The Brown Knowser

I know, my title to this post sounds like it belongs with a horror movie, much like the supernatural thriller TV series, The Returned ( Les Revenants , as the original—and much better—French series was known). And sometimes, when I think of my return, the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I'm going back to South Korea. For those of you who may not know, my wife and I lived in Chŏnju, a city about a three-hour drive south of Seoul, from 1997 to 1999. We taught English to children as young as 7 and adults as old as 70, at a private institue, called a hagwon , to universities, and a few private lessons in between. I wrote a novel, based on my experiences ( Songsaengnim: A Korea Diary ), and am writing the sequel, Geosunim , oh so slowly. While the character and his history are fiction, almost all of his experiences in Korea are true, had either happened to me or happened to people I knew. When my wife and I prepared to return to Canada, some of my stude...

I couldn't do it. The last time I photographed the aftermath of a tragedy, I felt as though I really had no business doing it. Sure, I'm a journalism graduate, have worked at local newspapers, and this blog sometimes shares news or this city—and the world—with my viewpoints. But that doesn't give me the authority to impose myself into an unfolding story to which I am not a part. Though my home isn't that far from the path of one tornado and my office isn't that far from the path of the other, I had no right to go to the scenes, to capture images of the destruction. On Saturday, DW and I visited her father, as we do every weekend. It was there where we learned that the tornado that touched down in Arlington Woods and left a path of devastation in Craig Henry, and the Merivale power station, also hit the Colonnade Road business park, which was only a few hundred metres from her dad's retirement facility. His residence has a backup generator, which maintain...

I feel kind of stupid to be writing about my silly photo challenge while many people in our city are still without power, or worse, without homes. Friday's tornadoes in the Ottawa-Gatineau region were pretty scary, no matter where in the area you were. The tornado that struck the Arlington Woods area and passed through Craig Henry and Tanglewood, where the Merivale power station was completely destroyed, and continued all the way through the Colonnade Road business park, were wooden poles were snapped like match sticks, was only about four kilometres to the north of my neighbourhood. DW and I were driving on Fallowfield Road when the tornado warning came over our smartphones and radio, and we could see the dark clouds along Hunt Club Road. The other tornado, which devastated Dunrobin before it crossed the Ottawa River, into Gatineau, and wreaked more havoc on Mont Bleu, was only a couple of kilometres away from my office building. As I write this post, I don't even know i...

I rarely find the time to attend grand-openings of breweries. Even more rare are my visits to breweries that are celebrating an anniversary. I think I've only been to two, maybe three, opening celebrations of Ottawa breweries: I was definitely at the party at Whiprsnapr Brewing , in Bells Corners. I was at a celebration at Nita , but I can't remember if it was for when they opened, when they celebrated an anniversary, or was merely launching a new brew. A year ago , I made it all the way out to the eastern-Ottawa community of Orleans for the opening of Stray Dog Brewing Company , which has, over the past year, become one of my favourite breweries in the city. This past weekend, I completed a Beer O'Clock first: not only did I attend the grand-opening of a brewery, I also made it to their one-year-anniversary celebration. In mid-September, 2017, Stray Dog caught my eye (and my taste buds) with bold flavours packed into solid ales. I was blown away by thei...

Last month, I thought that the Where In Ottawa photo challenge would look like it's a piece of cake, but I didn't think it actually was. Apparently, it was because it was solved in only a couple of hours. I'm trying my luck again. But, this time, the challenge runs for one day fewer than usual. For those of you who haven't played my photo challenge before, here's what I do: below, you'll see a photo that has been shot somewhere in Ottawa. Your job is to identify the spot and let me know by leaving your answer in the Comments section to this post. The first person to correctly identify the location of the photo wins (bragging rights only). Please do not send me your answer through any other means: no Twitter, no Facebook, no e-mail, no smoke signals. You can guess as many times as you like. For every day in which no correct answer is provided, I will leave a clue in the right-hand margin of this blog, below my goofy face. If the challenge is...

Despite the sun, a haze obscured stark shadows on the pavement, making them grey, rather than a clear contrast between light and dark. I looked at the small hut, in the middle of Friedrichstrasse, and thought that it looked simple, easy to walk past. Only the much larger barriers, beyond, where the low observation towers and grey, simple walls indicated a clear demarcation between west and east, made me nervous. My camera bag was slung over my shoulder. Every component of photographic equipment—the lenses, flash, filters—was neatly organized into its own compartment and pouch, for ease of inspection. The micro-cassette recorder in a slim partition, between the flash and the camera body. I walked to the American hut, Checkpoint Charlie, with my passport in hand, but the officers within didn't seem to want to bother with me. They didn't care who was heading into east, communist-controlled sector of Berlin. I smiled and continued to the Soviet-controlled checkpoint. ...