A Theatre Experience Tailor-Made For Rural Saskatchewan

source: Farm and Food Report

“Farmer Joe is tired of losing his shirt on the farm so he plants the ultimate cash crop….” Talk about an attention-grabber. Farmer Joe and the Money Trees is Dancing Sky Theatre’s latest offering and yet another collective creation that is likely to hit home like no other, according to Meacham resident, actor and director Angus Ferguson.

“We stage entertainment that is tailor-made for rural Saskatchewan,” Ferguson says. “Our plays reflect what rural people experience. When you look at most television programming today, 90 per cent of what is aired targets urban audiences. There is very little out there that addresses rural life. We wish to change that.”

Ferguson explains that Farmer Joe and the Money Trees is a humorous and thought provoking look at priorities and values. The play is performed in the style of old English pantomime and loosely based on the story of Jack and the Beanstalk.

“Pantomime lends itself extremely well to stories such as fairytales because it is a form of theatre that is extremely accessible,” explains Ferguson. "It’s great fun really. Think of it along the same lines as harlequin, burlesque and sketches. Its roots are hundreds of years old, but it is still relevant today because it speaks to the people and is clearly identified with the Christmas season back in England. Except that we are really creating our own rural Saskatchewan version in this case.”

The artists and the community behind Dancing Sky Theatre have much to be proud of. The company was started 10 years ago. The plays are staged in the old Ukrainian Orthodox Hall completed in 1925 and moved to its current location from four miles away in the early 1950s. The place is equipped with a traditional proscenium stage, but seating can be arranged in a variety of configurations, depending on production requirements. Up to 115 guests at a time have attended performances there.

An evening with Dancing Sky may involve a home-cooked meal served right in the hall.

“We are well aware of the needs of rural people who must drive long distances to go places,” Ferguson says. “Between 60 and 70 per cent of our audience is rural, with about 30 per cent who drive 40 minutes from Saskatoon. People who come from Watrous, Bruno or Lanigan appreciate having a meal before the performance.”

The Meacham-based professional theatre company prides itself in hiring only Saskatchewan actors. Farmer Joe and the Money Trees may well be the perfect Christmas present for rural families, but really, everyone is invited as long they want to have fun and their heart is in the right place. Performances will take place December 3 to 19. Tickets are available by calling (306) 376-4445.

For more information, contact:

Angus FergusonDancing Sky Theatre
(306) 376-4445
www.dancingskytheatre.com

Nativity Story Takes On Farm Flavour Near Regina Beach

source: Farm and Food Report

At the Two Spirit Guest Ranch and Retreat near Regina Beach, good ideas are harvested by the bushel.

Co-owner Denise Needham had always been curious about the one big story that moves everyone around Christmas. Her partner, Lee Tennyson, who also works as a United Church Chaplain at the palliative care unit of a Regina hospital, undertook to re-write the Nativity story in a reverent way and then interpret it in a contemporary setting. Thus, the “Christmas in a Barn Pageant” was born.

Last year, the two business women, who also operate a senior care home on the farm, welcomed 400 guests over 10 evenings to relive the story right in their facilities, with their livestock.

“Depending on the arrangements we make, people come to Homestead Hall. We can feed them a whole turkey dinner with all the trimmings, salads and vegetables,” explained Denise Needham. “We invite people to dress in Nativity scene outfits we provide. We then move over to the barn as a group.”

The whole yard has been specially decorated with lights in an arrangement that helps create the right atmosphere. Tennyson then proceeds to narrate the story while Needham cues the improvised re-enactors.

“Mary gets tapped on the shoulder in an improvised manner (she doesn’t have to say any lines); all of a sudden our pony appears and she is invited to get on his back. Soon after, Joseph is handed the halter… and so the story goes.”

Guests are invited to dress warmly and to bring an old blanket, as the temperature in the barn is the same as outside. At the end, guests are invited back to the house for hot chocolate. Blankets are often donated to people in need. Last year, the pair collected over a hundred for the Carmichael Outreach Project.

“We find that this is an opportunity for people to reconnect with the real meaning of Christmas. Someone loaned us a miniature donkey for the event this year. Last year, one of our sheep had a late lamb, which we were able to produce to be held in someone’s arms in December. We also had a very pregnant cow at the time,” quips Needham.

Asked if there were some special challenges in recreating the Christmas story with a multitude of animals, Needham recalls one performance in particular:

“Lee usually trains the sheep to go straight to a pile of strategically located oats a couple of days before we stage the pageant. Last year, one night, someone forgot to put out the oats. The four sheep were let loose and they went running around like crazy looking for their missing reward. Our guests thought this was a cleverly orchestrated choreography. I guess now… they know it wasn’t.”

The pageant also features musical pieces from artists like Manheim Steamroller, Reba McEntire and Jerry Vale… even Bob Marley’s Go Tell It On The Mountain is featured.

Tickets are available for nights between November 26 and December 31st on Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings. Other nights are available for larger groups upon request. Just call (306) 731-2200 for more information or to make reservations.

For more information, contact:
Denise NeedhamTwo Spirit Guest Ranch and Retreat(306) 731-2200http://tinyurl.com/5dn6n

British Farmers Fall in Love in Saskatchewan

When John Lewis first came to Saskatchewan in late January of this year, he absolutely fell in love with the prairies.

