Downtown Vancouver Chapters Board Games Night!

April 26, 2013September 6, 20153 Comments

Hey everyone!

So if you live in Vancouver, you may want to check this out! My friend and I stumbled onto this while we were walking around downtown waiting for our friend’s birthday party to begin.

Did you know that Chapters (the one near Howe street in downtown Vancouver) has board games night! It happens on the last Thursday of every month (according to the poster, up to July anyway), and it is free! They had two tables and board games scattered around for you to play with. What is even better? They serve popcorn and juice!

Free refreshments? Yes please!

It starts at 7PM, and our friend’s birthday party did not begin until 7:30, so we decided to sit down and join a game of Taboo! They also had Jenga, Apples to Apples, and the other table was playing some sort of complicated card game. We met a nice group of people, and our table eventually started to grow. The staff kept offering popcorn and drinks to everyone, and it was definitely fun! Shame we could not stay longer!

So if you are downtown on a Thursday night, and it happens to be the last one that month, you may want to drop by Chapters and play a game or two with strangers! It goes on from 7:00PM- closing (which is around 10PM I believe)!

Our Taboo table! 😀

Hope you guys are enjoying the sun!

-Karen

Fan Expo Vancouver 2013

April 23, 2013September 6, 20154 Comments

This year, I decided to go to the Fan Expo in Vancouver. I am not sure if it was the wisest choice, as it was sandwiched between two final exams (I actually could not go on the first day because it was ON the day and time of one of my exams), but it was definitely fun and I am excited to see how the expo will grow in the future! Vancouver’s Fan Expo is quite new, and has a while to go before it can catch up with many of the other conventions out there, but it was very promising.

I cosplayed as Amelia Pond from Doctor Who, and my friend cosplayed as the 11th Doctor. At one point, we met several other Doctor Who cosplayers who told us that they were going to do a Doctor Who photoshoot at two o’clock, and invited us. The photos were fun, and around thirty of us showed up–all doing a bunch of silly poses.

The expo’s floor was not too big, taking up Halls B and C at the Vancouver Convention Center–if I am not mistaken, but it was packed with vendors and there was an artist alley. Celebrity guests included Stan Lee, Michael Rooker (from The Walking Dead”), Nichelle Nichols (Star Trek), Sean Astin (from Lord of the Rings), and the whole cast of Continuum.

I really like conventions because I love looking at cosplays. I admire how you can see how much effort people put into their costumes, and when they stay in character during the whole con, it makes things that much better. At the Fan Expo, I would say around 50% of the people there were in costumes? Not a bad turnout!

Here are some random pictures from my adventures that day!

My friend and I who cosplayed characters from Doctor Who

Sauron! Amazing costume!

Pics from the Doctor Who photo shoot from my camera– which explains why no one’s looking at the camera.

A picture of the companions

Tardis!

And of course, all the doctors!

A cosplayer cosplaying a nurse from Silent Hill. She limped around the whole con the whole day. Props to her for her dedication!!

If you live in Vancouver, keep an eye out for the Fan Expo next year! You may want to check this out!

– Karen

“42”: A Movie Review

April 23, 2013September 6, 20151 Comment

I just came back from watching 42 from the cinemas.

Honestly, when asked to choose a movie, I opted for this one because Harrison Ford was in it. I was not entirely sure what it was going to be about, but I ended up crying through the whole movie because it was very touching and motivating. The man next to me gave me a high-fived for weeping through the whole thing. Props to him for putting up with my sniffling.

“42” is a movie about Jackie Robinson and how he joined the Brooklyn Dodgers despite being black. The story in itself is inspiring, but seeing those around Jackie willing to find acceptance and change was the most amazing part of the film. The end credits also explain how different members of the team went on to achieve great things. They also explained that the number 42– Jackie’s jersey number– was retired by the major baseball leagues to honour him. Like my friend said, it was a bit cheesy at times, but overall, I would defintely recommend this. Especially if you liked movies such as The Help. It really shows how far we have come in society.

I do not want to spoil too much (though it may be a bit obvious how it will end), but I suggest that if you wanted something good to watch, especially at a time like this when the movies seem to be lacklustre (at least in my parts of town), go watch 42.

– Karen

This Came Across My Attention…

April 14, 2013September 6, 20156 Comments

And I usually do not get too huffy over stuff like this, because society is changing, albeit slowly. I cannot possibly comment on everything that seems sexist on the internet.

But because the Avengers is something I am really into and love…

Here’s some T-shirts that can be found in the Disney Store online

For boys

For girls

Another one for girls

I went on the site myself to see if people were being selective in what they chose to display to other people– just to get them riled up. Turns out they were not. I went through all the Avengers merchandise selection and saw that this was truly the only tees for women there.

So while little boys get to be heroes, little girls are told that they need a hero. I think we need a little bit of Black Widow spicing things up in here. Excuse me while I go find a hero to kiss because I cannot possibly do any ass kicking on my own.

-Karen

*Edit: This is the petition that came with the post I read http://www.change.org/sexismavengers

Marketing Post #6: Assignment 3 Reflective Post

April 8, 2013September 6, 2015Leave a comment

My last marketing post for my COMM 296 course is a reflective piece, and I now choose to do it on our last team assignment: Assignment 3.

For the project, our team of five had to analyze our chosen company’s (BlackBerry) marketing mix, and then see if it matches the target market we suggest for the company. It was also a video assignment, so we had to find some way to make all our info into a video.

This assignment also required very little new research, as it builds on our two previous assignments. The challenge was to find a suitable way to display our info into a video, while making it interesting to the viewer. We did consider doing the very popular drawing/writing on a board idea, but we thought too many other groups would want to do that. So instead, we decided to film ourselves in a variety of scenarios that mimicked BlackBerry’s Keep Moving ads–except in a negative light. The video making process was a great bonding experience for the team, and became one of the funnest meetings we had together. We went around campus doing silly things (e.g. pretending to hit a group member with a car as he talked on his BlackBerry device), and we had a lot of laughs. It was definitely an unforgettable experience.

A problem we ran into was the fact that none of us were very skilled video editors. We had a basic idea of what we wanted to do: we’ll first show the spoof of our ad, followed by a Prezi presentation with a voiceover describing the slides. To go on from there, we realized we would have to learn how to use Prezi, as well as record voiceovers and piece everything together into a nice video. However, we did have a member who was semi-competent at video editing, and his help on the last part of putting together the whole thing was invaluable (thanks Jordan!).

Overall, although this project took a long time to complete, it was not an unpleasant experience. It did bring us out of comfort zone and ultimately, I think my team and I can all agree that we learned a lot more about BlackBerry as a company.

Blackberry’s Keep Moving ad that we mimicked.
Our idea: To display a variety of individuals who kept moving with their BlackBerry device, but end up running into a lot of dangerous or negative scenarios as they kept moving forward ignoring the consequences. This suggested that we believe that if BlackBerry was to continue targeting the general public (instead of Business and organizations as they formerly did), it was going to be a dangerous move on their part, as they have relatively little market share in the casual smartphone consumer market.

Karen K. Lee

Finding myself

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