issue #26 spring 2010 TREK The Magazine of The u n i v e r s i T y o f B r i T i s h C o l u mb i a ~ inside ~ Tales from the Old Auditorium · 12 ~ On the Art of Being Canadian · 18 ~ Academics and Avocations · 24 ~ Getting Cultivated: UBC’s Botanical Garden · 28 Spring 2010 Trek 1 Published by The universiTy of briTish Columbia alumni assoCiaTion Contents: FEaTures DEPaRTMENTs TREK edITor in ChIef Christopher Petty, MFA’86 MANAgINg EdITor vanessa Clarke, ba 18 on Writing 05 Take Note 11 Letters to 38 Class Acts ArT dIrector Keith leinweber, bdes 12 Tales from the Old Auditorium CoNTrIBuTors Michael awmack, ba’01, meT’09 “on the Art of UBC researchers teach us the Editor adrienne Watt The Old Aud is where students graduated, trod the boards, played about happiness, 40 Books BoArd of Directors music, heckled with enthusiasm, gasped with delight, staked their Being Canadian” ChAIr ian robertson, bsc’86, ba’88, ma, mba sustainability and getting out 36 Networks & VICe ChAIr miranda lam, llb’02 claim on cafeteria tables, sweated through exams, and fell in love. Sherrill grace’s book explores the vote in Argentina. 42 T-Bird News TreAsurer robin elliott, bCom’65 what the arts can tell us about events MeMBers-at-LArge (07-10) don dalik, bCom, llb’76 being Canadian. 46 In Memoriam dallas leung, bCom’94 MeMBers-at-LArge (08-11) By Sherrill Grace brent Cameron, ba, mba’06 marsha Walden, bCom’80 ernest yee, ba’83, ma’87 blake hanna, mba’82 21 Blythe Eagles: MeMBers AT LARGE ’09-‘12 aderita Guerreiro, ba’77 Volunteer What the Trek? mark mawhinney, ba’94 Trek Magazine caption competition PAsT ChAIr (09-10) extraordinaire doug robinson, bCom’71, llb’72 seNIor AdMINIsTration ReP (09-10) Community builder, Send your witty captions for this photo (no more than three attempts per person) to Vanessa Clarke stephen owen, mba, llb’72, llm UBC stalwart, gardener. at [email protected], or to the mailing address on the right, by May 31. The winner will be chosen brian sullivan, ab, mPh AMS ReP (09-10) Blythe Eagles set the bar by the Alumni Affairs communications team. The prize will be personal glory and a brand new travel mug Tom dvorak, basc’07 for volunteering. (in which to contain your excitement). We’ll print the winning caption, details about the photo, and a new CoNVocation Senate ReP (09-10) Chris Gorman, ba’99, mba’09 By Michael Awmack challenge in the summer issue. (Photo Courtesy UBC Library Archives) YouNg ALumni ReP (09-10) Carmen lee, ba’01 okANAgan ReP (09-10) 28 getting Cultivated Catherine Comben, ba’67 APPointment to BoArd (09-10) at UBC ian Warner, bCom’69 rod hoffmeister, ba’67 UBC’s Botanical garden is a Judy rogers, bre’71 haven for serious scientists, Jim southcott bCom’82 eX-offICIo avid gardeners and carefree PresIdeNT, UBC nature-lovers alike. What’s stephen Toope, ab, llb and bCl, Phd PresIdeNT’s desIgnate behind the garden gate? barbara miles, ba, Postgrad Certificate in ed. ChANCeLLor, UBC sarah morgan-silvester, bCom’82 Associate VP, ALuMNI / ExeCuTIVe Director, ALuMNI AssociatioN 31 The Advocate marie earl, ab, mla 24 Academics and Avocations Trek magazine (formerly the ubC alumni Chronicle) is Wesley Shields, BA’89, is committed to leading the way. published three times a year by the ubC alumni UBC’s finest indulge in some hobbies you might find surprising. association and distributed free of charge to ubC alumni By Mark Sollis and friends. opinions expressed in the magazine do not By Hilary Feldman necessarily reflect the views of the alumni association or the university. address correspondence to: 32 farewell to Marie Earl The editor, ubC alumni affairs, After five years transforming alumni services at UBC, Marie Earl is 6251 Cecil Green Park road, vancouver, bC, Canada v6T 1Z1 heading back to California (with a tear in her eye). e-mail to [email protected] letters published at the editor’s discretion and may be edited for space. Contact the editor for advertising rates. 45 More MoA Contact numbers at ubC address Changes 604.822.8921 After a multi-million dollar refurbishment, the Museum of via e-mail [email protected] alumni association 604.822.3313 Anthropology is bigger and better. toll free 800.883.3088 Trek editor 604.822.8914 ubC info line 604.822.4636 belkin Gallery 604.822.2759 54 The Last Word bookstore 604.822.2665 BA’52 Chan Centre 604.822.2697 norm Young, , wants to be Miss America (and other secrets). frederic Wood Theatre 604.822.2678 museum of anthropology 604.822.5087 volume 65, number 1 | Printed in Canada by mitchell Press Canadian Publications mail agreement #40063528 return undeliverable Canadian addresses to: records department ubC development office suite 500 - 5950 university boulevard