Posts Tagged ‘Events in Ottawa’
Ottawa Pop Expo (Sunday Edition) – S09E13
Day 2 of Ottawa Pop Expo was a relaxed affair as I decided to check out the celebrity Q&A. I forgot to take a photo of their logo but able to take a photo from their video screen along with a countdown.
Let’s say that it was more on Doctor Who as Neve McIntosh and Seventh Doctor, Sylvester McCoy were guests of the pop culture convention. It’s their first time to be Ottawa, Canada.
Aside from that, the first panel I checked out which was the Q&A on Doctor Who’s 50th Celebration. After the brief session, I had to bolt over to the celebrity Q&A for Neve McIntosh, who plays Silurian, Madame Vastra in the current series of Doctor Who. She’s quite a lovely actress without the heavy makeup as the fan-favourite Silurian. Her Q&A was pretty good as she told the crowd as being a lifelong Doctor Who fan and having Tom Baker (Fourth Doctor) as her first and favourite Doctor growing up. McIntosh also said that she will be back for Series 8 when Peter Capaldi takes over for Matt Smith in the new year. Towards the end of the Q&A, a couple of Daleks and Seventh Doctor, McCoy appeared to join McIntosh on the Q&A. It was quite the fun and hilarious moment as it felt like the Seventh Doctor crashed the party.
After her Q&A was then McCoy’s turn to get questions asked. Quite an entertaining and funny Q&A session as McCoy decided to walk off the stage and get interactive with the fans. Things he brought up was that he never watched the previous Doctors and decided to be his own character. He mentioned the 1996 TV movie and not knowing about the perks as he mentioned Eric Roberts wanted to change the carpet. McCoy also cracked a joke on Toronto mayor, Rob Ford. He liked how Canadians are polite towards him.
Overall, it was great to see one of the living Doctors to be Ottawa. It’s definitely a treat for Doctor Who fans in the Nation’s Capital. You will see some of the photos from below.
The last Q&A to check out was a popular actor who was in the hit show, The Game of Thrones. I decided to check out Jason Momoa because of the blogger I met at the convention to check this guy out. Mind you, I’m not into Game of Thrones as I listen to a radio show on Sunday nights. I know people tweet like crazy, hence the spoilers. OK, onto Momoa. He played Khal Drogo from the hit series. On stage, he got a nice comfortable chair and drinking Guinness beer. He talked about his time on Game of Thrones, Conan and going against Sylvester Stallone. He also mentioned about a movie he directed called Road to Paloma. The tone of the Q&A was more on the no-so family friendly side as Momoa swore a bit and there were a few guys asking negative questions towards him. It kind ruined the fun atmosphere because I could say that men are jealous of him, but it’s just my opinion.
All in all, what a way to wrap things up for the first year of Ottawa Pop Expo as the main convention, Ottawa Comiccon will be in full swing for May 2014.
Check out the photos!
I’ll be back again for the radio show recap as I have the interview with Kat Burns of Kashka.
Ottawa Pop Expo (Saturday Edition) – S09E12
I had the opportunity to attend Ottawa Pop Expo, a pop culture fan convention which features genres from comics, sci-fi, horror, anime and a bunch of others. It’s in the realm of geek culture nonetheless. The convention is presented and run by the organizers of Ottawa Comiccon. It’s the first time the pop culture convention is being held in December as Ottawa Comiccon has been running for two years and held in May.
For this convention, I decided to take photos of the cosplayers for the fun of it. You will see a bunch of photos below. I totally forgot to create a main photo for the blog entry. Luckily, I took a photo of their podium as shown above.
I decided to check out the celebrity Q&A with Tom Felton. The actor who played Draco Malfoy from the Harry Potter film series. I got to deal with the screaming fans who are big into the actor.
Lastly, how could I say that I finally met one of Canada’s known wrestling analyst/commentator and TV personality, who’s currently with The Weather Network. It’s none other than Arda Ocal. I’ve been tweeting him back and fourth about wrestling and his time at The Score (now Sportsnet 360) on the programme, Aftermath. It’s a privilege to finally meet him and just good timing to see Ottawa become a fun city.
I will be back for another entry on Ottawa Pop Expo for Sunday and it’s most likely on Doctor Who.
From Nuit Blanche to Polaris Music Prize – S09E03
It’s been an eventful last week in Ottawa. I was away in Toronto when the tragic news of the OC Transpo being hit by a VIA Rail train. It’s sad to hear the lives lost. Condolence goes out the lost ones affected by it.
Aside from that, what a weekend when I checked out Nuit Blanche Ottawa-Gatineau. It’s the second year that the artistic and wonderful event has been held. It started at 6:20pm to 4:20am. It’s a basically a long night to experience the unique fun.
I missed out on the first edition as I was in Montreal for Pop Montreal. Even though it was raining throughout Saturday, it didn’t help deter people checking out unique arts and crafts located at various places in Ottawa. I was able to check out the downtown and Gatineau for Nuit Blanche.
