Tag: The Concordian

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Community

Our beloved groundhog has passed away before making his prediction

Carleen Loney/ THE CONCORDIAN @shloneys

What does that mean for spring?

When Feb. 2 rolls around, we all come together to celebrate Groundhog Day. Whether you partake in making a prediction or not, it’s always fun to hear what the predictions might be. 

Some of you might find yourselves asking, why do we have Groundhog Day? 

Well to begin, Groundhog Day falls right in between the winter solstice and spring equinox. In many different cultures, Feb. 2 brought many events of various significance, the most popular being the event celebrated in Christianity. 

Christians celebrated Candlemas, which was a feast that commemorated the presentation of Jesus at the Holy Temple in Jerusalem. If the weather around Candlemas was sunny, Christians believed that there would be 40 more days of snow.

According to the History channel website, the first official Groundhog Day was celebrated on Feb. 2, 1887, in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. The celebration was the ingenious idea of the local town’s newspaper editor Clymer Freas.

Freas at the time sold a group of groundhog hunters and businessmen, known as the  Punxsutawney Groundhog Club, on the idea. 

At first, the annual Groundhog Day festivities took place at a site called Gobbler’s Knob. Nowadays thousands of people flock to this site in Punxsutawney for Groundhog Day. 

But unfortunately in our neck of the woods here in Quebec, tragedy has struck this Groundhog Day. Fred la Marmotte passed away on Feb. 1, the night before he was supposed to give his prediction.

According to Global News, when the organizer of the event at Val d’Espoir, Roberto Blondin, went to wake Fred up during the night, he wasn’t showing any signs of life. 

Blondin explained to the crowd at Val d’Espoir that Fred most likely passed away during hibernation. 

The celebration of Groundhog Day still went forward despite the tragic turn of events. A group of volunteer children came in and made the prediction in front of the crowd at Val d’Espoir in Quebec. They predicted six more weeks of winter.

Close to Quebec in Ontario, Wiarton Willie predicted an early spring from a plexiglass box on stage in front of a big crowd.

In Nova Scotia, Shubenacadie Sam also predicted six more weeks of winter. She ventured out of her enclosure at the Wildlife Park and saw her shadow.

Next year, the tradition of Groundhog Day will continue with Fred la Marmotte’s successor, Fred Junior.

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Arts Exhibit

[espace variable | placeholder]: experience art in a post-pandemic flux

La Centrale - Courtesy Photos

Concordia students and alumni open a new online art exhibit in regards to adapting to a world affected by COVID-19

La Centrale galerie Powerhouse hosted the vernissage of their new exhibit [espace variable | placeholder] on the evening of Feb. 2. The online gallery was created, in part, as a statement that the world of art has shifted to the internet. 

It was created out of inspiration from a term coined by sociologist Ray Oldenburg: the third place. Third places are the spaces where people can spend time in between their first place (home) and second place (work). As of recently, the world’s third place is the internet.

The exhibit is divided into four categories: Read, Observe, Listen, and Interact. 

La Centrale Courtesy Photo

Read, the first category presents texts reflecting artists’ experiences involving themes pertaining to third places, place-making, technological presence, and artistic subversion. 

Observe, the second category, displays the interdisciplinary approach to the concept of placeholding. 

Listen, the third category, involves audible artwork alluding to memory, transmission and reciprocity. 

La Centrale Courtesy Photo

Interact, the last, is a space which provides literature for readers to further their understanding and research of third places.

This exhibit explores navigation through third places as well as artists’ “(re)telling” of stories about finding a voice, or making a place, of those who have been demeaned by racial injustice.

One of the installations at the vernissage was from artist-in-residence rudi aker of the Byte-sized Sound Creation Residency. “This work, a bird in the hand, is what feels most appropriate to share with a larger public from those recorded conversations,” explains aker in their artist statement. The audio piece is “a move to safeguard our personal and familial histories from the often prying and exploitative consumption of Indigenous oral histories.”

