Message to Reception Honouring Vic Falkenheim's 50 Years of Teaching

In 1983, Vic took over supervision of my doctoral dissertation when Bill Saywell left the U of T to become President of Simon Fraser.

It was a wonderful apprenticeship, both in the Sidney Smith Building and with the Joint Centre for Modern East Asia. The Joint Centre was a very active Centre under Vic's direction. As I recall, most of the Joint Centre seminars, usually held at Glendon, commenced or terminated with a celebratory duck dinner at the Fang Shan Restaurant. That restaurant was strategically located on Eglinton and Avenue Road between York and U of T and not far east of where Vic lived in those years. Excellent free Chinese meals washed down with Tsingtao beer was one of the many benefits of being an apprentice of Professor Falkenheim.

Insofar as his mentoring went, Vic explained to me that key to his own success in completion of his thesis at Columbia was "valium and scotch." Now that I am older I all the more appreciate the wisdom of that advice.

In return, when he and family went away in the summer, I happily moved into his house, slept in his bed, fed the cat and cut his lawn; as was the expectation for grad students in those years.

So 50 years on, thank you for everything, Vic! I am so grateful to be one of your trainee successors in China studies.

The Faculty Association as Union

The current controversy at Brock University over the Faculty Association's role in the matter of a professor who is alleged to have had improper contact with students late at night in his office while drunk calls into question the relationship between professors and librarians and their union.

The issue comes down to is it the function of a faculty association to represent the will of the membership, or should a faculty association be driven by labour movement ideology?

What we want is openness, transparency and honesty. What we don't want are hidden agendas driving manipulation of the "union membership" to fulfil union movement sociological goals beyond the terms and conditions of our employment.

What we want is a university that is led and directed by scholars.  We do not want to be the subjects of “profit and efficiency” corporate agenda scheming by the people we entrust to serve us as our university administrators.

Nor do we want to be the subjects of labour activism.

​Brock University tells student to keep quiet about sexual harassment finding - Canada - CBC News

​Brock University tells student to keep quiet about sexual harassment finding - Canada - CBC News

Brock University has issued a response to the CBC report:
http://www.brocku.ca/brock-news/2016/03/brock-officials-moved-promptly-after-being-told-of-sexual-harassment-claim/


My comment: Respecting students and maintaining proper trustful student-teacher relations is the central responsibility of university professors. After all, it is an asymmetrical power relationship. So it is incumbent on the professors not to abuse this power.

And the burgeoning growth of Brock's bureaucracy of non-scholar administrators, aside from leeching scarce resources away from the teaching and research function of the University, does not seem to have served the student victim well in this case.

The whole thing just fills me with a deep sense of despair.


Later: Story gets worse and worse: "Sexual harassment at Brock University brought into the spotlight" - The Brock Press  - http://go.shr.lc/1QKZQqa

My Son Punched a Boy Making Racist Taunts

On a couple of occasions since Geoffrey moved to a French immersion school, he has ruefully commented to me “You are so lucky Dad that you don’t look Chinese.”  And then he recounts yet another incident of racist teasing by his classmates in the playground at recess.  But he flat refuses to provide the names of those responsible.  “I still have to play with these guys, Dad.”  Then in the 150 year tradition of parents of Chinese-Canadian children, I urge him to pay it no mind.  “These boys are ignorant idiots.  Be proud of your heritage.”

Yesterday Geoffrey told me a different story.  A much larger boy gives him the slitty eyed routine, mimicking his silly notion of the sounds of the Chinese language, and throwing in a couple of racial slurs.  Geoffrey as instructed by me does not respond to this taunting.  Instead he simply walks over to this latest “ignorant idiot” and silently slugs the boy in the stomach.  To Geoffrey’s evident satisfaction, the boy crumples to the ground writhing in pain.  Seems that all his hockey games and drills on the ice with the St. Catharines Peewee Hurricanes has made Geoffrey a lot stronger than he looks.  Turns out my son packs a mean punch.

