Lack of lake-life love doesn’t bode well for bond

Folklorama unites Canadians of all ethnicities

On Wednesday night, I found myself sitting at a cafeteria table with a bunch of strangers in an elementary school gymnasium, watching a high-octane tae kwon do demonstration set to Korean pop music.

Where else but Folklorama could you have such a surreal experience?

First, a confession: before I finagled my way onto Wednesday night's VIP bus tour -- which is kind of like a pub crawl for the older set -- I hadn't been to the festival since I was a teenager. Back then, it was mostly obligatory. I dutifully supported the pavilions friends were representing as proud and vaguely embarrassed youth ambassadors, decked out in resplendent cultural dress so far removed from the jeans and T-shirts I saw them in every day.

But once I got there, I was always struck by the strong sense of community. And I always had fun. I loved seeing the fruits of the dance classes they spent their evenings and weekends in. I admired how connected many of them were to their roots; it made me want to learn more about mine. Like many third-generation Canadians, I have roots in many countries: Italy, Austria, Ireland, Scotland and England, to name a few.

Dramatic views and vintage treasures tell a unique story

Every garden, large or small, has its own personal narrative to tell. Its design is a canvas for the owners to express themselves through visual elements like colour, shapes and composition.

Karl and Mary Loepp have a broad, living canvas with breathtaking garden vistas around every curve. Situated near the end of a winding road framed by majestic trees in historic St. Andrews, their stunning half-hectare property is a story of surprise and discovery.

Formerly a farmer’s field bereft of a single tree when the Loepps purchased the property and built their home in 2002, it was an apple orchard decades ago. When Karl first began working the soil and building the garden, he found coins dating back to 1908.

Both Karl and Mary spent their childhoods on family farms. They have a deep connection to nature and a passion for preserving history. Avid collectors of vintage farm equipment and hand tools, they are regulars at auctions, always searching for that one special piece to integrate into their garden where it becomes an intentional focal point.

Family account spiced with magic realism, geopolitical intrigue and a ghost story

Tom Lin’s second novel Babylon, South Dakota moves beyond a historical account of an immigrant family’s struggle, delightfully blending and bending genres.

Lin is a Chinese-born novelist whose family emigrated to the U.S. when he was four years old. His debut novel, The Thousand Crimes of Ming Tsu, won the 2022 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, making him the youngest ever recipient of that award. He earned a PhD in English from the University of California Davis and is currently an assistant professor of English and creative writing at the University of Iowa.

Babylon, South Dakota takes place in an unspecified time period that can be understood to be during the Mao era — likely the 1950s or ’60s. A young Chinese couple, the Hsuis, immigrate to the rural community that gives the book its title. They take the names Saul and Mei and settle on a 160-acre homestead left to them by a distant relative.

Saul’s dream is to breed and sell chrysanthemums from seeds he brought from China, while Mei wants to raise livestock. They speak no English, know nothing of life in the United States, are unprepared for the harshness of winter and the isolation of the farm and bring nothing with them except some gold, which Mei hides around the house for emergencies. Their only link to the outside world is a discarded and marginally functioning TV set, which Saul rescues and rigs up.

Family demands change after being denied access to dying HSC patient

DESPITE desperate pleas to be at her husband’s bedside during his 18-hour stay at the Health Sciences Centre emergency department, Theresa Jobse was only granted a few, fleeting hours with her partner of 46 years before he died.

The grieving family is calling for changes to hospital visitation policy so other patients do not have to suffer without the support and comfort of loved ones.

Alfred Jobse, 70, was taken by ambulance to HSC on Sept. 2, after he collapsed at home.

The Stage 3 cancer patient spent a total of 13 hours in the downtown hospital without a single visitor — despite his entire family being fully vaccinated against COVID-19 — due to pandemic infection prevention protocols that restrict emergency department patients from having a support person at their bedside, unless they are nearing death.

The end of the road

St. Louis and the end of the trade route