That's Fantastic!

Not Fantastic: Losing your Best Friend

5 years ago today was one of the worst days of my life. 

I was goofing off online in the wee hours of the morning, procrastinating some school project or another, and I came across a post from one of my high school friends.”RIP Melissa.” I read it, then scrolled past it, then scrolled back up. Next to it was a photo of my life partner through high school. My best friend. 

I scrolled away again.

Nah, couldn’t be her. Her birthday was yesterday, she couldn’t be dead. I figured I was just making stuff up in my tiredness. I hadn’t seen her in a while, sure, but obviously this was a fake.

I scrolled back up.

I stared at the picture. No. Why would he post such a thing? I commented underneath, accusing him of lying. He quickly wrote back “Amanda, I’m so sorry. Melissa died this morning.”

I scrolled away.

I started choking. I couldn’t look at the words, because dammit, if I didn’t read the words then they didn’t exist. But it was too late. I scrolled back up and wrote: “How?”

He replied: “Cocaine.”

I knew she loved the stuff. We’d all tried to talk her out of using it. She had been staying away from it. But for her birthday, I suppose, she decided to celebrate a bit too hard.

For the rest of the night I sat, scrolling through the words in my memory. Rip. Melissa. I remembered the last time we spoke, it was a few weeks prior. I was at a bar that we had gone to, once, and had a hilarious, crazy night that we talked about constantly. I called her from the bathroom to tell her I was thinking of her. Just a quick chat. I meant to call her on her birthday, but had forgotten, what with school and such. She was never into birthdays, so I figured it didn’t matter.

Hindsight. That bastard is always 20/20, isn’t it?

The next day I drove to Brampton for a memorial of sorts. Someone had organized a gathering at Chinguacousy Park. When I showed up, people were just scattered; some hugging, some standing glossy-eyed in silence. I didn’t quite know what to do, so I sat on the grass by myself - I didn’t feel like talking to anyone, but I felt like being in the presence of people who were in a similar emotional state. 

Soon, a movement started. Someone pulled out a guitar. Someone else pulled out some drums. We all clamoured together into a heap on the bandstand stage. And soon we turned into a big, sobbing, singing mass. It seemed the best way to get the grief monster off our chests. Then, someone pulled out some candles. People pulled out their lighters. And slowly, people got up and planted those candles in the ground, spelling out Melissa’s nickname: Mo. 

And it helped. Seeing her name burning through the high September grasses, it was almost cathartic. And it made no sense then, and it still makes no sense now, but who needs to make sense of sadness?

Which is why, every year for the past 5 years, we gather, make music, and light up the grass in Ching park. To remember the girl who was, the girl who could have been, and to remember that if you want to make a damned phone call, you just do it, because you never know when you won’t be able to anymore.

Fantastic: Firefighters

To say it’s overwhelming is an understatement.

The Richardson wildfire ripped through Northern Alberta, burning up a chunk of forest the size of one-and-a-half Prince Edward Islands. A handful of days after the fire ripped through and here I am standing right smack dab in the middle of it. Blackened trees stretch as far as the eye can see, like big black smokestacks jutting out from the blackened earth, ready to fall with one wrong nudge. The smell of campfire creeps through the sky, latching onto our clothes, our hair, everything. 

Firefighters have been here for weeks just buried in this blackness, constantly scanning their eyes over the ground, looking for a sign that the ground underneath is burning. 

Because, oh hey, it is burning.

Sometimes it’s up to 2 metres underground. By the end of the day, I’m even spotting them. Hotspots, as they’re called. The ash pattern is different in one spot on the ground. Or you just feel the heat radiating through your boot. I’ll point out what I think is a hotspot burning in the forest. The firefighters come over and punch their hands into the ground. If it is, in fact, a hotspot, they rip their hand out, shake off the heat, and call for water.

All in a day’s work, right?

I wasn’t even supposed to be here.

I was supposed to be in Cold Lake, Alberta, testing gun systems on helicopters with the Canadian Military. But when that story fell through the day before I left to head westwards, I had to find something to fill that gap. I was still scratching my head when I got off the plane in Edmonton and wondered aloud “Why is it so foggy around here?” 

A lady turned to me with a raised eyebrow: “That’s from the fires.”

The next day, after spending 12 hours chasing Grizzly bears through the foothills of the Rocky mountains, I got to work. I found a team flying over the wildfires, doing aerial mapping of the hotpspots burning below. While driving the 9 hours from Hinton to Fort McMurray, I made over a dozen phone calls and set the wheels in motion. By the time we arrived in the north, it was set. Just 28 hours later we met up with the crew at the Fort McMurray airport. Suddenly it’s 4:00 a.m and we’re flying in the far north, taking heat scans to see where the earth is still burning.