(I recall that my Geoffrey’s 5’4” great-grandfather was something of a boxing champion in his division back in our ancestral home of Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire.  Subsequently Granddad coached amateur boxing part-time.  Too bad he did not live to see this day as his athletic prowess definitely skipped two generations.)

Anyway tacit message delivered, Geoffrey just walks away from his tormentor.  Me: “Well, anyway I still don’t think it is a good idea to hit people regardless.”  Geoffrey: “But Mummy thinks I did the right thing!”

There is more.  Subsequently the boy recovered from Geoffrey’s wallop and enraged by the unexpected turn of events sought Geoffrey out to seek revenge.  But just as he was fixing to pummel my son into a pulp, their teacher comes along. Witnessing what appears to be an unprovoked attack on  much smaller boy, she sends the bully off to the principal’s office.  Geoffrey gets off scot-free.

According to Geoffrey the bully spent a considerable time with the principal (“two units”, whatever that means in minutes).  On return the “ignorant idiot” was made to sit by himself at a desk well away from the rest of the class.

Consequently, Geoffrey is highly satisfied that justice has truly been served.

But as his father I am not sure how I should respond to all this.

One Explanation for Why I Am Not Rich

When I was a first year undergrad I took a course in a new discipline called "Computing Science."  Due to some bonus marks I ended up with a final grade of 104%.  I was subsequently approached and lobbied pretty hard to major in this "Computing Science."

I thought it over and decided that these computers were really just glorified adding machines albeit useful for tricky statistical analysis.  But that that was about it.  I concluded that, attractive as the offer was, there would be little future for me in computers.

So I went to Cambridge to study the history of ancient Chinese thought instead.

Observation: I am the same age as Bill Gates and am still making mortgage payments.

Designation of Former Family Residences on Lisgar Street in Ottawa as Heritage Buildings

In Ottawa last week, I decided to walk back to my hotel from a meeting downtown via Lisgar Street.  I was a bit thrown to see a "Sold" sign on 66 Lisgar where I had lived with my parents, great-grandfather and grandmother as an infant.  I assumed that this meant that the old house would be torn down and the land used to build a high rise condo to join the others surrounding it.

Then to my happy surprise I found that 66 Lisgar and my namesake great-great-grandfather, Charles Magee's house next door both have been designated as heritage buildings by the City of Ottawa earlier this month.  So those family residences should be preserved for a good long time, I hope.

Here is some relevant documentation:

Report on designation of 66 and 78 Lisgar Street as Ottawa heritage properties
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2D2uy6GvLKWajdXalBpLWRnMUE/view?usp=sharing

My letter of thanks to Nancy Schepers, Deputy City Manager (Planning and Infrastructure) and Michael Mizzi, Chief (Development and Review Services Planning and Growth Management), City of Ottawa
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2D2uy6GvLKWOWtyNmQ1NHZ6aWM/view?usp=sharing

Photos of 66 Lisgar Street as it is presently in 2014
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2D2uy6GvLKWZVR0ckFPdG9XWU0/view?usp=sharing

Reflections on Harry Belafonte Song Lyrics

I was disappointed to learn recently from my Uncle (erstwhile Parish doctor of St Philip, Barbados) that the claim in the Belafonte song "Coconut Woman" that "Coco got a lot of iron, make you strong like a lion" is actually not true at all. There is only a trace amount of iron in coconut. Coconut is evidently a very good source of potassium though. 

On the other hand  when I select fruit at the St. Catharines Sobeys, I do continue to abide by his important warning in "The Banana Boat Song" that "A beautiful bunch a' ripe banana hide the deadly black tarantula."

Belafonte's confusion over the nutritional benefits of coconut water may have its origins in that fact that Belafonte was a native of Harlem in New York City, although his Mum was an immigrant from Jamaica and his father from Martinique.