One unique thing I got was a firefly. As the website explained that it’s hackable (open software) and when interacting with other fireflies, it create a unique light pattern. You’ll see a photo below as I tweeted to someone that I got the lumipendant.
Overall, it was a fun event and hope the 2014 edition doesn’t have rain in the forecast. I posted some photos below. Check it out.
Monday’s Radio Show
On this week’s radio show, it’s the Polaris Music Prize edition as it’s day of the gala. Ten nominees are vying for the $30,000 prize to claim the best album of the year. As mentioned everytime, the Polaris Music Prize is based on artistic merit and judged by over 200 jury members from radio, tv, print and Internet.
I had the opportunity to chat with Ryan of CKCU’s Whatever’s Cool With Me as he’s jury member and in Toronto for the gala. He also explained on the show that this year’s shortlist is the strongest for artistic merit and had a difficult time choosing the albums. It was a fun chat as I don’t usually interact with a lot of CKCU hosts.
Who will win the prize? We’ll find out in due time
You can check the playlist over at this link. You can listen to the audio below.
Have a great week and I will be going to Montreal this weekend.
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Summer Special 2013 – The Social Media Summer Series #1
It’s back for another year. The Social Media Summer series is an alternative program for my radio show on CKCU-FM. It’s a spotlight on people who are using social media and how it’s become very useful to one another. It started with the dynamic duo of Nat & Marie last year and this year, it’s going local and trying to get guests live on the show to talk about their use of social media. Another topic to bring up on the SMS series is the importance that Ottawa is not a boring city. Letting the listenings on getting the better perspective of Canada’s Nation’s Capital. There are a lot of interesting places and things to check out in Ottawa.
The first guest for the 2013 is Nick Bachusky. He’s a mortgage agent but he’s a host of a podcast series called Lunch Out Loud Ottawa. Aside from that, Bachusky is an avid music fan. You can listen to the audio below or on the playlist at CKCU-FM’s website.
Hope you enjoy the interview with Nick Bachusky and the playlist from the live show can seen over at this link via CKCU-FM.
Also on the show, myself, along with Summer guest co-host, Katarina and Nick went through some of the nominees for the Polaris Music Prize Short List. I forgot to add Colin Stetson on the live show. It was used on the podcast part of the show.
On the Wild 10 Countdown, Louise Burns is still number one for the second week. You can check summary at this link.
Have a great week and stay cool from the hot weather.
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Summer Special – The Community Cup 2013
It’s soon to write a blog entry as the current season wrapped up but this is a Summer special. All I can say that it was a great opportunity to participate in The Community Cup for the second year and to support and represent CKCU-FM. What a way to start the Summer fun and a lead in to Canada Day.
I have to grin and bear it as Team CBC Ottawa beat Team CKCU to a score of 3-1. They took a nice revenge after a score-less tie from last year’s game. All in all, it’s for a good fun and no bitterness afterwards. You were awesome and a class act. It was also great to see Amanda Putz of CBC Bandwidth as I haven’t seen her around in quite awhile. Great to see get into the soccer spirit and downing Team CKCU.
I was able to shoot this video on Instagram of the post-game handshakes. Another Instagram video with Teri Loretto and Jewne Johnson doing the news. Lastly, I brought along the Fujifilm Instax Camera and the people were astonished to see the camera and instant film.
It was nice to have hosts of Fundamentally Sound and Debaser take part in this year’s Community Cup and there were a few other hosts as well. Kudos to DJ 2 Creamz for DJing at the event as well.
Time to recover from the pain.
Photos are posted on Flickr at this link. Some photos are posted on Facebook over at this link.
On the Summer edition of WildWorks on CKCU, I will be airing some of the reactions and thoughts from the teammates and a few from CBC Ottawa.
Have a great Canada Day! You can check the photos from Canada Day over at this link.
Update for July 3rd – Audio segment from The Community Cup is posted up. It consisted of reactions of teammates from CKCU and CBC Ottawa. An apology as I forgot to give thanks to the organizers of The Community Cup on the radio show.
The Wild 10 Countdown for July 3rd entry is over at this link.
Ottawa Comiccon 2013 – S08E39
It’s been several years since I went to a comic book convention. Ottawa Comiccon was the event for comics, Sci-Fi and Anime fans alike to bring out their inner geek and to hobnob with the celebrities. The event is in its second year over at Ernst & Young Centre. It’s my first time to attend the convention as I had previously went to comic book conventions in Toronto. It’s also convenient to attend in my area, except for the one hour bus ride.
I had the opportunity to check out the marvellous vendors and the varieties of people dressing up in wonderful costumes. It ranged from comic characters to Sci-Fi characters such as Doctor Who and various Anime characters.
Being a comic book fan, I did not bring a lot of comics and trade paperbacks but was able to get my X-Men: The Dark Phoenix Saga trade paperback signed by Chris Claremont. It was definitely a plus as he’s a legendary storyteller.
