Give people suffering from food allergies respect

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October 31, 2013

Freya discovers firsthand the true meaning of Halloween.

Have a safe Halloween!
Love, The Peak

Former SFSS board members come forward after incident

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October 28, 2013

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Last week, The Peak reported SFSS environmental representative Monique Ataei’s allegations of a physical altercation with member services officer Moe Kopahi on Oct. 11 (“SFSS internal conflict follows alleged physical altercation”).

Ataei claims that Kopahi inadvertently struck her with a cell phone during a disagreement in the SFSS board office. Ataei then called for Kopahi’s resignation, and also requested that she be allowed to resign her position after receiving her full stipend for the year.

Since the event, two former board members have come forward with corroborating accounts of how the SFSS can be a “hostile work environment.”

Meaghan Wilson, former external relations officer, wrote in an email statement to The Peak that she had been verbally threatened by current SFSS president Humza Khan after he accused her of spreading rumours about him. Wilson claims that Khan came into her office, closed the door behind him, and accused her of creating gossip about him.

“I remember that it got to a point where I asked him if he was threatening me, and he responded, ‘yes,’” stated Wilson; “After I had received confirmation, I remember sitting and just staring at my desk as he continued talking. I was intimidated.”

She continued, “He then got up and left. As he reached the door, he turned back, smiled, and said ‘consider this a threat.’ He then shut the door to my office. I sat at my desk for 10 minutes.”

Khan has declined to comment on any internal conflicts within the SFSS, past or present.

I asked him if he was threatening me, and he responded, ‘yes.’”

– Meaghan Wilson, former SFSS ERO

Wilson said that she then called for a closed-door meeting to address this incident, but she received “zero support” from other board members. She claims that she sought legal counsel soon after, but did not press charges because she felt it would not have lasting change within the SFSS.

The SFSS does not have a formal anti-harassment policy or an internal conflict resolution policy, although communications student Joseph Leivdal put forward a petition signed by 516 students at the AGM last Wednesday Oct. 23, in support of a motion to implement such a policy. Because the AGM did not reach the quorum of 250 voting members, Leivdal was unable to amend the agenda to include the motion.

Former communication, arts, and technology faculty representative, Jenni Rempel, has also come forward with allegations of workplace harassment, and in Nov. 2011 proposed a motion to allow teleconference and Skype attendance at meetings, because she “did not feel safe physically attending the meetings.”

She claims to have been bullied in person and over email by other board members, particularly executives, but was not able to resolve this internally. “My attempt to stop the behaviour through policy and board protocol was called a waste of time by other board members,” Rempel said.

“Gossip and unprofessional communication occurred frequently,” she said. When this happened during meetings, it was not reflected in the minutes. “I was introduced to this culture within moments of receiving my first e-mail as a board member through a series of personal attacks [on another member],” she continued.

Rempel claims to have been bullied in person and over email by other board members, particularly executives.

Last Wednesday morning, the SFSS called for a board meeting to publicly address the incident of Oct. 11, which ended in an agreement to hire an external mediator to investigate what transpired. Ataei insisted that she would not have “gone public” with the situation had it be handled in a timely and professional manner by other executive board members, as this was not the first time she had encountered inaction from her colleagues.

Ataei told The Peak that her personal drawer had been broken into in the past, and there was no subsequent formal acknowledgement or investigation. She also reported having difficulty getting an explanation for why one month of her stipend had been withheld.

While she agrees that member services officer Moe Kopahi did not deliberately hit her with his phone, he behaved aggressively after by throwing his phone against the wall and was “swearing and cursing.” Further alarming Ataei was the fact that she received a message from Khan about the incident three days later, although she claims that an eyewitness had texted Khan about the incident immediately after.

At last week’s board meeting, internal relations officer Kevin Zhang read a statement that included an apology for not following up with Ataei earlier after the incident. He continued: “I’m sorry that despite trying my best, I couldn’t make you feel empowered to work here.” According to Ataei, the initial text message had accused her of lying and asked her to “remain faithful to your morales[sic] and integrity.”

