Torontoist » curiosity

KAMP: Horrors at the Hands of Humans

Carly Maga — Fri, 24 May 2013 17:30:28 +0000

Three puppet masters portray a day in the life of Auschwitz through a detailed miniature construction of the grounds and thousands of tiny handmade puppets.

When telling the story of the Holocaust, one effective way to overcome our sheer inability to comprehend the scope and scale of such atrocities is to zoom in on one or two stories: share one particular experience, in all its brutal specificity, and we have at least a small way into the event—the small details illuminate the larger whole.

One theatre company from the Netherlands, Hotel Modern, takes a related approach in KAMP (CAMP). The production depicts a typical day at the Auschwitz concentration camp, but instead of zooming in into a closeup, it shrinks everything down, literally, into miniature. It’s the accumulation of thousands of small details that has the impact in this case.

Ontario Bike Summit Aims to Change the Conversation on Cycling

Chris Dart — Fri, 24 May 2013 15:30:00 +0000

Bike Summit organizers say that drivers and cyclists are often the same people.

Eleanor McMahon thinks it’s time to change the conversation around cycling in Ontario.

McMahon is the founder of the Share the Road Cycling Coalition, who will be hosting the fifth annual Ontario Bike Summit this week in Toronto. She says that we need to stop talking about things like bike lanes and other bicycle infrastructure as a zero sum game between cars and bikes.

“We do polling, and our polling tells us that 89 per cent of Ontarians are both drivers and cyclists,” she says. “The notion that it’s cars versus bikes is overblown, and it’s really not working anymore. Deciding to change the conversation means going out of our way to poke holes in that idea and say from the get go ‘We don’t buy into that philosophy, and just because you say it, doesn’t make it true.’ ”

Celebrating Curiosity

Kevin Scott — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 13:15:23 +0000

A party at the Hotel Ocho watched on as NASA landed Curiosity, its new rover, on the surface of Mars.

Above the din of celebration in the seconds following the NASA rover Curiosity’s descent onto the surface of Mars early Monday morning, there was the sound of an exultant, unidentifiable voice. It clarified any confusion about how successful the mission had been, while framing the event in a topical metaphor:

“If this were gymnastics,” the voice said, “it would have stuck the landing!”

All of this happened at the Hotel Ocho, where local space enthusiasts anxiously awaited the enthralling moment among a jam-packed crowed. Curiosity’s way of landing on the planetary surface was famously complicated, so success was anything but a foregone conclusion.

Amidst kitschy decorations that featured an abundance of inflatable planets, cardboard stars, and a cut-out astronaut that attendees could put their faces in for photos, revelers at the Ocho were treated to a number of attractions, including three themed cocktails that were named for the three existing Mars rovers.

There was a simulator that allowed people to have an attempt at navigating the rover’s safe touchdown, an achievement that frequently drew cheers. There was also a live feed from NASA headquarters in California, where speakers included Bill Nye “The Science Guy” and, somewhat inexplicably, Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane. Several local guests took to the microphone at the Ocho.

Randy Atwood, Editor of Space Quarterly, detailed the history of Mars exploration, from its primitive beginnings to the sophistication of this newest rover. Still in their late teens, local students Asad Muhammad and Matthew Ho discussed how they sent a LEGO man into space, complete with impressive video evidence of the accomplishment. Also on hand were several members of the York University Rover Team and a rover they had designed, which attendees were able to control using an Xbox controller.

Of course, the York rover was hardly in the same league as Curiosity. Carrying over ten times the mass of scientific instruments as either of the previous rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, it is no mystery why the mission was dubbed Mars Science Laboratory. Canadians can take pride in the fact that we have contributed to the breakthrough. Ralf Gellert of the University of Guelph developed the APXS (Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer) that will be used to determine elemental chemistry of the planet.

As the clock ticked down toward the projected landing time, at approximately 1:30 a.m. EST, the guests—a few wearing Star Wars shirts and a couple dressed as Klingons—began to feel the excitement building. At one point, the crowd was subjected to the surreal sight of Bill Nye and those assembled in California viewing the Toronto celebration live via satellite. There were few murmurs of doubt or skepticism regarding the outcome, but a lot of concerned discussion regarding the precision required in completing the operation.

When the time finally arrived, the crowd had nothing to do but study a live stream of the NASA team in Washington D.C., arranged in rows behind computer terminals, just like in Apollo 13. As they all erupted in cheers, shaking hands and embracing in well-earned hugs, it became clear that the Curiosity team’s achievement was painstaking, and that its results may be invaluable. Two and a half billion dollars and nearly a decade were spent to ensure that nothing went wrong and, lo and behold, it had all gone off without a hitch.

Soon, we were looking at images from the surface of the red planet, as Curiosity regarded its own large shadow.

Photo by Kevin Scott/Torontoist.

Televisualist: Look! Up In the Sky!

Christopher Bird — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 18:30:00 +0000

Each week, Torontoist examines the upcoming TV listings and makes note of programs that are entertaining, informative, and of quality. Or, alternately, none of those. The result: Televisualist.

This is 28 times funnier if, while looking at the image, you sing the theme from Mighty Mouse in your head but replace the words “Mighty Mouse” with “Jake Pavelka.” Illustration by Brett Lamb/Torontoist.