On Saturday, I got to check out a few panels. One panel had quite a humourous trainwreck which was Name That Anime Tune. The participants did not know certain themes to Anime shows and I didn’t know any as I haven’t followed a lot of Anime shows for so long. One panel I truly had to attend was The Doctor Who panel as it had two authors from the book, Who Is The Doctor. They talked about 50 years of DW and how’s still a hit for 50 years. Plus, the Dalek appeared and humourously crashed the Q&A panel.
It was funny bumping into people I know and some have said that it’s their first time attending Ottawa Comiccon. It’s pretty surprising that Ottawa is known for being a boring city but the magnitude of Comiccon showed that there’s a big following for comics, Sci-Fi and Anime. The organizers and sponsor bringing in big name celebrities know how to attract fans and people in general. It’s quite wonderful to experience seeing lots of people to be at a convention.
The only setback I had was the lack of cell phone signal at Ernst & Young Centre. I was hoping to tweet and photos but the reception was not great to do so. At least I was able to shoot photos on the DSLR camera. You will be able to view the photos of people in their creative costumes from below.
There’s a photo of lovely ladies in Sailor Moon costumes and I know one of them as you can check her blog. They were made quite nice and also got some attention from the people. ’nuff said on that one.
Links to my Instagram from Friday – my media pass, green Dalek, Dalek Emperor (I think), classic Dalek, and R2D2.
Overall, I had a good time at Ottawa Comiccon and the organizers sure made it top notch. Lastly, happy Mother’s Day to everyone!
Coming up on Wednesday’s radio show, I will be airing the interview from a member of The Doctor Who Society of Canada.
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Ottawa = Winterfell – S08E28
We know, we know – there are enough jokes out there about Snowmageddon and Snowpocalypse and …Winterfell.
But seriously, this snow though…It would give even the Night’s Watch a run for its money.
Still, we did our darnedest to pull together a good show yesterday. This post is a little delayed, since Lenny and I were stuck shovelling our driveways all afternoon, but here it is – our recap of this week’s edition of WildWorks.
Some pretty exciting news to start things off – The RBC Royal Bank Bluesfest lineup was announced yesterday, and we were reaaaal keen when we saw some of our favourites on the list. Big acts include Björk, BB King, the Dixie Chicks, Rush and Wu-Tang Clan. Personally I’m excited to see Passion Pit, Mother Mother, Zeds Dead, Camera Obscura and Bahamas.
The Birthday Edition: Interviews with Young Rival and The Elwins – S08E27.5
Hey friends, this is Candice writing a quick recap of today’s edition of WildWorks.
So busy, busy show today – not only did we have a double dose of interviews with bands Young Rival and The Elwins, but today was also Lenny’s birthday! Happy birthday, friend! Here’s to another amazing year ahead and all the DAVIDsTEA your heart desires. : )
The photo shown is Lenny with The Elwins, after the interview.
On today’s show, we played a few tracks from artists and bands that are competing in CBC Music’s Searchlight contest. CBC is looking for Canada’s next big thing, and the winning artist/band will get a sweet $20,000 in music-related equipment from Yamaha. The list of the top 20 acts is slated to be released Feb. 25.
Chinese New Year 2013: The Parade in Ottawa Chinatown – S08E26
It was a chilly but wonderful Saturday as the lions and dragon roamed through Ottawa Chinatown for the annual Chinese New Year parade. Also on hand were other drummers and twelve animals from the Chinese zodiac.
This year was unique as it was in conjunction with Winterlude/NCC.
For myself, I was on the cymbals and the tail of the lion. The photo shown had Ottawa mayor, Jim Watson giving the red pocket to the lions under the Chinatown Gateway. It was definitely the popular spot as crowds waited for the lions and dragon to come through the part of Chinatown.
Don’t forget to check some of the photos I took during the parade.
Here’s a short clip via Vine at this link.
Overall, the weather was great and fun watching families and their kids be happy for the occasion. I forgot to mention that the seventh day of Chinese New Year is everyone’s birthday.
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Chinese New Year 2013: Lion Dance at T&T – S08E24
Kung Hei Fat Choy!
What a way to start Chinese New Year for 2013 with a lion dance performance at T&T Supermarket, Ottawa location. Although, my lion dance troupe had done a few performances since Thursday leading up to Chinese New Year, it’s been exciting to see people be happy to watch the colourful lions.
It’s been wonderful having two small lions and three big lions for the big occasion.
The performance at T&T was pretty crazy as crowds were getting packed and we performed for about 30 mins around the supermarket. It was quite a frenzy for the guy dressed up as Cai Shen. He was giving out the red enveloped and lots of people were grabbing the red envelopes like hotcakes. That was quite a moment.
There’s one more big performance and it will be on Saturday (Feb. 16) for the New Year Lion Dance Parade.
Don’t forget to check the photos.
Last thing, I have been using Vine and here are a few lion dance related clips to check out.
http://vine.co/v/bvi7aUxUhlD
http://vine.co/v/bve0TJb1Z2X
Happy year of the snake!
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