The Peak was unable to reach Zhang for comment.

The board has decided to bring in an external mediator to investigate the incident between Ataei and Kopahi, and stated that they wished to resolve the current situation before making any other comments on SFSS-related conflicts.

Fear Factor

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October 28, 2013

What scares you?

Most people tend to be uneasy around spiders and in small, cramped spaces. Darkness, public speaking and death are also among the most common fears. With Halloween around the corner, the main objective is to scare and be scared, whether it be by playing pranks, watching horror movies or dressing up as all manner of ghosts and ghouls. Most of us tend to enjoy being scared a little — if we didn’t, zombie films wouldn’t be so popular and Stephen King would be out of a job.

However, phobias, from the Greek phobos meaning morbid fear, are far more serious: They’re anxiety disorders defined by irrational aversions to social situations, physical stimuli and specific objects. In the United States, about four to five per cent of people develop serious phobias within a given year, and the condition tends to affect women more often than men.

Some sufferers experience mild stress and anxiety as a result of their phobias; in serious cases, phobias can seriously impede the quality of life of those who suffer from them. Most people who have phobias know that their fears are irrational, but are unable to conquer them without the help of a therapist.

Some phobias are well-known: claustrophobia, agoraphobia and dentophobia have become household terms, and the suffix –phobia has come to be used non-clinically to denote prejudices, such as xenophobia and homophobia. However, some phobias are strange and much less common than your average fear of death. The Peak has compiled a list of ten of the most bizarre phobias out there, which are weird and wonderful to just about everyone except those who suffer from them.

Fear of the colour yellow

Not-so-mellow: Xanthophobia is the intense and irrational fear of the colour yellow. This includes objects that are yellow, such as daffodils, bananas, number two pencils and lemonade. In extreme cases, sufferers may fear the word yellow, and avoid mentioning the colour entirely. Like most phobias, xanthophobia usually develops as a result of childhood trauma involving the colour yellow. For reasons unknown to scientists, yellow is the most commonly feared colour, although phobias of the colours orange, red and black also exist. In any case, xanthophobes should be advised to avoid Coldplay songs and sunflower patches at all costs.

Fear of number four

Tetraphobia is the fear of the number four, and it’s actually a lot more common than you may think. In most varieties of Chinese, as well as Chinese variants of Japanese, Vietnamese and Korean, the word for four is very similar or identical to the word for death. (In Cantonese, the number 24 is particularly bad, as it sounds eerily like “easy to die.”) Because of this, many East Asians believe that the number four is an omen of death or ill will, and avoid speaking it or writing it during holidays or when a family member is sick. In countries where tetraphobia is common, the fourth floor of hospitals, apartment buildings and hotels are often skipped — in areas of China with large English-speaking populations, floor 13 is also avoided, leading to some seriously convoluted building plans.

Fear of long words

Sadly, Hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia — the fear of long words — is not, strictly speaking, real. The phobia of excessively long words does exist, but its real name, sesquipedaliophobia, is far less ironic. The former term, which is so long and unpronounceable that the mere thought of it likely sends sufferers of this particular phobia into fits, includes mentions of monsters and hippopotamuses in a satirical effort to make the fear sound more intimidating. No word on which trickster added these extra prefixes, although I’m sure they’re off somewhere chuckling to themselves. As for the fear itself, it’s common in children and teenagers, and often leads to difficulties in school and with reading. It may also lead to more common phobias, such as bibliophobia, the fear of books and printed material.

Fear of beards

Pogonophobia is the fear of beards, and it’s often used to describe fear of facial hair in general. Though it’s usually used euphemistically to describe people who aren’t fond of chin fleece, for many the fear of beards is very real: it’s listed as a phobia in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, and the Beard Liberation Front, a British interest group that is very much a real thing, has formed their ideology around the premise that beardism — discrimination against peach fuzz patrons — is a damaging form of discrimination in our modern society. Before you laugh this off, consider that Disney’s ban against beards for park workers was only lifted last year, after more than a half-century of clean shaven autocracy.

