Read the other half of this debate here. Because 2020 wasn’t full of enough surprises, Premier John Horgan recently called an election. So on Oct. 24, like it or not, some British Columbians are heading to a polling booth. “I’ve struggled mightily with this decision, and it did not come easy to me,” Horgan said... Continue Reading

Read the other half of this debate here. B.C. premier John Horgan has called for an election on Oct. 24, one year earlier than we all expected, and there is a lot of controversy about the timing. It seems both Horgan and the new B.C. Green party leader Sonia Furstenau feels their parties’ confidence and... Continue Reading

Note: This article has been updated to include Ontario’s provincial mask policy which came into effect on Oct. 2. Before you leave the house in B.C., you make sure your door is locked. In Ontario, you also ask yourself, “Do I have a mask?” Wearing masks in indoor public places was made mandatory in Toronto... Continue Reading

Hearing languages other than English is nothing new to me. I grew up hearing my dad speak Spanish in our household, to our family back home in Mexico, and to his friends at get-togethers. I work at a pool in Surrey, where many patrons speak to each other in languages other than English. Parents call... Continue Reading

Life has not been easy for the past five months due to the “new normal” created by the COVID-19 pandemic. So far, our 2020 was nothing but filled with cancelled summer plans, school and work from home, and binge-watching all day. Even though most shops and restaurants are now open, everything has changed with new... Continue Reading

Vancouver City Councilor Sarah Kirby-Yung proposed last month that the city extend restaurants’ patio permits past their October expiry date. She says the patio program has saved many local eateries from going out of business due to financial strain from the pandemic. And according to a poll she made on Twitter, most people are in... Continue Reading

A former Royal Canadian Air Force officer, lawyer, and Minister of Veterans Affairs in the Harper government, Erin O’Toole has been an MP for Durham, Ontario, since 2012. This month, he was nominated to be the next leader of the Conservative Party of Canada. In his victory speech, O’Toole shared how he plans to lead... Continue Reading

Vancouver is notorious for crappy, cold, wet weather. At its worst, the weather curses us with an oppressive greyness that makes you want to do nothing. At its best, it provides warm days dotted with clouds to give you a break from the sunshine. Still, when the hottest months hit in Vancouver, they hit hard.... Continue Reading

All over the world, people are starting to use contact tracing apps. While each app might work slightly differently from the others, the premise is the same: They will alert you if you have been in contact with anyone that has been infected with COVID-19. The Government of Canada is encouraging us to use COVID... Continue Reading

The government of B.C. has decided to go back to in-school instruction in the fall, a decision which has elicited a lot of concern from many people. There will, however, be some changes to the way that kids are taught in September. One of the biggest changes is the introduction of “learning groups”. The size... Continue Reading

Two days before KPU shut down to prevent the spread of COVID-19, I had a 10:00 a.m. class on the Langley campus. It was normal, except for one thing: During a group discussion about COVID-19 coverage in the mainstream media, most students believed it was receiving “too much coverage” instead of not enough. Obviously, hindsight... Continue Reading

Quarantine has allowed us to feel the sting of boredom. In this era of uncertainty, the most absurd happenings occur: NASA has released footage of UFOs, monkeys have overtaken Thailand, and Hungarian scientists have bred two endangered fish species to create a ‘frankenfish.’ The Russian sturgeon and American paddlefish are two endangered fish species that... Continue Reading

While others complain about being stuck at home, I believe quarantine is the perfect opportunity to experiment with some new hobbies, like growing an oyster mushroom farm or starting a YouTube channel. I got my dad an oyster mushroom farm for Father’s Day. I didn’t want to go for cremini mushrooms or portobello mushrooms because... Continue Reading

Back in 2011, the City of Vancouver released an action plan which detailed its goals to become the greenest city in the world by 2020. That goal was not met, but the City did achieve some milestones — including a 35 per cent increase in green jobs since 2010, 139,000 new trees planted, and a... Continue Reading