vancouver, bC v6T 1Z3 Cover image: The paralympic torch passes in front of the Koerner library on UBC’s 30% Vancouver campus (photo: Martin Dee). Cert no. SW-COC-002226 Spring 2010 Trek 3 editor’s note 5 Take Note is edited from material that appears in other campus communications, including UBC Reports. We ta k e n o t e thank Public Affairs for allowing us to use their material. CiTR The Blue BRigade and the Rise of the VolunteeRs if you tune your radio to 101.9 in the Lower Mainland (or go to www.citr.ca), wiped water droplets off slalom gates so the next racer wouldn’t get a you will be listening to one of the best college radio stations in north face-full of wet as he or she screamed past, and the hundreds of other America. You’ll hear things you’ve never heard before (some of which you jobs, big and small, that had to be done for things to go right. impressive, may never want to hear again), talk that ranges from brilliant to goofy, and unbelievable and eye-opening. Paul hewitt is researching the role of perfectionism and suicide. a playlist of indie, alt and you-name-it music that will, if you’ll forgive an UBC also has a cadre of volunteers, without which the university old-school idiom, blow your mind. You’ll also hear great DJs who range would grind to a halt. The Board of governors might be the most visible Perfect Misery connection among teens is especially hostile. it’s a sad irony (known as a neurotic from mellow to hysterical and from academic to hilarious. it’s the most and, ultimately, the most powerful volunteer group on campus (they perfectionism doesn’t sound like a particularly relevant because of adolescents’ inherent paradox in the world of psychology) that the entertaining radio you’re likely to hear anywhere, and it sounds like the approve budgets, after all), but it’s just the top tier. The Botanical negative human trait. in fact it’s become a cliché self-consciousness and concerns about social thing most perfectionists crave – acceptance – heart and soul of UBC. garden would still be a stunning place if the FOgS (Friends of the for job interviewees, when pressed, to name relationships,” he says. is made more elusive by their behaviour. in Since CiTr first hit the airwaves in 1974, every one of the hosts and DJs garden) didn’t exist, but it would be inaccessible to you and me without perfectionism as one of their faults in a bid to Hewitt and Flett are testing a model they the case of perfectionist children, the way they have been volunteers. Some have been on air for 25 years. Arguably the them. Volunteers at the MOA dedicate their time and knowledge to downplay their weaknesses or give them a developed linking social disconnection with are perceived can even make them the target most famous among them, nardwuar the Human Serviette, has been teaching programs and the Museum Shop, and volunteer mentors positive spin. psychology professor paul Hewitt, perfectionism and suicidal thoughts. A recent of bullies. broadcasting at 3:30 every Friday afternoon since 1987. work with most of our faculties to help students with the sometimes however, takes perfectionism very seriously. study involved a group of young people, aged “We urgently need to know more about the CiTr is a great example of people doing things they love for free, and difficult transition from life at the university to life in the job world. “Most people don’t understand the toxicity of eight to twenty, who receive outpatient mechanisms of perfectionism, how it starts, making the world a better place in the process. (Visit www.citr.ca for more And elsewhere on campus, volunteers work in too many ways to name perfectionism,” he says. “perfectionists put psychiatric counselling at BC Children’s how it develops,” says Hewitt. “if we are to info and some history.) to make life better for our students. enormous pressure on themselves, making their Hospital. it yielded information on their provide better interventions and targeted We saw another great example of that during the Vancouver Olympics Here at the Alumni Association we have an active Board of Directors lives far from perfect.” perfectionism, experience of bullying, sense of treatments, we don’t need more evidence that and paralympics. i know many people (me included) poo-pooed the games that strikes volunteer committees (from Communications and Awards to For many years Hewitt has researched the social hopelessness, and their thought of and perfectionism is a problem, we need to know when Vancouver won the bid, but the way they played out warmed all but Advocacy and Finance) to help us develop and deliver programs and connections between perfectionism and poor attempts at suicide.