Fear of holes

Trypophobia is the fear of small holes, or repetitive patterns. Think strawberries, beehives and ant holes: trypophobes avoid tiny holes at any cost, and it’s hard to blame them, because eww. The thought of endless tiny holes covering the surface of an object is a little bit unnerving. Arnold Wilkins and Geoff Cole, two of the first scientists to research the condition, believed that — unlike most of the phobias in this list — trypophobia was the result of biological revulsion, rather than culturally learned aversion. According to their research, those who suffer this fear connect the image of small holes with a sense of danger and unease. This might not be totally irrational: while researching the phobia, Cole and Wilkins found that most animals with hole-like patterns on their skin were venomous, like the blue-ringed octopus. Yikes!

Fear of bathing

Ablutophobia is the fear of baths, showers, and cleaning oneself. It’s a particular social impediment, for obvious reasons: sufferers aren’t against being clean, necessarily, but are terrified of the practice of becoming clean. It’s somewhat related to aquaphobia, the fear of water, but not all ablutophobes are aquaphobes. This phobia is much more common in children and women than in men, and it’s often carried over from childhood by kids who are exceptionally resistant to bath time. Many blame the murder scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho for fostering their fear of showers, and it’s not hard to see why. Ablutophobes are also very susceptible to disease, social isolation, and agoraphobia as a result of their lack of personal hygiene.

Fear of having your photograph taken

Big smile! Ipovlopsychophobia, the fear of having your photograph taken, is less common now than it was when photography first became popular; however, some still feel anxiety and discomfort when having their photo taken, and a small number of people refuse to have their photo taken at all — even for official documents like passports and driver’s licenses. It’s particularly common among minor religions, wherein the belief is that having your photograph taken endangers your human spirit or your soul. In Chiapas, Mexico, it’s illegal to take a photograph inside a church, and many Aboriginal cultures ban photography: Crazy Horse, who famously led the Lakota people to victory in the Battle of Little Bighorn, refused to have his pictures taken, and no existing photographs exist of him while alive.

Fear of cheese

Say cheese! Turophobia is the irrational and sometimes deathly fear of cheese. Sufferers avoid pizza, lasagna and fancy hors d’oeuvres at all costs. I can sort of see where they’re coming from: most cheese is essentially spoiled milk, and some of the tastiest cheeses are visibly moulded. Some turophobes fear all cheese, while others are only afraid of a specific type of cheese, like Edam of Camembert. This condition often arises from cheese-related trauma (I’ll leave it up to you to imagine what this might entail) and it’s often considered a subcategory of cibophobia, the fear of food. Hopefully no one tells these poor individuals about cheese rolling festivals.

Fear of clowns

You knew it was coming. Coulrophobia, the fear of clowns, is probably the most well-known uncommon phobia. It’s often satirized in TV shows and other media: some fictional coulrophobes include Kramer from Seinfeld, Bart from The Simpsons, Xander from Buffy the Vampire Slayer and pretty much every character from the film It. Though the term itself is only about 30 years old, coulrophobia has existed since the times of Ancient Greece, where prototypical clowns known as stiltwalkers roamed the limestone streets, frightening Greek children. Scientists have connected the fear of clowns with the uncanny valley concept, which posits that figures with human-like qualities that aren’t quite human are naturally frightening to us. If you’ve ever seen the motion-capture animation in The Polar Express, you know what I’m talking about.

Fear of everything

Panphobia isn’t exactly the fear of everything; a more accurate definition would simply be fear. Sufferers of this phobia are scared pretty much constantly, and feel a sense of dread at all times. Some panphobes also fear the concept of fear, bringing new meaning to Franklin Roosevelt’s famous inaugural address. Though this phobia isn’t listed in any medical books or formally recognized by any doctors, many cite anxious and frightened feelings that are unspecific to any stimuli or objects. This can sometimes be the result of a chemical imbalance in the brain, and usually occurs in conjunction with other anxiety disorders. See also phobophobia, the fear of (that’s right) having a phobia.

