Stephen Weir articles, editorials and popular social media weir postings

Weird Happening on Zombie Reef  Based on an underwater true event Class didn't agree - Sigh - Very bad mark  from  Louis C's  4th year Windsor U Creative Writing course   I don’t care if you believe me or not. Sometimes I think I made it all up. Then there was last Friday when I was yelled at by former dive buddy Dr. J in the Miami Airport, and we-are-not-alone truth of what happened on Zombie Reef comes back full bore.   By Stephen Weir This truth goes back a decade or so. I picked up a gig with a TV show,  Strange Undersea Adventures . It was done-on-the-real-cheap. Each week the show would visit a different dive destination in the Caribbean. The host country picked up the tickets. The dozen crew members stayed on a live-aboard boat moored overtop of the dive sites to be featured. And when we were in port we’d pray someone would pick up the bar tab. The alcoholic producer dragged me along on this segment ‘cause of my last name. Weir. Weird. All...

  The last  Basilian   Father This Paragraph a False Assumption?   An ancient priest in an over-starched cassock makes a special noise when he shuffles across Assumption Hall’s wooden floors.  I listen while I pick the basement door’s antique lock. Click. I am in.  Rotting hand-made wooden steps against the massive fieldstone wall.  Shaky. I make it safely onto the heavily pock-marked basement floor.  A string of Edison era light bulbs hangs above. Clothesline style. I am facing a moss-lined tunnel that slopes toward the Detroit River. An iron bar gate blocks the way. Sigh. Another lock to pick. I hear the priest. He is at the top of the stairs. Cough. Door slams. Lights off. First Version (too long) Stephen Weir  Weir031, 4 th  year Creative Writing An ancient priest in an over starched white cassock makes a special noise when he shuffles across the wooden floors of Assumption Hall. “Poke me hard if you hear him comi...

  Ajax lawyer Jennifer Hirlehey is now chair and King and Queen star Mischka Crichton is the Festival CEO.    By Stephen Weir Just  as the Caribbean Camera was readying this week's paper the Toronto Caribbean Carnival (TCC) delivered a press release announcing several key management changes. The annual festival has been without a CEO and Chair since the early Fall with the departure of last year's CEO and Chair Laverne Garcia. Ajax lawyer Jennifer Hirlehey has been appointed the Chair and last year's Fesitval Manager  Mischka Crichton has been named Chief Executive Officer (CEO).   Hirlehey is described as an established community leader who is serving in her first year as a Board member for TCC. She is quoted as saying she is “excited and proud to make a contribution to this grand tradition that has given so much to our Caribbean community and all Canadians for 56 years. I’m humbled and honoured to serve the festival’s mission in the role of Cha...

Baboolal has kiddies carnival costume photography show complete with a live mini-parade photo by  Baboolal Will the stuffy old Rosedale neighbourhood ever be the same? On March 10 there will be a small Carnival costume parade where Mas has never gone before … out front the Rosedale United Church. All this month the Rosedale Church on Roxborough Drive (one of the most prestigious streets in the city) is displaying the photographs of carnival photographer Jenny Baboolal, in a show she calls Art of the Mas. The photographs are of children in Mas costumes taking part in Trinidad’s Junior Carnival. In an online newsletter the Church explains the show to its parishoners. “The children ( pictured in Baboolal’s colour photographs) wear their carnival costumes with pride and dance to the music in the company of family and friends.”   “The exhibit allows the viewer to get a close-up look at the masqueraders and the intricacies and splendour of their costumes, so that contemplation ...

March 31 will see an Epic costume launch.  Now that the Trinidad Carnival is over, Toronto Mas camps are getting ready to kick-off the 2023 Toronto Caribbean Carnival season. In a matter of weeks there will be late night costume launches and the opening of mas camps and pan alleys. E.P.I.C Carnival will be the first of the bands competing in this year’s summer parade to hold a costume launch. It will happen at the 400-person Grand Luxe Event Boutique on Bayview Avenue in North York on Friday March 31st.   “ Yes, we are coming out first this year and we can’t wait to kick off the season some EPIC costumes,” said Band leader Jerrol Augustine (aka “Stretch”). “Passion is the theme for 2023 and our 13 sections will tell a story of each of the designers’ passion!” The Mas Band has not yet revealed its costumes yet. However, it is already pre-registering revellers who wish to play mas with EPIC this year.  “On our website you can connect to buy $30 band launch tickets, pre...

