmower

A wheelchair...seen from the side.

Wednesday is my favorite day of the week. These guys are so much fun!

Life

There is rhythm to life that is starting to develop which I suppose is a good thing.






Mondays are spent doing school work at home.








Tuesdays I am at Burnaby from 11:30-2:20 for a crim theory class.





Wednesdays I am at the Surrey campus(pix here) where I facilitate 3 tutorials for CRIM 315, Restorative Justice.

Thursdays I spend at home doing school.


I leave bright and early on Fridays to go to Burnaby for a methodology class and then afterwards try to get in at least a 30-45 minute group session on statistics. A number of us in class have not had statistics before so we try to stay and help each other limp through the weekly assignment. I then go to the Surrey campus for the 2:30-4:20 Restorative Justice lecture. Yeah..the highlight of my week. Finally, I get to learn about the things I came to BC for!


Saturdays are another study day, but yesterday I didn't get much of that done, Liz Elliott, my thesis advisor(eventually, once I get to that point) invited numerous people over for Thanksgiving dinner including me and Jim.

Colleen is a Criminology Ph.D. student from Manitoba who TAs on the Burnaby campus for the same class I do in Surrey.

Liz, Merlin, and Jim enjoying a wonderful supper.

http://http//www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MJt2vchXvY Dr. Liz Elliott speaking about the over use of incarceration.

Liz and her husband, in the white tshirt, were lovely hosts. They had a house full of people, many like us who have no family in town.Their son is a student at SFU and he brought quite a few of his fellow football players with him and their daughter had a group of her girlfriends as well. So it was quite a large gathering. We had to eat and run since we (Jim, Colleen and I) had tickets to a play.

What makes it possible for people to:

Believe in stereotypes?

Witness hardship and not reach out?

Turn a blind eye, a deaf ear?

Wage war with others? What makes all these and so many other ways that we compromise the planets and humanity's well-being possible? The creation over and over of "the other," the creation of the "them" in "us and them."

The play was quite different with volunteers from the audience as actors(yeah to brave Colleen who made her acting debut!) and no scripts.

Sundays we go to Chilliwak for church and maybe some galavanting if the weather is good and we remember a change of clothes.

Today after church we went to the little cafe in Country Gardens for lunch with Linda, one of the ladies we have met at church. As you can see from the pix there is hardly a cloud in the sky, which was not the case when we left home, otherwise we would have brought a change of clothes and headed out to do some sightseeing.

And there's the week.....