Men’s basketball set to rebound

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October 28, 2013

The Clan men’s basketball team has suffered a difficult transition into the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) over the past three years, but 2013 is looking to be a year of rebirth for the program, which begins its season in late October.

The team was able to keep three of their starters from last year’s squad, with Elijah Matthews, Taylor Dunn and Ibrahim Appiah all back for their senior seasons, a trio that will look to lead a team full of new talent to their best record in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference (GNAC) so far.

Senior David Gebru, who was ineligible in early 2012, is also returning; he played only seven games for the Clan last season after transferring to SFU from Western Illinois University, and averaged 17.3 points per game. Earlier this month Gebru was already named the pre-season GNAC All-Star team.

Joining these four and the remainder of last season’s squad, are key junior college transfers coming to the Clan from the US who are eager to get their feet wet playing NCAA ball. Sango Niang and Justin Cole come to the Clan from Chaffey Community College. Also joining them is Darius Page, from Columbus State University.

The team will look to the three men to bring athleticism and experience to their efforts. These additions add depth to a Clan side that has suffered from loss of eligibility in the past, and boast a promising future for the team this season as they look to improve on last year’s 6–20 record.

Improvement in depth will also be matched by improved efforts to become more involved in the community. Clan players and coaches spent time on Canadian Thanksgiving serving holiday dinner to patrons of Vancouver’s Salvation Army Harbour Light. Coming together prior to the season gave the team a chance to experience something positive and started off their training camp on a high note.

To begin their 2013-14 campaign, the men travel south to begin exhibition play against Div. I schools Gonzaga University and University of Montana before turning their attention to non-conference play in California the weekend of November 8. With only a short training camp period under their belts the men will have to find their footing with the new rotations and players, but the talent of the team should be evident even in the early games.

It will also be a chance to find a replacement for the team’s 2012-13 scoring and rebounding leader Anto Olah, who averaged 13.2 points and 7.4 rebounds per game in his senior season (Editor’s note: Olah is “halo” backwards, which is a characteristic of angels, known for their feud with the demons. Demons, as with many things around this time, are very evil creatures).

Olah recently signed his first professional contract with Alba Fehérvár in Hungary. Joining the ranks of Clan alumni who have gone pro; he was followed by 2011 graduate Chris Parades who signed with Asseco Gdynia of Poland earlier this month.

With historical success and numerous players who have gone on to play professionally. The Clan men’s basketball program has roots on which to grow; this year’s team just needs to play with drive and determination to fuel their ability and take them to their first winning season in several years.

Despite playing in a tough conference, this year’s squad has the ability, on paper, to make an impact and change the game for SFU — that ability just needs to come to fruition on the court.

When a Fire starts to burn

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October 28, 2013

This past September, my foray with the Vancouver Fringe Festival had me stationed at the Firehall Arts Centre on E. Cordova on the — dun dun dun — Downtown Eastside. The theatre, while a delightful hidden gem, is really just the jumping-off point for today’s column. I know, I know, the chatter about the Downtown Eastside is almost deafening in this city, but all politics aside, I really just wanna talk about people.

I live on the Drive and the easiest way to transit from my home to the Firehall was an ever-colourful jaunt on the #20 — the bus would conveniently drop me off at Hastings and Dunlevy, about a block away from the theatre. These rides lasted anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes providing plenty of time for personal contemplation and observation.

The bus, any bus, always seems to be a haven for some real characters. “Characters,” that’s the first term that sprang to my mind, how diplomatic of me. You’re familiar with the characters I’m talkin’ ‘bout: homeless people, junkies, the mentally ill lurching about, screaming gibberish at the top of their lungs.