  The Mighty Jesse, at least for Black History Month   Jesse Ryan, the Grandson of the Calypso legend, the late Mighty Bomber (Clifton Ryan), is prone to saying that “Calypso History is Black History!”  So now that it is February, and in the spirit of the late great Trinidadian Calypso singer and composer, Happy Calypso Month! Ryan ( pictured above ) an up-and-coming Etobicoke jazz saxophonist has reached back into his Trinidadian roots for two Calypso musical performing this month. He will be performing a   Caribbean songbook this week at Halifax’s Immigration Museum as part of Nova Scotia’s Black History Month celebrations. His also is performing the songs of the Mighty Bomber on February 19  in Toronto. Saxophonist Jesse Ryan, pianist Eddie Bullen and   pannist Garrett Burgess   are celebrating their Caribbean roots with Halifax fans with a performance of classics from Ryan’s Caribbean songbook. They are paying homage to som...

The last  Basilian   Father This Paragraph a False Assumption?   Stephen Weir  Weir031, 4 th  year Creative Writing Assignment Assignment - write a paragraph based on my take on a Windsor University scene Submitted version The last  Basilian   Father This Paragraph A False Assumption?   An ancient priest in an over-starched cassock makes a special noise when he shuffles across Assumption Hall’s wooden floors.  I listen while I pick the basement door’s antique lock. Click. I am in.  Rotting hand-made wooden steps against the massive fieldstone wall.  Shaky. I make it safely onto the heavily pock-marked basement floor.  A string of Edison era light bulbs hangs above. Clothesline style. I am facing a moss-lined tunnel that slopes toward the Detroit River. An iron bar gate blocks the way. Sigh. Another lock to pick. I hear the priest. He is at the top of the stairs. Cough. Door slams. Lights off.   “I ...

  IT IS A DOG’S LIFE IN THE WORLD OF ANDRE ALEXIS Woof. Woof. Who let the dogs out? The Crow’s Nest Theatre in downtown Toronto is quick to answer that it is Caribbean Canadian author Andre Alexis who is to blame.   For almost two weeks the Carlaw Avenue theatre has been selling out each and every performance of their new play “Fifteen Dogs”.  The new work is based on the award winning novel  by Alexis which won the Giller Prize, the  Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, and Canada Reads   back in 2015.    The book has been adapted for the stage by  Marie Farsi and has received funding in part from  The Hilary and Galen Weston Foundation  and the Canadian Literature Adaptation Fund.    The play follows the book storyline which begins with two Greek Gods – Hermes and Apollo, drinking in a seedy Toronto tavern. They make a bet to what will happen when they grant 15 dogs human consciousness. They watch fro...

  Toronto dancer about to take to the big stage with Alvin Ailey Dance Theatre Not only is it the first weekend for Black History Month in Toronto, it will also be two days of first for dance fans.  On February 3 rd  and 4 th  “America ‘s Cultural Ambassador to the World” the Alvin Ailey Dance Theatre will kick off its 2023 North American tour with a trio of performances at the downtown Meridian Hall (formerly the Sony Centre). The 32-member dance troop will be performing for the first time in Canada a new dance —  Are You in Your Feelings   — that acclaimed  choreographer Kyle Abraham describes as a “celebration of Black culture, Black music, and the youthful spirit that perseveres in us all.” Finally and probably most importantly dance lovers in the city are finally going to see  Hannah Alissa Richardson  perform live on stage with this famed Dance Theatre. This is the Toronto native’s inaugural season with the Company and the first time fo...

  Looking at our New Year’s incoming messages   By Stephen Weir The Premier probably used a speech writer. Some, from the looks of what they wrote, had help from bartenders and/or friends lying under the tables. Letters, oh yes we did get letters, emails, and texts, and videos and phone messages last Sunday night. In fact, readers are still sending me New Years’ Greetings, but now in 2023 most of what we see arrives from the Internet.  But no matter how the messages got on our computer screen, the thoughts and prayers continue to be the same year after year after year. Hope. Love. Peace. Oh yes and “Let’s Lose Weight” and “Exercise!”  And me? 2021 and 2022 was pretty horrible time for me.   Here's wishing 2023 is going to be different! As Curwin Baptiste posted just after the big ball dropped “I say let us get back to Basics, if you want to stop smoking, smoke a half a pack, not a full pack. Liming and enjoying each other company and stop taking and m...