Even from up in the air, we could see the blackness below.

We flew, and flew, and flew, and it just never stopped. Some trees survived, I was told, because they were a different species. Or they lucked out, and the wind changed before the flames could take hold. I knew I wanted to be down there, on the ground. I woke up my Ontario team two timezones ahead of us, and got them to get us in with the Alberta Government. 

And that’s how, the next morning, we are up and at ‘em with Canada’s top firefighters.

We start our trek bright and early, at 5:00 a.m. Because we’re in Fort McMurray, Alberta, the sun is already shining bright, egging us on to get our butts in gear. And no matter how tired me and my crew are, when we show up at the camp site about 100 km north of nowhere, we know we can’t complain.

The firefighters are divvied up by province. Alberta firefighters have their tents in one area, Ontario firefighters are off in another. We sit through the safety briefing, listening as the guys get their orders, splitting up sections of the forest for their massive scavenger hunt of the day.

I say guys; they’re kids, mostly. The ones I talk to - Tony, Baywatch, Neil - they’re all 19, 20 years old. But they’re all excited to show us around, to show us what they do. And we’re excited to see what they do. We join the convoy of firefighters and head even further North into the blackness.

That’s how I find myself in the middle of the Boreal forest, a chainsaw roaring to the left of me, trees falling to my right, sweating in my standard-issue coveralls in the mid-summer heat, trying to lug a wide angle lens and a Radio Shack’s worth of batteries without letting anything touch anything burned; all while trying to do my job by asking the right questions of the right people and getting the right footage I need to build my story.

All in a day’s work… right?

It took us 26 hours of shooting over 2 days to get this story, and trust me when I say it was an experience I don’t think I’ll ever forget. 

To watch the finished product, click this, this link, right here, to check it out.

Fantastic: Namibia

The car that was supposed to be waiting for us at the Windhoek airport wasn’t there. 

This isn’t usually a problem. We’re not exactly fancypants who are used to having cars and drivers available to escort us around. But we’re in a country, on a continent, that’s completely foreign to us, and we don’t know where we’re going, and we’re trying our best not to get screwed over. 

The arrivals terminal is about the size of an elementary school gymnasium and almost as chaotic. At one end of the room is a mass of men, waving their arms frantically, saying TAXI! TAXI! MISS! I AM TAXI!, and it’s like playing a game of dodgeball trying to avoid their advances as we try and figure out what to do. We find an airport information attendant who speaks English. “Those men over there, can we trust them?” 

She looks at us with an eyebrow raised.

“You should pay no more than $28 US Dollars to get into town. Don’t worry, they’re nice boys.”

I’m not sure I believe her, but we have to get into town somehow - the airport is in the middle of the Namibian desert, 40 kilometers away from the nearest town. 

We turn towards the mass of desperate taxi drivers and they start flailing even more. We start laughing and stare at the crowd, trying to figure out who to choose. Finally one young guy bursts through the crowd and grabs our arms. “You ladies need taxi?” he grins. “28 dollars!”

“Ok, let’s go.”

He drags us out, as the other taxi drivers scream after us. “Miss! Miss! My car is closer than his! My car is nicer!” We just burst out laughing and go with our chosen guy, whose car is actually at the back of the lot. As he throws our stuff into the cab, he is shouting at the other drivers, and while I don’t speak Setswana, I’m pretty sure he was saying “HAHA FUCK YOU GUYS I WIN!”  

The cab takes off towards Windhoek. Our driver, Roderick, excited about his victory, blares a Mariah Carey CD and encourages us to sing along. We wind through the desert, glued to the windows in awe as the sun sets behind the Namibian sand dunes.

Not Fantastic: Blatant Racism

I’m white.

And I’ve never been more aware of it than in Cape Town, South Africa.

South Africa has only recently started to catch up to the rest of the world in terms of basic equality. Up until 17 years ago, the country was living under apartheid, which meant that non-white people weren’t equal to the whites according to the (white, minority) government. Even though Blacks made up 70 per cent of the population, they had no rights whatsoever. They had different schools, different hospitals, and were even placed in different neighbourhoods. Most were kicked out of their homes and given a tin shack in townships outside the city, leaving all the posh downtown area for the whiteys.

But even though apartheid is gone, racism is still everywhere. Black people are poor and work shitty jobs. White people are rich and want you to know that they’re rich. Picture a major metropolitan 8-lane highway system, with herds of black people walking along the shoulder to get home to their townships, and white people blazing by in their Aston Martins to get to their beautiful homes dotted alongside Table Mountain, overlooking the ocean.