La Centrale Courtesy Photo

My Little thingliness (SCRUB-A-DUB-DUB-BEBOP), another creation presented at the vernissage, is a spoken-word/sound immersion performance written and performed by Faith Paré. The piece thrashes you into the world of generational forced labour and abuse that Black women succumb to in order to survive white supremacist society. Because of this, Black women of today have the choice and opportunity to work with their minds instead of their hands.

Art history and studio arts major at Concordia India-Lynn Upshaw-Ruffner was the Artistic and Community Alliances Coordinator of [espace variable | placeholder] for some time. Through La Centrale, Upshaw-Ruffner met the Publications and Communications Coordinator Lital Khaikin.

During the creative progress of [espace variable | placeholder], the two developers contacted Paré, who Upshaw-Ruffner had discovered through a project she did at Concordia. Paré knew rudi aker through a class that they took together as well. The [espace variable | placeholder] ex-coordinator met rudi aker through a class on indigenous curatorial methodologies they had together. It goes to show that networking at school is important!

If you want to frequent an art exhibit but hate walking, you can now experience it from your own home. Click here. To access La Centrale Galerie Powerhouse’s website, Click here.

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News

ConUHacks: winners’ submission sparks outrage online

The team found themselves at the center of controversy after winning first place

The winning team of Concordia’s ConUHacks event came under fire last weekend after accusations of violating competition rules were posted online.

ConUHacks, the event which the project was produced for, is a yearly competition during which teams must conceptualize and code an application in only 24 hours to impress judges and potentially win prizes. This “hackathon” is primarily organized by Concordia’s HackConcordia club.

NearByNow, the winning submission, was accused of being presented to judges under false pretence and omitting key lines of code to prove its authenticity. This led to an investigation into the validity of the winners’ application.

Although the accusations were proven false, the winning coders are now worried of online harassment. 

“I was confused. We all were,” said Samuel Chuang, a fourth-year computer science student at Concordia and one member of the winning team. “Honestly, I had to think to myself, maybe we did do something wrong.”

Chuang said everything went well during the competition, leaving the judges impressed. Their hard work was rewarded with first place. 

Six days later, Chuang found out about the controversy forming around their application.

A post on Concordia’s official Reddit page that called the team’s winning project fraudulent garnered the attention of many who had participated at the event. 

Soon, Chuang said he’d seen a post by an anonymous user on Concordia’s official engineering and computer science Discord server, suggesting users should flood the team’s LinkedIn pages with negative comments. 

“Hate on the project as much as you want but there’s a potential of ruining people’s reputation,”said Chuang.

Chuang and his team contacted Major League Hacking (MLH), who help run weekend-long hackathons like ConUHacks and partly oversee judgment. 

“We found what we would expect to see from a hackathon project built in just 24 hours,” said Ryan Swift, a member of the MLH who reviewed the team’s project.  

According to Swift, Chuang’s team was accused of faking the demonstration of their project. More specifically, by faking results given by the programmed A.I., which ran the application. They were also suspected of omitting the code which the A.I. had been programmed through- what’s known as a “neural network.” 

NearByNow shows users information about a storefront or company in real time once given a logo. This feature relies on multiple application programming interfaces (API), for example one from Google Maps. The A.I. then communicates with the API to produce the desired results. 

The neural network was not made public, which added to the accusers’ suspicions. Swift said his team verified its existence as well as its timestamps to confirm that it was coded during the hackathon. 

The team would also “hard-code” data given by the application. Hard-coding data means that the results given by the program are directly put into the code rather than obtained by prompts. According to Swift, this was done for simplicity’s sake and the team had done nothing to break the competition’s rules.

“Because they are developed in just a single weekend, hackers don’t typically follow industry-best practices,” said Swift. “Their projects are often laden with bugs, and many features aren’t fully completed.” 

Vatsa Shah, co-president of HackConcordia, the club responsible for organizing ConUHacks, said his team did not appreciate the public accusations of malicious intent towards the team. “Our team is always willing to investigate and review issues as they arise, but we prefer to do so in private specifically because of situations like this where public backlash can take over,” he said.


