Browsing “In Your Words, YYC”

There’s a March snowstorm outside. Calgary police have advised against driving and the lights are flickering across the city. Still, I walked a blustery five blocks and waited just 15 minutes in the blowing snow—don’t worry, it was a dry cold—to get this single seat at the counter. And it was so worth it.

It’s cosy in the Beltline diner, with just enough space for the servers to slip between the tables of 10:30 a.m. brunchers. The next hungry lot is chattering cheerfully while crammed up against one another in the make-shift waiting area. There’s a growing line on the other side of the door, too, comprised of resolute, chilly wannabe diners.

In Calgary, the only thing we love more than brunch is drinking on patios (especially drinking on patios when it’s warm enough to take off our toques).

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Calgary is awesome for not only what is today, but also what it will grow up to be in the future. The city is evolving and with an influx of young professionals and cultural enthusiasts it’s beginning to set its own tone.

Calgary is a place where you can do anything you want. You can be inventive and dream up any experience you can imagine. With enough hard work, and Calgarians are extremely hard workers, people are getting there. Calgary is a city of entrepreneurs, dreamers and conservative realists. This combination has produced a generation that thinks big, formulates a calculated plan and has the balls to execute it.

 PARKLUXE 2012 (Hyatt Auto Gallery Mercedes Benz) – Photo by Jessica Hunter

PARK was my first experimentation with this kind of thinking. The non-profit organization was founded in 2008 as a recognized community need for artist/designer opportunities and a lack of creative platforms. The organization has since grown to include 15 incredible volunteer members and hosts semi-annual fashion and art show cases that have been selling out since 2009.

This enthusiasm for Calgary’s cultural evolution brought me to New York’s Mercedes Benz Fashion Week to discover and bring back what others are doing in larger creative centers.  On my third day of attending MBFW shows I had the very good fortune of being able to attend the Tommy Hilfiger Men’s SS13 show. I arrived at the last minute, Caitlin Power blazer drenched with humidity after navigating trains from Brooklyn into Manhattan in 30 degree heat. Although I had an invitation I wasn’t given a seat and was meant to blend in with the PR interns and stage crew in a back corner. While fanning myself aggressively to try and dry my hair a PR minion noticed that I was still standing and no amount of ignorance on my part prevented her insistence of seating me. To my horror she led me past seated celebrities, media, and editors, plopping me down embarrassed and red-faced, front row next to Suzy Menkes (I was the last person to be seated).

Half star-struck, I sat on her program which she tartly yanked from beneath me. Shocked, I apologized and sat up super tall just as the music started and the models began walking. Apparently by doing this a piece of my hair moved into her peripheral vision. After a stern “Excuse me, your hair is blocking my view!”, and me sheepishly tucking the piece of hair behind my ear I realized just how much I missed home. I couldn’t believe how humiliated I felt over something SO ridiculous.

As much as I have a strong belief in our local fashion and creative industries throughout this trip I came to the realization that Calgary could and would never be like New York (for which I am grateful!). This city has no preconceived expectations, snobbery or constraints about what our creative industries should or need to be. Our local industries and their supporters will create a path and means for sustainability through pure Calgarian stubbornness and relentless will. It will be based on what works best for us here and not copying what others are doing elsewhere.

Calgary is relying on our generation to lay down the foundations for our own, unique, cultural future, and I am so glad that there are no people here telling us that our hair is in their way.

Kara Chomistek is a born–and-raised Calgarian, a biomechanical engineer, President of PARK and most recently the owner of her self-titled creative direction, styling and fashion production company.

In Your Words, YYC is a regular CIA feature that allows awesome Calgarians to share their awesome views on our great city.

The way the media and critics talked about it during construction, it was Calgary’s enduring shame. A waste of money. A slap in the face to hard-working taxpayers. But forget all of that: the critics and curmudgeons are wrong-headed and small-minded on this one. The Peace Bridge is simply a treasure—and one of the things I love the most about Calgary.

It isn’t just an ordinary foot bridge across the Bow River. From the minute it was opened to the public, the Peace Bridge instantly became one of Calgary’s favourite public spaces. Dog walkers, wedding photographers, joggers, strollers with kids, seniors with canes—it seems that people just love being around it. The vibrant red-and-white color and distinctive design set it apart from everything else that is sometimes too grey, too beige, or too dusty in a Prairie town like Calgary.

Even before it was built, the Peace Bridge was doing its job: getting people engaged and caring about their city. Love it or hate it, most people had some strong thoughts about the bridge itself. Calgarians started to examine their urban environment. And even those who still conclude that it’s a waste of money had to stop and ask themselves: what kind of city do we want? Getting citizens to ask that question is half the battle in getting them to care.

