No More Stolen Sisters

Friday is Lethbridge's Sisters in Spirit Vigil. It is a chance to remember our missing and murdered Indigenous communities. It is a chance to tell our sisters that they are loved and important. It is a chance to tell the government that the rates of violence being perpetrated against these sisters is unacceptable, and that the work being done to protect and save them is not enough. It is a chance to demand more, for and with, our Indigenous sisters.

Tonight (Tuesday) is the monthly letter writing campaign with Amnesty International chapter. I have to work so I am going to write a letter now and mail it myself. If you can do that same - please check out Amnesty's information to make it simple to have your voice heard.

Thank you to the community organizers who continue to struggle for justice and celebrate the value of Indigenous women.

Easy (Vegan) Chocolate Cake

I came home from a pretty long day today, and you know what I wanted? Chocolate Cake. I never want cake. I want fries and chips and bread and other salty goodness, but I never want cake. (Well except today clearly)

So I scrounged around cookbooks and found my super easy cake recipe I found in Belize, where I made more chocolate cake than I have in the rest of my life with the AMAZING local chocolate. And 40 minutes later - cake!

It's a vegan recipe, not because I went vegan in Belize but because I didn't always have eggs or milk and stores weren't always open when I was craving a local, sweet treat, so I found a milk/egg-less recipe to enjoy. I don't like icing so I also have a glaze recipe I put on this.

Anyway, I just finished the piece of cake I was craving but I have a whole rest of the pan leftover. Good thing I have girlfriends to pawn baking off to!

Yummy Cake!

Here's the easy recipe! Enjoy!

Easy Vegan Chocolate Cake
1+1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup cocoa, unsweetened - ideally from Belize if you've got it hanging around ;) 
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup warm water
1 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup veg oil
1 tsp vinegar (white or apple cider)

Preheat oven to 350F
Mix flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda and salt with a fork, mix it well.
Add water, vanilla, oil and vinegar. Blend well with a fork.
Bake at 350 for 30 min
Cool as long as you can stand. Today, that lasted approximately 3 minutes. If you're going to put glaze on it, do wait until it cools or the glaze will just get super liquidy and melt off the cake rather than stay on top with it's deliciousness.

Glaze 

1/2 cup sugar
4 tbsp margarine (butter if you're not vegan - I'm a real-butter-all-the-time kind of gal)
2 tbsp plain almond milk/soy milk/cow milk
2 tbsp cocoa
2 tbsp vanilla

Combine ingredients in a small saucepan over low-medium heat, stirring to prevent burning. Let it cool slightly before pouring over cake. If it hardens too much, just heat it back to liquid.
I read somewhere once that burning chocolate is considered a sin in some cultures. I would concur.

Knitting for Women's Rights

I tried knitting once - it was ... less than successful. However, when this event came up, I was there! What event, you ask?

A motion was introduced in February that, if accepted, wold call a committee to discuss whether fetuses should be included in the Criminal Codes definition of human being - which is the trying-to-be-sneaky way of saying "let's discuss if abortion is murder."

Ok. seriously PCs? The abortion debate was closed in 1988 and we've been doing just fine for the last 24 years.

So some awesome women decided to make sure their MPS knew that they were quite happy having rights to decide what to do with their own bodies, thank you very much. Some groups are doing this in this States too, where in many places women are REALLY having their health and rights challenged and even stripped away by politicians who don't even HAVE uteri! So the idea is, we'll make one for them so they'll have their own uteri to legislate and they can leave ours alone. Anyway, we got together, and at this great Womanspace event we knit/crocheted/sewed uteri to send to MPs who said they would be supporting the motion.

Hey - it's my uterus! 

I loved the event - it was a creative way to resist a motion I don't agree with, it was a great space with positive energy, and plus, how often do you get to sew a uterus! What a fun project! 

Apparently the news loved the event too! We were covered by a local media group CJOC FM, the Winnipeg Free Press and even the Globe & Mail!  We're famous! [Update! Our local newspaper, the Lethbridge Herald ran the story from the G&M with a photo of my little uterus! She's famous!] [ANOTHER update! We're in the CBC! Good thing my uterus isn't camera shy!]

We're excited for round two tomorrow night, August 14th. It will be at a local watering hole, the Owl at 6:30 and we'll even show you how to do it! Like I said, my knitting skills leave a little to be desired and I still have a pretty pink uterus to be gifted to my MP. :) Check out the deets on Facebook and see you there! 