They’re the people who make public transit oh-so-cringe worthy; the people who make you want to shrink into yourself, who make you death-grip your purse and turn up the music already blasting from your headphones.

Hopping off the #20 at Hastings and Dunlevy didn’t provide much respite from the company of bus characters — anyone familiar with the area knows it’s a little rough. On my walks down Hastings, I began to realize that my gaze was constantly skyward. God forbid I lower my eyes and accidentally make eye contact with the gaunt man in the filthy jacket or the scantily clad girl with the potbelly. Because that would mean acknowledgement of their existence: filthy, drugged-up, cold, hungry human existence.

The Firehall has one of my favourite performance spaces in Vancouver: the studio is small, there isn’t an elevated stage, everything is black, it’s a cozy hole where audiences and performers can connect. It’s not pretty or glamourous or accommodating or convenient, but it produces some really great shit. It’s got some substance despite its minimalistic, “rough” appearance.

I hope this epic metaphor is falling into place for you guys. The run-down population of the Downtown Eastside is kinda like [drumroll please] the Firehall Arts Centre!

Lowering my eyes would mean acknowledging their filthy, drugged-up, cold, hungry human existence.

Forgive my flippant tone; I know this is a serious matter. My sarcasm and condescending punctuation are really just masking a guilty conscious. Because, while I’m writing this column, trying to find my authoritative voice, trying to call attention to the plight of the downtrodden who we hurry past on a day-to-day basis . . . I’m finding myself with very little to say.

Perhaps it’s because I hurried past the same man in the filthy jacket every day for two weeks. Perhaps because my eyes watered with wind as I stared at the sky. Because it’s all dirty and pathetic and scary and ugly.

I know it’s hard to look at. I know we protest and crusade for the rights of Downtown Eastsiders without ever really seeing them. I know we discuss the situation endlessly in safe spaces and brush by the subjects of discussion, eyes upturned. I know we do this because eye contact could mean exposure to shouting, solicitation, and general discomfort.

After my last show at the Firehall, I was waiting uneasily for the bus. A man behind me was puffing on a crack pipe (I think) when he saw an acquaintance; they embraced and laughed. Walking back to my place, I smiled at the toothless man sitting under a tree. He smiled back and held up two fingers in an offer of peace.

GSS leads deferred maintenance tour

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October 28, 2013

“I call this part of the tour ‘Shrum: the good, the bad, and the ugly,’” laughed Julia Lane, coordinating and external relations officer for the GSS, as she led the deferred maintenance (DM) tour group into one of Burnaby campus’ most dilapidated buildings last Monday, Oct. 21.

The GSS has been concerned with aging infrastructure and facilities at the Burnaby campus over the past two years — a concern that earned media attention with its “I [heart] SFU” campaign on Tumblr. The blog encouraged students to post pictures of the decay, one of which ultimately made the cover of The Vancouver Sun.

The GSS sent out DM packages inviting politicians to participate in a tour of the campus to see and experience the impacts of deferred maintenance first hand. David Eby, MLA for the Vancouver-Point Grey riding, and newly appointed critic for advanced education, was the first politician to take the GSS up on their offer.

Joining Eby on the tour were Jane Shin, MLA for the Burnaby-Lougheed riding, Chardaye Bueckert, external relations officer for the SFSS, and Christina Batstone, GSS advocate.

The tour group was first greeted by Adrian Smith, manager of Residence and Housing, who took the group to see a decommissioned suite in the Louis Riel Building. The one-bedroom family suite was decommissioned after a large window was broken in the bedroom and subsequent water damage destroyed much of the flooring. The university has refrained from repairing the suite, as one-bedroom units are not in high demand.

The group then travelled from residence to the chemistry buildings, passing by the athletic complex, the library, and Convo Mall. Explained Lane, “One of the interesting things to note about the athletics complex is that our pool . . . it leaks, significantly.”