There’s no middle ground, at least, not that I can see. 

And we’re tourists, so we also get treated differently. It’s not like anyone says to us “You are white so you get this secret members-only coupon book, oh, and here’s the secret handshake.” We just get treated with a certain amount of deference, combined with a lack of eye contact and a certain level of servitude that just leaves us with a bad taste in our mouths. And on the flip side, sometimes we feel like we’re being glared at behind our backs. 

It’s a shame, because a lot of time and money went into making Cape Town as aesthetically pleasing as possible. But because of apartheid, it’s inherently flawed. Every house is surrounded by barbed wire, or an electric fence, or some other violent security system. We hear stories about people installing rape gates in their bedrooms, where, if a security system is tripped, your bedroom becomes a fortress, so at least you won’t get raped by your intruder, who likely has AIDS. And that’s just in the regular family homes. 

We’re warned not to walk anywhere after dark. We do anyways, because we feel perfectly safe. We make it around unscathed, but to some people, that’s a surprise.

How do you even think living like this is ok?

When we leave Cape Town, I am sad to leave. It’s a beautiful city, filled with stunning scenery and amazing food and some lovely people, and I’d go back in a heartbeat.

However, I am also eager to hit a country that’s a little bit less stressful; a little bit more like the Africa we were expecting.

Fantastic: The edge of the world

It’s really hard to describe the smell, but that’s what I remember the most.

Sort of sweet, sort of salty, sort of green. If I could bottle it, I would have. But when you’re standing at the bottom edge of the African continent, with the calm, docile Indian ocean to one side and the rough, moody Atlantic at the other, with mountains looming around you and local wildlife giving you the stink eye for invading their turf, it’s easy for your eyes to get a bit overwhelmed. At this point, the nose needs to kick in and do its part for the memory making.

Ashley and I are already a bit discombobulated. One, because of the jet lag, two because we’ve been in Cape Town for less than 24 hours, after about 44 hours spent in four different airports and on two separate red eye flights. Our luggage had been misplaced somewhere between Amsterdam and London, so we have nothing familiar to cling to. Just the clothes on our backs, and each other.

We hop in a van with a tour guide who repeats every statement twice with completely different intonations. His name, Simpiwe, means ‘gift’ in Afrikaans. He drives the long, winding highway south from Cape Town to the southern tip of the world, pointing out rich people’s houses along the way. He mentions nothing about the shantytowns peppered in between, other than pointing out the one he calls home.

We head back up the Indian Ocean side and stop at Boulders beach, a place famous for its large colony of Jackass penguins. There is a large tourist area to the left that charges admission, but ‘Gift’ leads us to the right, where there are fewer tourists but more penguins, all for free. I decide that I want to touch the Indian Ocean, so I climb on some giant rocks, trying to reach the water. Of course, I slip and fall, smashing my camera, rendering it unable to zoom for the rest of the trip. With my ass and ego equally bruised, I decide to just stick to appreciating the penguins.

With my pants still soaked with Indian Ocean, the tour heads to wine country for some wine tasting. Soon enough, Ashley and I are drunkenly running through the rain, looking for the cheetah sanctuary buried within the grape vines. This was what had sold us on the tour; when we saw the brochure advertising “Go to a vineyard - and pet a cheetah!” we just had to see what was up. But we’re unwilling to pay the 100 Rand extra to pet Toby the cheetah, so we just stand behind the fence, giggling at the his angry, angry face.

After a full day of exploring, we get back to our hotel and find our luggage, finally, amazingly, had arrived from god-knows-where. As we blissfully change into our familiar, warm, dry, clean clothes, the rain stops, and we rush outside to catch the last glimpses of the sunset. 

And then it hits me - Damn. We’re really, really, far from home.

And I couldn’t be happier.

Fantastic: Yelling at Authority

What with the election being called in the True-North-strong-and-free, I figured it was time to rehash an old story of mine. Ladies and Gentlemen, gather ‘round, as this is the tale of a time when I accidentally yelled at Stephen Harper, the Prime Minister of Canada.

________________________________________________________________

I’m at the NHL Awards, running down a flight of stairs at the Elgin Theatre. I have voices in my head yelling at me, asking what to do. One of my heels comes off, and I bolt towards an elevator. 

10 minutes to show time.

I run down another flight of stairs. I’ve changed shoes. The voices in my head are telling me to get everyone in the theatre. I start commanding the 1000+ people to get inside and take their seats. Upstairs, I have Heather waiting with 300 seat fillers. Once the ticket holders take their seats, we have to file these 300 people in to fill in any gaps. The elevator only holds 10 people at a time. 

7 minutes to show time.