Monday

Bachelor Pad has its second-season debut with a three-hour premiere episode (wait, what?) as people ask themselves “wait, why does this show even exist?” But people love them some Bachelor and Bachelorette, and if you aren’t gonna see those people fall in love, you might as well see them play a half-assed version of Survivor, which is basically what Bachelor Pad is, except without the surviving or the “being an entertaining show” parts. This time around, the season’s big draw is that Jake “Airplane Pilot Bachelor” Pavelka is returning to compete, along with Vienna Girardi, the girl who won his season of The Bachelor and who dated Pavelka for almost two whole months before they broke up. Are you pumped for this? WE’RE SO GODDAMNED PUMPED! (City, 8 p.m.)
Tonight on Kate Plus 8: first Kate and the kids travel to D.C. to visit the stars of TLC’s show about cupcakes, cleverly named D.C. Cupcakes, and eat cupcakes! Then, in the next episode, the kids make their very own movie and take to the red carpet—Hollywood style!—for the premiere of the movie they’ve made! Does this show feel to anybody else like it’s just counting down to the inevitable shooting spree? (TLC, 9 p.m.)

Tuesday

Tonight on POV, you can catch Food, Inc., the Michael Pollan–narrated documentary about corporate farming in America that has gotten heaps of praise for being brutally honest about the environmental unsustainability of factory farming, but ultimately it feels like half a film because it never bothers to address alternatives beyond halfhearted “maybe we should do something else, huh?”–type statements. Honestly, this is the sort of thing that begs for Michael Moore, who may be annoying but knows how to craft a documentary: Moore would throw in one or two stupid publicity stunts involving himself, yes, but he’d also take the time to discuss alternative farming methods that can address the needs that have led to factory farming (e.g. producing massive quantities of food), and that would have been welcome. (PBS, 9 p.m.)
The Simpsons rerun of the week: “Hurricane Neddy,” wherein Flanders finally snaps and loses it with all the idiots of Springfield. A true classic. “Well, my family and I can’t live in good intentions, Marge! Oh, your family’s out of control, but we can’t blame you, because you have gooooood intentions!” (Comedy Network, 9 p.m.)

Wednesday

America’s version of So You Think You Can Dance concludes tonight and tomorrow as the final four dance-off in a season that has managed to somehow have both exceptionally talented dancers and still be underwhelming, which shouldn’t be possible but there you go. Partially this is because the judges have almost entirely stopped giving good criticism in favour of playing to the crowds, making them equivalent, judging-wise, to a table full of less-drunken (and therefore less entertaining) Paula Abduls. Partially it’s because the producers’ attempts to manipulate the results by favouring certain dancers have been extremely transparent this season, to the point where Melanie—one of the favourites—has only danced outside of her comfort zone two or three times all season, thus making her a possible winner who has never really had to excel in the way that past winners have. Partially it’s because the guest-judge gimmick has kind of sucked this year. Partially it’s because the choreographers this year have been often strikingly lazy, rehashing whole routines over and over again from previous seasons in the most obvious ways possible. Partially it’s because they kept the All-Star concept, even only halfway, and all it does is serve to remind viewers that this show has become so contemporary-focused that they need to keep bringing back Pasha from season 3 in order to have a competent ballroom dancer. On the bright side, Cat Deeley is still awesome. (CTV, 8 p.m.)

Thursday

Results show for So You Think You Can Dance. Go, Sasha! Or Marko, or even Tadd. Just not Melanie, please. (CTV, 8 p.m.)
Unfortunately for the Discovery Channel, Discovery’s episode of Curiosity, “Did God Create the Universe?”, which is actually a nifty hour-long documentary about the Big Bang and religious philosophy, was promoted on Twitter with the hashtag #goduniverse, and boring Twitter people turned it into their daily affirmation of faith about how awesome God is, thus ruining Discovery’s guerrilla marketing attempt. All of this just goes to show you: this is what happens when Shark Week is only four days long. Karma, Discovery Channel! (8 p.m.)

Friday

Karaoke Battle USA is a competitive reality show hosted by Joey Fatone of ‘N Sync fame and some other people who are not Joey Fatone, and it’s… well, it’s a singing show. It makes some pretense about not taking itself as seriously as other singing shows, but it’s a competitive singing show just like all the rest, and the only difference is that it admits it’s a karaoke show, as opposed to all the others where singing famous songs other people wrote and originally performed is some amazing creative endeavour. But—Joey Fatone! (ABC, 8 p.m.)
Thom Ernst of Saturday Night at the Movies and Peter O’Brian host A Tribute to Norman Jewison, which is mostly a compilation of archival interviews the great Canadian director did with TVO over the decades (most of them with the late Elwy Yost, naturally). This is the sort of thing you can only see on TVO. Don’t miss it if you care about film. (10 p.m.)

The Weekend

NBC’s continuing desperation to find anything at all to fill up hours of programming time hits a new low with WrestleMania: The World Premiere, which is just a bunch of clips and highlights from this year’s WrestleMania, which happened back in March, so calling it a “world premiere” is just begging for a false advertising lawsuit. Hey, does anybody remember when NBC would actually pay the WWE to put on original shows like Saturday Night’s Main Event and they actually acted like it was a big deal? This is the opposite of that. (8 p.m. Saturday)
If you like country music, then the CMA Music Festival special is what you’ve been waiting for, as tonight’s show will have performances by (deep breath) Lauren Alaina, Jason Aldean, Sara Evans, Lady Antebellum, Miranda Lambert, Martina McBride, Reba McEntire, Scotty McCreery, Brad Paisley, Rascal Flatts, Darius Rucker, and Blake Shelton. That’s not one but two contestants from American Idol and you get Hootie in the bargain! Fun additional fact: Reba McEntire these days has taken to calling herself simply “Reba,” which we’re not sure you can do if you are not Cher or possibly Prince. (ABC, 8 p.m. Sunday)