Extreme Kindness

Erik's Journal

Date: Oct 27th 2002

Geography: Ottawa, Ontario.

Point form day: Up late -worked and had breakfast in my room -went downtown and filmed with City TV (bought pumpkins and got people to carve them and Pay them fwd also gave out hugs and met a great street musician) -ate my first beavertail (no beavers were killed to make this tasty snack) -went for a long run around Ottawa and over the bridge into Hull -snuck into the Canadian Museum of Civilization after hours -ran back across the bridge and back to the hotel-had a group meeting and ate dinner -helped the restaurant staff with clean up -met a great guy in the kitchen -worked on the computer until 12:30.

Highlight of the day: Meeting up with the CityTV subsidiary The newRO. We bought pumpkins at the market and grabbed random people off the street and had them carve Jack o lanterns in the middle of the sidewalk. When everyone was finished they had to pay it forward and give that pumpkin to another random person.

Most inspiring moment: As a group we had great discussions about the future. We sat back after dinner and talked about the potential for the American tour, future group endeavors, and brainstormed ideas for this tour. We have a lot of exciting things in store.

Shout outs: Busker John for putting great music into the world.

Classic quote: "Salut" -I greeted everyone that I passed in Hull and was only greeted back with "Hello". How do they know I can't speak French?

My crux: Frustrated with motivations of some group members. We all seem to have such different ways of moving towards a similar goal.

Physically speaking: Good, I went for a run about the city. I saw 10x the amount of Ottawa that I would have if I had not gone for the run. My finger is a little infected.

Mental stimulation: Not really.

Big laughs: We were at the Market and were getting random people to carve pumpkins. I grabbed one guy who was in his late teens and handed him a pumpkin and a knife. He handed the knife back to me and proceeded to use his teeth to form eyes and a mouth. About 20minutes later, face covered in pumpkin guts, he had finished by far the best pumpkin I had seen all day. It looked like something out of a Tim Burton cartoon. We were all pretty impressed.

When I finished writing this I was: In a funk.