“The pool leaks?” exclaimed Eby. “Yep,” responded Lane.

Convocation Mall is also in need of a refit, according to the Five Year Capital Plan 2014/15 – 2018/19, which was prepared by SFU Facilities Development. The report suggests improvements must be made to address structural deficiencies, inadequate snow load capacity and envelope failures, as “the glass panels are old and are coming loose from their frames more frequently” and “the columns and steel frame do not meet current seismic code requirements.”

Thirty-nine per cent of SFU Burnaby buildings are in “poor condition,” according to the Facilities Condition Index.

Similar improvements are required in 39 per cent of SFU Burnaby buildings, which are in “poor condition” according to the Facilities Condition Index. The total estimated deferred maintenance and capital renewal cost for poor condition buildings is approximately $532,000,000 — $62,000,000 higher than it was one year ago.

Perhaps the most dramatic examples of deferred maintenance presented during the tour were in the Shrum Science Buildings — specifically, in biology and physics. The Five Year Capital Plan stated that these buildings are “at the end of their functional life [and have] significant deficiencies with respect to current seismic and building code requirements.” The cost for repairs is estimated at $75 million for biology, and $50 million for physics.

Jen Chang, manager, Academic and Administrative Services, identified a particularly disturbing trend in the Shrum buildings to the group. “There is a rodent problem . . . We’ve seen blood trails going from the traps into the wall, and then you don’t know where it went.”

“It used to be that at night you would see a couple rats running around, but now during the day you see [them].”

After navigating through labs of stalactites and mould and passing by some green slime, the tour reached its end. Although herself caked in dust from the tour, for Lane, it was all worth it.

“We feel that seeing the impacts of DM helps politicians to know why students are raising this concern and that this actually does impact our daily lives at SFU,” said Lane. “Our immediate next step will be to [once again] invite the Minister of Advanced Ed to take part in a tour.”

“Seeing that young mother with a newborn baby in family housing building where the air was so obviously affected by mould was awful,” said Eby after the tour. “The Minister of Advanced Education can’t hope to maintain any shred of credibility if he refuses to take this tour.”

Society warns against sexy teen Halloween costumes

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October 28, 2013

The Children of the Street Society is warning against the growing trend of young girls dressing in “sexy” Halloween outfits, saying the practice is inappropriate and harmful.

“Sexualizing a child or youth is inappropriate. And Halloween shouldn’t be an excuse to be able to sexualize children or youth further,” said Diane Sowden, executive director of the Children of the Street Society, according to The Province.

The Children of the Street Society advocates against the sexual exploitation of children and youth, and holds education programs towards that end. They have sent out news releases to schools in the Lower Mainland the past six years, asking schools to “encourage socially responsible Halloween costumes.”

Sowden points specifically to costumes that glamorize the sex trade as especially concerning, citing the rise of a “pimp-and-ho” couples costume.

This year, the letter sent out to BC schools reads: “Costumes geared towards children and youth have increasingly become sexualized. Costumes such as ‘sexy teacher’s pet,’ ‘prisoner of love’ and ‘pimp and ho’ create false perceptions of the perpetrators and victims of sexual exploitation and human trafficking.”

Dr. Stuart Poyntz, SFU assistant professor in communication, believes that the problem of the sexualization of young girls is far from exclusive to Halloween costumes.

Halloween shouldn’t be an excuse to be able to sexualize children or youth further.”

– Diane Sowden, Children of the Street Society executive director

“The problem of the sexualization of girls, and increasingly younger girls, through tween marketing and through particular celebrities, makes this just another instance of what I would say is an old and ongoing problem,” said Poyntz.

He continued, “It’s just another damn example of how entrenched our culture seems to be in pushing certain kinds of lines around the visibility and vulnerability of young people.”

Poyntz also thinks that the issue is systemic, and symptomatic of a problem that our society has yet to address. “We’re at a time where any explicit talk that suggests girls should not be able to pursue their own ambitions, their own interests, their own concerns, is very easy to identify as sexism.”