Heather and Rachel are herding people as fast as they can into mezzanines so that they will be ready to shove into seats. I am still downstairs, herding the ticket holders in. I tell Pat Quinn, the former coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs, to hurry his ass up. Sir. He laughs at me and hustles his wife into the theatre. The voices in my head are asking if I have any extra spots to slot in for Kim Stockwood and Damnhait Doyle. I sprint down the aisle and find them some.

3 minutes to show time.

I sprint upstairs. Rachel’s voice in my head is saying she still needs 75 more seat fillers to fill up the balcony. I take off my headset. I stand in front of the crowd of people and order them to follow me down the stairs. Hurry, Hurry. Hustle it, Common guys, Follow Me. They’re like a wave, and I’m a surfer just trying to stay afloat. I start barking at them to get in seats. Rachel’s got the balcony covered, but there’s still downstairs. I bark into my headset, Get Them Downstairs. Heather’s voice in my head gives me a 10-4. 

Another voice comes: We’re live.

Shit.

I stop on the stairs and put my arms up, stopping the wave. They’re mostly young twenty-something hockey fans, and all they want is to see someone famous. All I want is to make that happen. I usher half of them down the stairs and order the other half up the stairs to wait for my signal. I can’t move anyone in or out until commercial breaks. I take a breath.

Another voice comes in: Amanda. There. Are. Two. People. Sitting. Behind. The. Prime. Minister’s. Seat. Getthemoutofthere.

What?

The right honourable prime minister Stephen Harper was at the NHL Awards on this evening, and apparently two of my seat fillers hopped into the seats that were designated for his security. He was to be seated soon, and his security needed to be sitting with him.

I had a seating chart in my hand. I ran to the nearest RCMP officer and asked who the seat fillers were. He pointed at the seats. DD 29 and 30. Sounds like a bra size. I got as close as I could to see if I could figure out who the people were. You can’t see the seat numbers when people are sitting in them. Shit.

The Prime Minister does his thing and sits down. His security are eyeing me to move the people out from behind him. I won’t do it until commercial - he’s front row, and rule number one is that I am not to be seen. I have no idea if I’m doing the right thing. I’m following my gut, but these guys have guns.

I hear the band kick in. Commercial time. I sprint down the aisle, RCMP officers in tow. The band is deafening.

“YOU - HEY YOU!” I bark as I approach. “YOU’RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THERE!”

I’m now standing in front of the Prime Minister talking to the couple behind him. But he thinks I’m talking to him.

“Me?” says Stephen Harper, looking embarassed. He takes his hands from out of his lap and goes to stand up.

“No no,” I say curtly, “Not you, Prime Minister!” I say it as if it’s his name. I don’t know why.

I look at the people behind him. They’re looking at me like I’m nuts. They are an older couple, wearing a lot of jewellery. Sure don’t look like seat fillers. I ask if they have tickets, and they show them to me, with a look that could kill. 

Just as I’m standing there, leaning over the Prime Minister of Canada, offending who I later find out are incredibly wealthy members of the Toronto Elite, with two RCMP officers standing behind me, the music stops.

Commercials are over, and I’m front row centre.

I bolt to the side, and luckily the RCMP officers follow my lead. I throw them four seats away from Harper, and I run to the back of the theatre.

I’m in the back of the theatre, barking into my headset that those people aren’t seat fillers. “OH,” says the reply, “YEAH, THAT WAS THE NHL’S FAULT.”

But now, because I was doing that, we have empty seats. I spend the rest of the show sprinting up and down, filling seats. Guys are touching my arm, flirting with me, cooing into my ears that they want to sit in the front rows next to someone cool. Then they give me the eyes. Please? I politely shoved them next to nobodies, and put the excited, honest fans in the front. 

I’m running back from another commercial break, and this big lumbering figure is in my way. “EXCUSE ME EXCUSE ME EXCUSE ME MOOOOVE!!” I yell. The figure turns around, and it’s Pat Quinn again. “You again?” He laughs. I smile, then shove him aside and throw two more butts in seats.

Later, Mary Walsh would come up to me and say, “Holy shit! You’re the girl who yelled at the Prime Minister!” My superiors would say that they wished cameras had been rolling. That people loved seeing me, in my formal wear, sprinting at commercial breaks. Better entertaiment than the house band. We did a fantastic job. Kudos. Breathe.

At the after party, Pat Quinn is sitting at the end of the bar. I go up and apologize for barking at him, and we have a great 20 minute conversation about how much fun it is to be unemployed. I say I’d hire him as my assistant. He laughs. His wife complimented me on my necklace. Schmooze. I grab him a beer from the open bar and get a picture with him. Smile and nod. Flash.

Breathe.