And remember - Women's health and rights are not up for debate! Make sure your MP knows you feel that way, even if you don't get to knit them a present. 

Why I voted for Shannon Phillips

There has been a big "Anti-Wildrose" push on Facebook lately. While I am glad people are seeing the danger this party represents for an equitable society in Alberta, I'm not really a fan of the campaign. When I go to vote, I don't want to vote AGAINST somebody, I want to vote FOR somebody. And I'm very glad that in this round of elections I have a great option.

I voted for Shannon Phillips in the advanced polls because she's even more than just an alternative to the Wildrose. While she IS an absolutely fantastic and totally winnable candidate for Lethbridge West as an alternative to the Wildrose, Shannon and the Alberta NDP have a lot more to offer than just that.

Here are some of my reasons:
1) She's a rockstar. I met Shannon at the beginning of my university career when she led a media workshop for LPIRG. I was super impressed at how articulate, intelligent and all around savvy she was. She has continued to live up to that fantastic first impression.

2) She knows what she's talking about. Shannon is no new comer to politics and it shows. She's young but not naive, she gives her colleagues run for their money - anyone who has been to any of the forums this election knows what I mean. She calls out the other candidates with hard facts and with the experience she already has under her belt.

3) She has a great platform. Again I reiterate, in elections, I don't like to vote against someone, I want to vote FOR someone who will stand up for what I believe in and for what I want in my province. Shannon and the Alberta NDP will do that. They're plans for environmental sustainability, education, health care, resource management and Indigenous relations all reflect the values I hold myself.

4) Have I mentioned she's a rockstar?

5) She has the energy this city needs in a representative. Lethbridge is an exciting, growing city with a lot to offer, and Shannon knows how to represent that. You can see it in her campaign so far - she has been non stop. She's been talking to people in person, on their doorsteps, at their favourite events showing her support for US as Lethbians, not just asking us for OUR support.

Basically Shannon is just one of the most intelligent and articulate and high energy women I've met and I am so glad she's a candidate in my riding and that I get the privilege to vote FOR a great candidate like her rather than thinking I have to vote AGAINST someone else.

If you're interested in finding out more about Shannon's campaign, check out her website or her facebook page.

Polls are open tomorrow from 9am to 8pm. Find your polling station here and go exercise your right to vote!

Federal Budget 101

Alright - so I'm a little slow out of the gate, but I wanted to share a couple Federal-Budget 101 pages I saw and found pretty useful in explaining the recently revealed budget.  Click the picture to see the full page.

Above is the first page of an infographic from the Globe and Mail, and it has a few more graphics that explain a lot. For example, in the "departmental cuts" section we can see something that really freaked me out. Health care and national defense spending got a similar cut - just over 5% each. BUT. Health care's budget lost $309.9 million, while defense lost over a BILLION. With a B! Meaning - provinces get a little over 5.4 billion to pay for doctors and hospitals while the army gets almost 20 billion dolllars, more than three and a half times more... Excellent.

What I was disappointed not to see in the G&M highlights was how the budget affects Indigenous communities in Canada.

The Huffington Post was also on the ball and added pictures to their interpretation of the budget as well - click the picture to see their highlights, which do include the budget changes for Aboriginal education.

Among some of the high profile cuts/gains you may or may not have heard about

• Yes, they're getting rid of the penny. Costs more than one cent to make it, so they've scrapped it. My sister is not pleased.
• Katimavik is cut. As someone who believes firmly in getting youth involved in their communities, and providing opportunities for them to learn through travel, I am not impressed. Shows the Conservatives don't place a value on all the service these youth provide to their communities. And since communities program funding is also getting cut left right and center, not sure where the organizations that get help from Katimavik volunteers are going to get all those hours from. While I don't know the specifics of how Katimavik's money is being spent, I'mm sure they deserve at least a review of their expenditures, rather than being cut all together. I'm not opposed to more efficiency in these kinds of programs, I encourage it, but they weren't even given a chance to do so.
• CBC lost 10% of their funding. Not as bad as some had feared but not good.
• The Community Access Program (CAP or C@P) which provides free or low cost internet to Canadians through community centres, libraries and other access points has been cut abruptly, cutting off low income Canadians from things like job posting, tax information and forms and basic things like email. Only 54% of homes with an income of $30,000 or less have access to internet, yet the funding was still cut. 
• Canada is going to stop policing nutrition claims on food labels. Better start learning what all those ingredients really mean and stop believing claims of "low sodium, high fiber, low fat, organic..." (but really, those really should never have been our guiding lights when purchasing food.)
• Canada's budget for development assistance was cut drastically as well. An amount equal to CIDA's "basic education budget, immunization budget and the funding to fight tuberculosis" has been cut - a change from 2010, when the government capped the spending. Was that supposed to ease the people around the world into not expecting more help from the privileged nation of Canada? Well, now the cuts have come, a detriment not just to our reputation but to our ability to fight the causes and consequences of extreme poverty around the world.   
• And finally, in the gains column - a new national park in Toronto. Maybe next time the G20 comes to town, they won't have to build a fake lake...