An official comment was written by the MLH under the original accusatory Reddit post stating that the investigation had been completed.

Categories
Arts Exhibit

Exhibition review: Montreal printmaking artist’s life path

Death of the Cyclist - Photo by Jiawei HONG

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts displays 30 remarkable artworks from Albert Dumouchel, representing the evolution of his art style throughout his career

“Printing remains a simple, Austere Language– As I have often said, it’s like chamber music” – Albert Dumouchel.

Albert Dumouchel (1916-71) was a Montreal printmaking artist. He met London artist James Lowe in 1940, which inspired the start of his printmaking career.

An exhibition in honour of the late artist is located on the second floor of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, surrounded by white walls. The room is lit in a warm tone, dimmer than the lobby but matches the tone of the artist’s featured works. This exhibition displays 30 of his prints from the 1940s to the 1960s. His printmaking has been influenced by the development of art in many other countries.

In 1942, Dumouchel’s artwork “Pietà” marked the beginning of his journey. Unlike the traditional drypoint technique, in which an image is drawn on the plate with a sharp needle-like tool. Dumouchel decided to carve his images into a sheet of transparent plastic. “Pietà” demonstrated a picture of the Virgin Mary mourning the death of her son. 

Although the overall lines of this piece are rough, the painted appearance on Mary’s face expresses strong emotions. The sharp white shapes in the background form a strong contrast with the surrounding dark round shapes, enhancing the viewer’s visual senses. His spiritual expression laid the groundwork for the later transformation of his artistic style.

In the late 1940s, Dumouchel turned towards surrealism, expressing external reality through his own psychological and poetic imagination. In “The Banners in the Night,” 1958, he used etching to show the technical improvement. Each line in the work flows naturally, twisting together to create the changeable forms of the wind.

In 1965, with the ascent of the Pop Art movement in North America, Dumouchel returned to figurative form in 1965. One remarkable technique he used was lithography. This technique was used in his piece “La mort de la cycliste” (The Death of the Cyclist), presenting his art in a completely new way.

Dumouchel returned to carving, making woodcuts late in his career, like his piece called “L’Horrible chat des neiges” (The Horrible Snow Cat).The penetrating gaze of the cat is what makes the work memorable. Referring to his earlier works, he has a talent of using minimal backgrounds to enhance the expression of the main subject’s manner.

Throughout this artist’s experience in printmaking, much of his inspiration has come from other cultures. “When I think of this artist, or any other artist, I would just think of his expression of art,” says one of the visitors. “Anything could be the inspiration, like what you learned and what you experienced.”

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Arts

Glass Onion and the pellucid greed of the one percent

Header Glass Onion Courtesy

Netflix’s newest mystery film includes some interesting class commentary, but it doesn’t live up to its predecessor

Glass Onion, the sequel to the 2019 murder-mystery Knives Out, is making the rounds after a limited-theatre run and a Netflix release at the end of December. It follows the same skeleton as its predecessor — the detective Benoit Blanc, played by Daniel Craig, investigates a murder amongst a group of out-of-touch rich people, only this time it takes place on a billionaire’s private island in the middle of the pandemic.

It continues the current trend of criticizing the upper class, seen in HBO’s The White Lotus and Palme d’Or winner Triangle of Sadness. This criticism, not entirely new, has recently been reignited due to the rising cost of living and post-pandemic inflation.

Glass Onion Courtesy

The film starts with the billionaire Miles Bron, played by Edward Norton, sending all his friends a box of riddles. Upon solving, the box opens to reveal an invitation to a murder-mystery party held on his private island, reminiscent of Kim Kardashian’s controversial birthday party at the height of COVID-19. On the way to the island, the friend group meets Benoit Blanc and a woman named Andi, played by Janelle Monáe, who is revealed to be the true brains behind Bron’s company Alpha.