Years (or maybe months) from now, people will forget the price tag. They’ll forget the sometimes flawed manner in which the project was debated and approved within City Hall. They’ll forget that there could have been better locations for the bridge. What we have will endure: a place where people love to hang out, be in community with each other, and enjoy life in Calgary.

Todd Hirsch is the Senior Economist at ATB Financial, and the author of “The Boiling Frog Dilemma: Saving Canada from Economic Decline.” He’s lived in Calgary since 1989.

In Your Words, YYC is a regular CIA feature that allows awesome Calgarians to share their awesome views on our great city.

When I think of elements that make Calgary an awesome place to live, wildlife immediately comes to mind. With several natural parks linking the city to the great outdoors, we are blessed to have wild residents and visitors all year round. They traverse the river valleys and ravines, treading timeless trails and tracks, usually in silence and anonymity but sometimes crossing our paths. A walk in Fish Creek Park for example might allow a glimpse of a beaver developing the engineering marvel that is his dam. The tawny shape of a coyote might be seen in March as she hunts for mice. Her pups are nearby, hidden in a well-concealed den. Most times, the grazing Mule Deer are not fazed when I come upon them. They raise their heads and twitch their big trumpet ears, knowing that I am no threat.

On a hill I might see mum skunk with her babies. They have just emerged from their den and they follow her in rolling balls of fur as she shows them around their new environment. Depending on the season, there are many more such sights to enjoy. A fox could streak across your path heading for the creek, or a porcupine might climb a nearby tree searching for berries. The scream of the Red-Tailed Hawk circling effortlessly on the high air currents will not be a surprise. On the other hand, the sight of a black bear making her way towards a clump of berry bushes with a cub trailing behind her is a real bonus. Equally delightful is the loud staccato sound of the Pileated Woodpecker decimating a fallen tree trunk in search of dormant grubs. And I am honoured when I see my Black Capped Chickadee friend fluttering towards me. He alights on my hand. He knows I have sunflower seeds for him.

Calgary has many seasonal avian visitors who travel on the wide flyway that extends all the way from the Arctic to South America. I love to watch them from my window. Once on a cold January day, I saw a magnificent Snowy Owl sitting on one of my garden posts framed by snow-dusted spruce trees. In summer I welcome the Baltimore Oriole but have been unable to locate her hanging nest, one of the finest examples of intricate construction known to Man. I could go on: I marvel at the brilliant blur of the Humming Bird. The lament of the Mourning Dove haunts me, while the song of the Evening Grosbeaks in the high poplar branches lifts my spirits. I chuckle at the incessant chatter of the wren or the noisy quarrelsome energy of the Pine Siskins. I am filled with admiration as I watch the Kildeer crying and feigning injury so pursuers will chase her and not see her defenceless chicks. With such sights to see, there can never be boredom.

I have all this and more in Calgary. Yes, I know there are some that take wildlife for granted. Or worse, fear them or perceive them as threat or nuisance. I, of course, vehemently disagree. Those feathered, furred or scaled creatures are just like me, “caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth.”

Max Foran is a professor at the University of Calgary and historian of all things Calgary.

In Your Words, YYC is a regular CIA feature that allows awesome Calgarians to share their awesome views on our great city.

Photo credit: Harrison Gallelli

I’m a big fan of Calgary, Calgarians, and the diverse and interesting communities we share here. In fact, there are few things that make me as proud as watching fellow Calgarians engaging in making our city better. I love to share, and so in my words here are three (awesome!) reasons to love and engage in Calgary.

1) We do well by being awesome

Calgary is the kind of place where you get ahead by doing a good job, and where hard work and performance are rewarded. Calgary is very much the city and community you make it, ripe with opportunity for doing awesome, being awesome, and seeing the outcomes associated with your efforts. All you have to do is do it.

2) We give generously

Calgary leads the country in strength of our non-profit sector, which is guided by the generosity of very high skill and high-level volunteers from across Calgary. Everyone from the CEOs of our major companies to the front line leaders in start-ups are getting involved by contributing their time, money, and voice to causes that matter to them. It is one of the things that makes Calgary a great (nay, awesome!) city. Haven’t started yet? There’s no time like today to join in.

3) We celebrate where we come from

The Calgary Stampede is a non-profit organization whose mission is to “preserve western heritage and values” – that is, to bring forward an annual celebration each year of where we come from, and it then reinvests funds back into our community all year long. I challenge you to check out a side of Stampede you’ve not experienced before, whether experiencing community at a pancake breakfast, learning about the history of Stampede at the Western Oasis, or checking out an agricultural exhibit or the rodeo. Knowing where we come from strengthens the foundation for where we are going.