Why I Love Volunteering

While The Meliorist buzz this week will about the brave and fantastic decision of Kelti and the Meliorist staff to pull the TLFs to draw attention to the overt bullying for which it has become a platform, I also noticed another article. This one, Why I hate volunteering,caught my eye. No one gets to argue against volunteerism without a rebuttle from me. So here it is. 

Why I love volunteering

Okay, maybe love is too weak a word, but apparently it’s a strong enough feeling to bother writing about it, so here we go. Full disclosure, I was the president of the Rotaract Club last year, and I’m not at your throat but I am at the defence of volunteers and volunteerism.

Our volunteer-sceptic had good points and points that represent misguided resentment.  Yes, scholarships and graduate programs do need to consider work experience, financial situations and other extenuating circumstances more often (though that is why they also have financial need scholarships). But here’s the kicker – they’re not just looking for people who help others, this is often a way of making sure the applicants have received some of the benefits of volunteerism and community involvement. Namely, experience with new perspectives and communities, a feel for the bigger picture, and an understanding that progress in any field requires a group effort that no, there isn’t always money to pay for.

And I’m not sure if anyone has ever talked to volunteers in Rotaract or any of the other incredible clubs, volunteer organizations and non-profits around Lethbridge, but they do not represent this exclusively financially flush, elite group described. They are people who go to school full time, work full time jobs, raise younger siblings, have fended for themselves since their teens, and suck up massive debt loads. They give up their tv time, their dinner time and their sleep because they understand that this world needs every extra hand it can get, and they just want to do their part to make someone else’s life easier.

I’m someone who has volunteered for most of my life and someone who has coordinated and organized volunteers, even the kind that don’t necessarily want to be there. In my experience, yes of course you want volunteers who genuinely want to be there but isn’t having an hour-counting volunteer better than having no one to walk the dogs, sell the tickets, set the tables or put up the posters? And in a shameless plug for Rotaract, even people who sign up for hours, end up realizing how awesome an experience it is to be part of something bigger and better than yourself. And in case people are worried about the kids, folks in nursing homes, and rescued animals at the hands of these reluctant volunteers – don’t worry, people need a vulnerable sector police check and to pass probationary time with non-profits before they get to have that kind of incredible experience.

I’m glad our anti-volunteerism volunteer has a supportive family and does have the time to write articles for the student newspaper and volunteer occasionally. But I really hope that she realizes that if we left the volunteerism to the Carnegies and Bill Gates of the world, there would be seniors without visitors, there would be schools without readers, there would be refugee students without tutors, there would be homeless people unfed and unrecognized, there would Meliorists unpublished. Most of all, communities would be impoverished by the absence of the incredible, resilient volunteers I know who eat KD to feed their bodies and volunteer to feed their souls.

Chickpeas, Honey and Lime

Not sure if they make better ingredients than things like chickpeas, local honey, fresh limes, ripe tomatoes and garlic - I can't imagine they do.

I made this recipe with a mix of a bunch of salads I had seen online, and this is definitely a winner. Make it your own and enjoy! Mix up the ratios to make it look as delicious as you want. Here is what I put in mine

Salad:
2 cups chickpeas (or 1 can)
2 cups black beans (or 1 can)
1 cucumber, diced however you like (I cut circles then quarter them)
2-3 tomatoes, into medium sized chunks
1 carrot, peeled and cut the same as you do with the cucumbers
1 1/2 cup corn kernels (or 1 can)
1/2 bunch cilantro, diced

Dressing:
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup fresh lime juice (the juice of about 2 medium limes)
1.5 tbsp of honey
1 clove of garlic, diced

Mix and enjoy! Makes a great contribution to a potluck, or a great school lunch. Even a small serving is filling but not heavy, and it tastes so fresh!