Glass Onion is not a bad film — it currently has a critics score of 92 percent on Rotten Tomatoes. However,  it does fall short of the greatness of its predecessor. This difference in quality leads to an underwhelming yet enjoyable movie-watching experience that would be reduced had Glass Onion been a stand-alone film. 

Courtesy Glass Onion

The glass onion, which stands tall at the centre of Miles Bron’s island, is used as a metaphor to criticize the characters’ wealth and belief systems. Whereas an onion demands you peel away at its layers to reveal the centre, one can look right through glass with no effort. The character of Miles Bron is portrayed by the media as being a genius businessman and a true visionary, when he is, in fact, a fraud who is only rich and successful because of someone else’s idea. He is nowhere near as intelligent, complex, or disruptive as he pretends to be. He is a glass onion.

Bron calls himself and his friends disruptors, for he believes that they challenge norms and are brave and successful for doing so. However, in reality, they are upholding the status quo. There is nothing disruptive about being a corrupt politician, like Katheryn Hahn’s character Claire, or upholding patriarchal gender ideals, like Dave Bautista’s character Duke Cody. Their success is  due to the fact that they prioritize the power, influence and money of being friends with a man like Miles Bron over doing what is right. They are all, as Monáe’s character puts it, “holding on for dear life to Miles Bron’s golden titties.”

Netflix has already purchased the rights to a third film in the franchise, so this is not the end of Benoit Blanc.

Categories
News

The Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy hosts a naloxone training

Concordia’s student community looks increasingly supportive of having an open conversation about drug use

In Canada, in the first half of 2021 alone, an average of 19 people died from opioid-related overdoses every day, with a daily hospitalization of 16 people according to the federal special advisory committee on opioid overdoses. 

For the Concordia chapter of the Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy (CSSDP) and other harm reduction organizations, these numbers could be greatly attenuated through education, support for substance users, broad access to naloxone as well as safe supplies and safer injection sites. 

The CSSDP hosted a naloxone training on Jan. 26 at Le Frigo Vert at the downtown campus. Students and people in the broader Concordia community were invited to learn how to administer naloxone (also known as Narcan) to counter the effects of opioid overdose.

Harm reduction refers to the set of strategies aimed at limiting health or social risks related to a specific issue.

CSSPD member Assaf Azerrad explained that advocating for a harm reduction approach in the context of drugs meant taking the stance that drug use should not be encompassed in the criminal justice system, but instead should be understood as a public health and human rights issue.

In Oct. 2021, the CSSDP developed an anonymous 15-question survey about the perception and consumption of substances by the Concordia student body. The survey was aimed at gaining a deeper insight into how to deliver substance use education to students. A document sent to The Concordian from the CSSPD highlights that, among the 350 respondents, 60.3 per cent said they considered drug education on campus to be extremely important.

According to CSSDP member Alice Gendron, the data demonstrated a change in students’ perception of drug use and a greater openness to discussing the topic.

“The thing that is changing is maybe how open people are with talking about their substance use,” said Gendron. “There seems to be a progression in how open people are and that’s really something we focus on a lot as an organization because the more people are isolated in their consumption, that’s when issues can arise.”

Concordia student and substance analyst at CACTUS Philippe Lavoie said that opening this conversation is a way for people to start consuming more sensibly and in safer environments. CACTUS is a Montreal-based organization centered around harm reduction and prevention of sexually transmitted and blood borne infections.

“Especially with the rise of opioid overdose, I think people are thinking we should talk about this situation,” said Lavoie. “I think youth are feeling more empowered, and groups like CSSDP really help people feel safe to talk about it and exchange ideas.”

CSSPD member João Barbosa emphasized that naloxone kits are available for free at any pharmacy for everyone in Quebec. 

“The most important thing is to learn how to use it because people might be afraid to administer it,” said Barbosa. “We want to help people to learn to recognize an overdose, and how to act in such a situation.”