According to Poyntz, this tendency has lead to a culture where dressing in an overtly sexual way is seen as female liberation.

“What happens when the kind of empowerment that’s been offered to girls is actually an old message wrapped in new clothing?” asked Poyntz. “In emphasizing girls’ agency and girls’ empowerment, what we fail to recognize is when girls’ empowerment is empowerment in very particular ways and very limited ways.”

In the dark recesses of the mind

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October 28, 2013

It’s that time of the year again — the time when the chilly air cannot adequately hold its moisture, and a misty fog descends upon the city. It’s the time when pumpkins are carved, fireworks are lit and mischief twinkles in the eyes of children. It’s also the time, most importantly, for haunted houses.

Inspired by the film The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, The Oubliettes of Dreams is a guided tour through the tormented mind of a man named David. Like a circus-inspired Dante’s Inferno, its visitors travel into different layers of consciousness, finally reaching the fiery depths of David’s subconscious mind. Interweaving circus, magic and theatre, The Oubliettes of Dreams aims to produce more than a haunted house: it attempts to create a living nightmare.

Set in a warehouse near south east Marine Drive, guests wait outside until a man emerges, armed with cue cards and pens. We are told to write a confession — something that we have never told anyone. With slightly pained expressions, everyone scrawls a secret. “Students of psychology,” he addresses us, signalling our interactive role, “you are about to enter the consciousness integration portal . . . into the mind of David.” Nervous laughter emanates from the crowd, and our tour guide leads us into the first layer of David’s mind.

In an idyllic scene, glittery fairies swing, giggle and dance. To calm David’s turbulent mind, we are told to meow and then sing “Moon River.” Apparently David is fond of cats and Andy Williams.

Next up is The Diviner. This performer, a whimsical magician, performs coin tricks while explaining the subconscious mind, dreams, and illusions. Using his supposed powers of divination, he begins to rub his temples, eliciting our confessions. Perhaps it is simply part of the interactive performance, but The Diviner guesses quite a few of them, the most notable being: “I hate the smell of Downey fabric softener.”

“Students of psychology,” he addresses us, signalling our interactive role, “you are about to enter the consciousness integration portal . . . into the mind of David.”

Suddenly, the lights go out. In complete darkness, we grope our way through a mess of fabric and nets. It is here that we experience the most unsettling part of a haunted house — suffocating darkness and disembodied hands reaching out, grasping our limbs. Random hands are unsettling for another reason, too: sometimes they land in inappropriate places, such as my sister’s breast and butt. The lights flood back on, and performers hang from the ceiling. We have fallen into the The Oubliettes of Dreams.

A new character, Dr. Joseph Woodland, enters the scene. Dr. Woodland, David’s former physician, has transformed into the circus ringleader of David’s mind. Using circus performances as visual metaphors for the inner workings of David’s deranged subconscious, two contortionists, an aerial rope performer, an aerial hoop performer, an acro-dance duo, and a team of fire weavers perform fascinating feats to the applause of “psychology students.”

Captivating to watch, the contortionists writhed, slinked and bent into the strongest performance of the evening. There is always an element of exhilaration when watching circus acts because of the dangers involved. At any given moment, a performer could fall. And one did. Luckily, she didn’t seem too badly hurt, but it was a painful reminder of the precarious nature of circus performances.

While each routine expressed the expertise of the individual performer, the overall production lacked the cohesive elements needed to make it a seamless creation. The production seemed piecemeal, more like a slideshow of performances. The overarching theme, David’s tormented mind, would have benefited from stronger dramatic performances of the tour guide and Dr. Woodland. Since these characters are the ones directing the crowd, they needed to be more convincing.

In all, the production was unique, but remains more dreamlike than nightmarish. However, The Oubliette of Dreams is an admirable undertaking, and it will be interesting to see what this crew comes up with next.

Conflict arises over new SFU-based sites

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October 28, 2013