Those are my three reasons to love and engage in Calgary. What are yours?

Rhiannon is a philanthropist, researcher, educator, adventurer, and big fan of Calgary. Engage with @Rhiannon on Twitter.

In Your Words, YYC is a regular CIA feature that allows awesome Calgarians to share their awesome views on our great city.

Calgary is awesome. I argue this point almost daily with my husband, who although born and bred in Calgary, pines for the balmy winters we had for a few short years during an experimental stint in Vancouver. (Even so, he reluctantly loves Calgary.) Rather than wax poetic about my childhood (in Brentwood, then Mount Royal) or what I like best about this city, I put together a Top Ten list; which is in no way an exhaustive list, nor prioritized. But here, right this minute, are ten reasons I love Calgary.

1) My Mom, Meg Van Rosendaal. Over the years she has contributed enormously to arts and culture in Calgary – as creator of Art Walk/Art Week, past manager of the downtown cultural district, founder of First Thursdays, organizer of countless festivals and events that have done so much to build a sense of culture and community.

2) Baking from Aviv’s Sidewalk Citizen Bakery on Friday and Saturday mornings. You should go.

3) Nenshi. I could focus this entire post on the guy I went to junior high school with.

4) The dog parks. There are plenty of them, and they make for beautiful walks.

5) Sled Island and a hopping music scene. ‘Nuff said.

6) The food. Great chefs with innovative ideas, collaborations reigning over competition, food trucks, food bikes, pop-ups, growers and producers, fantastic butchers, bakers, brewers, and home cooks. Micro-ice cream makers, markets, urban gardeners, beekeepers, chicken-raisers – it’s all going on here. [Editor’s note: Check out Julie’s blog for more awesome foodie notes!]

7) Our proximity to the mountains. I’ve recently rediscovered the pleasure of the Friday afternoon hop to the Rockies – in less time than it takes most commuters to get home in Toronto or Vancouver – for a day or weekend getaway.

8 ) The Peace Bridge. It’s a beautiful, unique piece of architecture, and has become a hub for people out and about, on foot or bike.

9) The coffee. We have a fantastic coffee culture going on in YYC, with great baristas, roasters and hangouts – more, it seems, than Vancouver or Toronto. (But who’s comparing?)

10) Let’s leave this spot open – what do you love most about Calgary? [Send us a tweet to @ciawesome!]

Julie Van Rosendaal is the food and nutrition columnist on the Calgary Eyeopener, CBC Radio One, writes cookbooks and writes about food for various publications around Calgary and across the country.

In Your Words, YYC is a regular CIA feature that allows awesome Calgarians to share their awesome views on our great city.

When I was a small child I remember Calgary being a very exciting place to live in 1988. It was the year of the Winter Olympic Games. Even though I was very young, I had a sense that Calgarians were unified in celebrating their city. Thousands of volunteers worked countless hours to show the world how awesome we are. Many thousands more were spectators to events that put us on the world map as a place to see and live in. We did this together and we were proud.

Twenty-four years later we are on the stage again as the cultural capital of Canada. It is not a self-appointed title and it has taken a great deal of work to achieve. Hundreds of individuals at hundreds of organizations have worked hard to win the bid. Thousands more will work together to showcase what makes Calgary an awesome place to live and visit. Over two hundred and fifty Cultural Ambassadors have volunteered to represent the many scenes in this city. Our culture runs deep into our communities from the downtown core to the city limits.

This is the centennial year for the Calgary Stampede. This past March, over nine thousand Calgarians flooded Olympic Plaza to share in the 100-day kickoff event. They came together even though the Calgary Stampede did not advertise. They rang thousands of cow bells, cheered, applauded, and danced. Attendees feasted on pancakes, a tradition that was begun in 1923.

Calgarians love to listen to great music together. Calgary Folk Fest, Sled Island and X-Fest continue to grow. In April, a Garth Brooks concert sold out in fifty-eight seconds. Thousands will pack the field in front of the Coca-Cola Stage in July to be entertained.

Our city will continue to grow. Culture will continue to expand. Great events will thrive. Calgary is awesome because we experience what this city has to offer together.

Lonnie Taylor is a Calgary Stampede volunteer and a Calgary 2012 Culture Ambassador.

In Your Words, YYC is a regular CIA feature that allows awesome Calgarians to share their awesome views on our great city.