The CSSPD also offers a substance analysis service to test substances for potential contamination with opioids such as Fentanyl. For Lavoie, this is an important harm reduction tool as the amount of street drugs that are laced with Fentanyl or Benzodiazepine rises.

“It’s part of consuming sensibly to know what you consume,” said Lavoie. “The fact of knowing what’s in it, you can better assess the risks. Knowing the different cutting agents allow us to give better harm reduction tips as well.”

Individuals that are interested in free, anonymous drug testing are encouraged to go to the CACTUS checkpoint at 1300 rue Sanguinet or to the CSSPD on Fridays from 12 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Le Frigo Vert. 

Harm reduction organizations in Montreal include CACTUS, which offers supervised injection sites throughout the island, Groupe de Recherche et d’Intervention Psychosociale , a mobile drug-checking service, Dopamine in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve as well as Spectre de rue.

On campus, the Recovery and Wellness Community Centre offers resources for Concordia students who have experienced addiction and/or are in recovery.

A previous version of this article stated that the CSSPD partnered with CACTUS for the training. This was incorrect.

Categories
News

ConUHacks: coding competition at Concordia sponsors protection against cybersecurity

The Communications Security Establishment was looking for top coders last week at ConUHacks, as risks to cybersecurity increase

Coders from all ranges of experience filled the halls of Concordia’s JMSB and Hall buildings to compete in HackConcordia’s annual hackathon, ConUHacks. The event was host to many sponsors who planted respective booths to receive and recruit promising talent or “hackers.” 

The event was established by Terril Fancott, a computer science and software engineering professor at Concordia, who passed away in 2020. HackConcordia continues to host the hackathon in honour of his memory. 

A hackathon has teams of coders programming a project in a set amount of time. At ConUHacks, participants had 24 hours to finish their work and impress the judges to potentially win prizes. 

This year, the event had the most participants since its start in 2014, with over 800 applications.

However, the presence of the Communications Security Establishment of Canada (CSE) at the event was more than just for recruiting top coders. As  people continue to crowd the internet with their personal information, the CSE hoped to raise awareness of  cybersecurity threats.

Vatsa Shah, co-president of HackConcordia, said students interested in working for the CSE were encouraged to complete their sponsored challenge. Teams that could design programs around cybersecurity — for example, apps that could test password security — would be eligible to win extra prizes. Most importantly, they’d catch the attention of the CSE’s recruiters. 

“The experience they might gain here, that translates to real life,” said Shah. “Pushing to the limit, with challenges they can only get here.”

In a recent article by the CBC, head of the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security Sami Khoury advised to be more cautious than ever when posting personal information online. Khoury singled out TikTok as an application that caught the organization’s attention. 

Darren Holden, a software developer for the CSE, said that his team works towards building and maintaining applications that block malicious domains from Canadian networks. Although Holden couldn’t speak to specific threats on TikTok, he advised caution when using social media. 

“There’s always potential for harm due to poor cybersecurity,” Holden said. 

Holden encouraged those who are concerned about cybersecurity threats to visit the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security advisory website, which offers advice to users on safely using the web. 

The hackathon also gave novel coders the chance to gain experience in a setting that offered new challenges.

Nicolas Pop, a second-year computer science student at Concordia, took advantage of ConUHacks to hone his skills in A.I. programming. He recognized the importance of cybersecurity and expressed interest in applying to the CSE. 

“As we move towards a society that practically lives online, we need to protect the vital information being stored,” said Pop. Although his knowledge of coding for cybersecurity was limited, he took the opportunity to speak with recruiters and further immerse himself in a new field.  

Although he didn’t win, Pop aims to practice his skills to program a project of better quality next year. 

Categories
Sports

Why do teams tank?

Graphic by Carleen Loney/ @shloneys

Tanking is helpful… until it’s not

Tanking happens when a team is losing games on purpose, or has a losing record in a season, in order to get higher draft picks in the following draft. This is generally done by a general manager and not the players or coaches.

