Shut out extraneous noise over wedding plans

‘Sewing angels’ come to Folklorama pavilion’s rescue after Ghana dancers’ costumes stolen

Parents and volunteers had tears in their eyes when dozens of young dancers took to the stage for their opening performances at Folklorama’s Ghana pavilion Sunday night.

For a week-long run of shows, the dancers are wearing new outfits sewn by a team of volunteers, including strangers, who answered a call for help after the originals were stolen days before the festival began.

“Seeing all these kids and their excitement over the outfits, and then watching them on stage, I was very emotional,” said Jaelynne Wormenor, a pavilion volunteer whose three children are among about 40 youth dancers who perform multiple times per night during Folklorama.

“There was a really special feeling. It felt like it was a celebration. Something really bad happened, but then there was hope, there was resilience.”

Tent settlement remains a home for street family

Desirae has a pair of lungs on her. “Don’t stare at the zoo animals!” she screams, as people walk down Henry Avenue, past the encampment, just off the Main Street strip, where she lives. The world around her is chaos.

Steinbach ER nurses ask for triage help as wait-averse Winnipeg patients strain hospital capacity

Nurses at Bethesda Regional Health Centre in Steinbach have called on the regional health authority and provincial government to hire an extra triage nurse for the emergency department as increased visits from Winnipeggers stress the rural hospital.

Forty nurses from the hospital’s emergency department signed an open letter stating because of the current staffing ratio, nurses are witnessing “excessive and unacceptable safety risks on a daily basis.”

“(Nurses) constantly fear for the safety of our patients and community,” said the July 28 letter, addressed to Premier Wab Kinew, Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara, Southern Health-Sante Sud interim CEO Dana Human and the health authority’s board chair, Adam Monteith.

It is common for patients at the hospital to wait more than an hour before being seen by a triage nurse after they arrive, and eight hours before their conditions are reassessed, the letter states, adding the emergency department’s sole triage nurse can be responsible for up to 30 patients at a time.

Beach volleyball DJ, MC do the work of 12,000 fans

TOKYO (AP) — The Olympic beach volleyball venue in Rio de Janeiro reverberated with the cheers of 12,000 fans, who infused the arena with a samba-dancing spirit that spilled out of the stadium onto Copacabana beach.

This time, there is only a master of ceremonies, a disc jockey, and the whirr of the cicadas in the nearby trees.

“I’m still trying to figure out the best way to do this,” MC Michael Rivas said during a break between the 10-a-day matches of the beach volleyball round-robin.

“The only thing we can do is try our best to make the players feel a little bit more comfortable, hopefully pump them up when they make good plays,” he said. “It’s tough — not only for us, but most importantly I think it’s the athletes are missing the audience more than we are.”

Bread costs could skyrocket as Ukraine war hits wheat supplies, experts say

As conflict continues in Ukraine, a major wheat producer, supply of wheat products — and Russia’s fertilizer — will decrease and costs are set to soar.

Job numbers give Manitobans room for optimism

OTTAWA — Manitobans have room for optimism, as the first two weeks of a gradual reopening show those hardest hit in the COVID-19 recession have started re-entering the job market.

The monthly Labour Force Survey released Friday morning shows 13,100 Manitobans got back to work at the start of May. That's about 15 per cent of those who lost their job since the pandemic hit the province, with the largest recovery to food services, recreation and retail.

“Those are the ones that were hit particularly hard, so it's good to see those jobs coming back,” said Conference Board of Canada senior economist Cory Renner.

The number of Manitobans on a temporary layoff dropped from 33,400 in mid-April to 27,600 during the survey period of May 10 to 16.