While the NFL’s draft order is based solely on the previous season’s rankings — meaning the lowest-ranked team gets to draft first — the NBA, NHL, and very recently, the MLB, have a lottery that decides the order between certain ranks and their corresponding picks. But the lower a team finishes in the standings, the greater the chances are to pick higher in the following draft.

Some draft years are stronger than others, with projected top picks that are almost certain to become superstars. An example of this is the 2023 NHL draft, which is a particularly strong year with Connor Bedard as the projected first-overall pick, who will most likely be a generational player.

While tanking used to be frowned upon, it seems to have generally become more and more accepted.

But there are different levels to it.

Teams can tank simply by keeping a mid coach and play with half their roster sidelined due to injury. An example of this is last season’s Montreal Canadiens. Although they changed coaches before the end of the season, the culmination of all listed above resulted in the Canadiens finishing the season last in the standings.

Or, if a team really wants to take it to another level, a possibility is selling every player who’s decent enough to get acquired by another team, and get worse players in return to make sure they really tank and finish last in the league. But with a lottery, things don’t always go well.

The best-case scenario? That team gets the first overall pick and makes it work eventually.

But the worst-case scenario? The team doesn’t get that pick and gets a good player, but not nearly as good as they’d hoped.

An example of this is the 2014-15 Buffalo Sabres. They got rid of any good player who helped them win games in order to improve their lottery odds to draft Connor McDavid. However, they ended up getting the second pick, which they used to select Jack Eichel. The Sabres still aren’t nearly as competitive as they would’ve been had they drafted McDavid.

Tanking doesn’t always work, and taking it to the extreme can do more harm than good for a team in the long run as it makes rebuilding a longer and more difficult process.

But sometimes it works. An example of a successful tank is the 2013-14 Philadelphia 76ers, who traded good players away and ended up drafting Joel Embiid third overall in the 2014 draft. Since then, they have made the playoffs five times, and the conference semifinals four times.

At the end of the day, just like everything else in sports, tanking either ends in a W or an L.

Anything done the extreme way is very tricky. So low-risk high-reward should be the way to go when it comes to tanking. You can lose to increase your chances, but don’t trade away everyone so you don’t have to rebuild for too long.

But we can agree to disagree.

Categories
Opinions

Celebrities are now naming their babies after iconic Quebec swear words

Because Elon Musk’s experiment of a baby name was not enough

John Legend and Chrissy Teigen named their newborn baby Esti and Quebecers are the only ones laughing because the rest of the world obviously does not know the iconic Quebecois swear word.

The newborn’s full name is Esti Maxine Stephens, which makes it even funnier if you separate the first two names with a comma.

The couple’s baby is quite literally a legend (pun unintended) and they don’t even know about it.

An infamous swear word in Quebec culture, “esti” finds its origins in catholic liturgy. And now it’s a name, apparently.

The name Esti is the short form of Esther or Estelle that means “star.” Maybe Teigen and Legend were going for a subtle celestial hint to her sister Luna? At least for baby Esti, we’re the only ones laughing.

Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott named their baby Aire, a direct Arabic translation of “penis” or “my penis” that is often used as a profanity. But again, what you don’t know doesn’t hurt you.

Regardless, it’s pretty sad that the competition for the most original celebrity baby name has led us here. It’s safe to say that, in this case, ignorance is bliss for little Aire and little Esti.

Consider Elon Musk and Grimes’ baby X Æ A-12 Musk, which sounds bad in every language. When you need to explain your baby’s name because it looks like a serial number, I don’t see how you could ever think it was a good idea.

According to Musk, the name is pronounced X Ash Archangel Twelve, with the last part of the name being his own contribution. A-12 is the precursor to the SR-71, the coolest plane ever in Musk’s eyes.

However, according to California regulations, names can only contain the 26 letters of the alphabet for characters, which made the couple change their baby’s name to X Æ A-Xii.

This makes Esti and Aire sound like perfectly fine names, even knowing what they mean.

Swear words and genitalia aside, it looks like we have come to a generation where robots are named Sophia and humans are named X Æ A-Xii.

Categories
Sports

Pressure, academia and competition: why people quit organized sports

Former dancer Kim Maurer in a dance studio. Catherine Reynolds/ The Concordian

Concordia students share their experiences in organized sports

As a four-year-old kid in the UK in 2007, Kim Maurer, a current English Literature student at Concordia, was first drawn to sports when she wanted to follow in her older brother’s footsteps.

She enrolled in a wide array of sports like field hockey and football, but her true loves were dance, swimming and rounders (an English sport that resembles baseball). At 14, however, she would stop all those sports, joining an ever-growing trend of kids leaving organized sports in their teens.

“I was definitely a really happy kid because of how many sports I played. But I think, as you get older, it begins to negatively affect you,” said Maurer, recalling the pressure of competition she felt going into secondary school.

“I was always pushed academically,” she added. “So, if I was good at school, I had to be good at sports, I had to be good at music, I had to be good at every single thing I dipped my toes into.”

Sports that once served Maurer as a distraction from school were soon overpowered by academic pressure.

“When I was doing sports, I was there physically, but not mentally, because I’d be focusing on what I have tomorrow, what kind of exams, what do I have to prepare for. It wasn’t fun anymore,” she said.

Kim Maurer holds sports awards she won when she was younger. Catherine Reynolds/ The Concordian

But Maurer’s not alone. More often than not, it’s the lack of fun in organized sports that makes kids quit.

“The stakes are much higher and people compare you to everyone else,” continued Maurer. “That’s one of the reasons why I quit [dance], it became too toxic.” 

The decision to quit swimming and rounders — one of Maurer’s favourite sports — was even harder.

Charlotte Weissler, a journalism student at Concordia, recounts a similar story. She, too, came from a sports-oriented family and started gymnastics at four years old in France. She recalled having a love/hate relationship with the sport.

“It was a really hard sport, it hurt physically, you fall a lot, and I got injured a lot,” she said, also mentioning the mental challenges that came with putting a lot of effort into the sport. Nonetheless, she felt at home in the gym.

At seven, Weissler began competing.

“I really liked it because I was better when I was young, I was winning all my competitions and I enjoyed it obviously. But it was also stressful, and I hated that,” she said.

Going to high school at 16 changed everything for Weissler, and the pressure to have good grades was an added source of stress.

“I didn’t think I could handle four training sessions a week and do my assignments. It just wasn’t possible,” she said. She was stuck in an all-or-nothing situation and her gym wouldn’t accommodate for fewer than four sessions per week.

However, some friends that Weissler met while doing gymnastics are now completing master’s degrees, all while keeping up with gymnastics. She believes the difference between her and them is passion.

“It was [a hard decision], but also, after 12 years, all the pressure became so strong that at one point I thought I wasn’t passionate enough to want that pressure anymore,” Weissler said.

Both Maurer and Weissler noted that many of their peers quit sports at the same time as them.

But juggling academia and sports is possible. Concordia Stingers’ Alice Philbert, goaltender for the women’s hockey team for six years, shows just that.

She started goaltending at 13 in the RSEQ — after playing defence for five years — and has dedicated her life to playing hockey and studying since then.

“I started my graduate diploma in business administration to continue playing hockey [with the Stingers],” she said. “If it wasn’t for hockey, I wouldn’t have undertaken it.”

Philbert’s coaches at Dawson and Concordia taught her valuable lessons through sports, like putting her team first and that everything is earned.

“When I go to the arena, I know I’m going to have fun,” she said. “It’s not stressful and I know people are there to help me.”

And that’s what sports should be for young people: a stress-free environment where they can have fun and make new friends.

Categories
Briefs News

Students are buzzing for the new Hive Café

The Hive's new location at the Loyola campus, which opened on Monday, January 23rd. CATHERINE REYNOLDS/The Concordian

The Hive Café has finally opened its doors on the Loyola campus with a fully affordable vegetarian menu

The new location of the Hive Café finally opened on Jan. 23 on the second floor of the CJ building at Loyola Campus. 

The café, which is open Monday through Friday from 8:15 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., mirrors the same menu as the downtown location with a selection of sandwiches, soups, salads and sweets, as well as coffee and cold drinks. 

The Hive Café strives to be as sustainable as possible by offering only vegetarian and vegan options and by prioritizing locally sourced ingredients. 

“We work closely with our local suppliers and producers, so we can maintain affordable food for students while keeping our costs low,” said Calvin Clarke, the café’s manager. “Within the competitive environment of restoration, that can be difficult sometimes, but that is a priority for us.” 

“They also strive to be allergen friendly,” said Clarke. “We have a nut-free kitchen both for the Hive and also the Hive free lunch.”

The Hive Café Co-op offers a membership program for users. Students can purchase a ten-dollar membership card which gives them access to ten per cent off on all products sold at the café for life. 

The café was supposed to open last semester, but did not. According to Clarke, the main reason for the delay was due to lengthy negotiations with the administration for the signing of the lease. 

“It was kind of a difficult situation for us,” he said. “We figured that the best thing was to say we’re going to open up in the winter semester, and we’ll be true to our word for that.” 

The Hive is a cooperative that strives to provide fair labour, according to Clarke. “That’s always a priority for us, and within our board of directors we do have worker member seats, right now five seats available for worker members.”

The Hive invites all of its members to an annual general meeting (AGM), which is usually in October or November. An AGM is a meeting where the status of a company or Co-op is shared with all members and they make decisions on its future.

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Music

Remembering David Crosby, a folk-rock legend

David Crosby passed away at 81

The Laurel Canyon pioneer is the reason why a lot of artists you know and love are even around 

If you felt a little blue within the past week, I don’t blame you. David Crosby, one of the music industry’s most influential musicians passed away on Jan. 18. He was 81 years old. While they were notified about Crosby’s death through an intimate sourve, “they did not disclose a cause,” according to Rolling Stone.

The folk rock icon was most known for his albums If I Could Only Remember My Name, and Oh Yes I Can, Crosby was a founding member of the band The Byrds — founded in 1964. The Byrds played for almost four decades until their retirement in 2000. Crosby was also a part of the supergroup Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, which was formed in 1968 by Graham Nash and David Crosby in Canadian Folk legend Joni Mitchell’s living room in Laurel Canyon, no less!  

To top all that off, he also juggled a third project: his solo career, which spanned nine studio records along with three live records. Crosby even collaborated with the likes of legendary folk artist Joan Baez, ’80s hit savant Kenny Loggins (“Danger Zone”), Carole King, and of course the neo-jazz group Snarky Puppy. 

He has had a controversial music career, often blurting things out without fully explaining them, which has caused a couple other musicians to fire back at him, like Phoebe Bridgers. On more than one occasion, Bridgers has used profanity against Crosby through twitter, one example in response to his disdain for smashing her electric guitar on SNL. In 2016, CSN (Crosby, Stills, and Nash) disbanded after Crosby and Nash had a bad fight. “I won’t tell anyone about that, but I will say that the damage between us is irreparable” said Graham Nash.

He is survived by his friends and family; his wife Jan Dance, and six children Beckett Cypher, Django Crosby, James Raymond, Bailey Jean Cypher, Donovan Crosby, and Erika Keller Crosby. His fellow colleagues and musicians who played with him over the years have shared their grievances through Twitter, Instagram and other social media platforms. “It is with a deep and profound sadness that I learnt my friend David Crosby has passed,” said Graham Nash from CSN. American songwriter Brian Wilson shared his thoughts, saying “I’m heartbroken to hear about David Crosby.”

If you have the time, listen to some David Crosby today — trust me, you won’t regret it.  

Below is a list of songs that I recommend:

  • “Cowboy Movie” 
  • “The Us Below”
  • “Laughing”
  • “Orleans”
  • “Song With No Words (Tree With No Leaves)”
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