“I am in awe of the space, the hospitality and the opportunity to start anew as an agricultural producer in Canada. It has become very difficult to operate a family farm in England and I’m a farmer at heart. My family and I are willing to consider all possibilities, even if it means immigrating. ”

Lewis came to visit his in-laws who immigrated to the Willowbrook area north of Melville after they bought a farm there in June last year.

On his second visit, in June this year, his wife Catherine accompanied John. They were about to spend a week travelling throughout the province, looking for a suitable property.

As they flew to Regina they looked through the window, fascinated by the expanse of land, the irrigation systems, the network of sections, quarters and roads that give our landscape its distinctive qualities.

They were met at the airport by Bob Lane’s farm real estate team. Since 1998, Regina-based Lane Realty has helped about 50 farm families move to Saskatchewan from Europe.

“About half of them come from the United Kingdom, the others are from Germany, Austria and France, generally. We list the farms and ranches on our Web site but we also attend agriculture trade shows in Europe where we tell attendees about the Saskatchewan lifestyle, farming practices, social amenities, and educational opportunities here,” says Bob Lane.

The Saskatchewan Immigrant Nominee Program has simplified the immigration process for farm owners and operators who wish to relocate to our province. Applicants must be individuals with proven experience in farming, substantial capital available to invest in a farming operation, and who have made a signed offer to purchase land for a farming operation in Saskatchewan.

James and Christine Akrigg are often used as Saskatchewan ambassadors by Bob Lane, who regularly brings to them potential immigrants from the UK. They themselves moved from England’s Lake District in 1999 and bought a farm in the Dysart area with their three grown-up sons. They realized that their new house was somewhat bigger than their needs warranted. Within a couple of months, they opened up the Jumping Deer Bed and Breakfast. A stay with them helps put their guests’ fears to rest.

“You literally burn your bridges when you leave England. You must sell your farm to secure financing here. It is very much a leap of faith. We left the mountains but we got in exchange all that sunlight that you have here in Saskatchewan. And the sense of community is priceless, ” says Christine Akrigg. “Newcomers with children must put them in school and start getting involved in local activities.”

This is what happened to Laura and Robin Smith, John Lewis’ in-laws. After a year and a half in Saskatchewan with three children, among which two are of pre-school age, they had to mix in. What they didn’t expect was to find themselves combining in sub-zero temperatures:

“For us to have imagined the environmental conditions in which farm producers must operate would have been difficult. For instance, back in England there is much to do on the farm in the winter. Here you are much more limited because of the climate. It is a different world.”

Reached on the phone in England, John Lewis still ponders what the future holds for his wife Catherine, their 4 children and himself.

“ We saw one property we liked on our last trip, but it was not the right fit for us.
We are keeping our ears to the ground. There has been a major development in our lives recently. We sold our farm — the entire lot as we say here. Someone approached us with an offer we couldn’t refuse. We are now tenants in our former home. As you can imagine, many questions enter our mind as to what the future holds for our family. Moving to Saskatchewan is one of the options we are considering.”

There is solace in knowing that newcomers can count on Saskatchewan hospitality to make their farming transition a little easier on the mind and the heart… John and Catherine are well aware of that.

Fall Colours Index: An Idea Worth Exploring

Sharing with guests the land's pulse is always a sure way to increase their engagement level with our home place.

"Bonjourquebec.com", the official tourist site of the Government of Quebec taps into this concept most effectively with the "Fall Foliage" report it publishes and updates regularly on the Web.

The report is contextualized in the seasonal transformations that Quebec's tourism products assume throughout the year. While Fall is a distinct season in itself, the face it shows visitors and inhabitants varies greatly as the colour of leaves changes from green, to yellow, orange and red.

The index is organized by region and provides a quick reference guide as to which regions are able to deliver the most vivid impression of a land getting ready for the annual big chill. Viewers are informed that: "the visual impact is already outstanding as soon as the percentage reaches 25% and the yellow, orange and red become dominant colours."

This initiative is indicative of the level of sophistication marketers can achieve when highlighting products that have very specific experiential aspects attached to them. Fall colours are like a new wardrobe for the landscape. Travelers who may have visited a destination in the summer, might wish to go back to dine, stay overnight and bike around in bucolic surroundings; or to simply experience the smells of Fall as one walks along designated trails in the forest.

Is there a lesson for us here on the Plains? Though our Fall colours don't generally assume the bright reds of eastern Canadian and American locales. Colours do change nicely here as well, more subtly perhaps. Here are some other suggested indices that might illustrate the rhythms of life on the Plains and be used down the road to make more accessible to visitors the transitions associated with Fall, in an organized region by region format:

Migratory Bird Update: we all know that when Fall comes, the skies become alive with them. Different staging areas welcome different species. A regular report on which birds are where might entice birders or potential visitors in search for a new weekend activity to hop on to the ornithological bandwagon and have a meal or stay in a town nearby to really take in the whole experience.

Harvest reports: agriculture-focused government bodies crank out "Crop Reports". It wouldn't take much to produce a region by region harvest report with visitors to rural destinations in mind. Is there anything sweeter than the smell of freshly cut wheat on a sunny Fall morning? I experienced this again recently. Golden fields animated by farmers bringing in the crops are always a charming sight. I know -- the price of grain being what it is these days -- the rewards are not as good for those sitting behind the wheel in the tractor's cab. But the harvest is a timeless ritual endowed with an inherent dignity that can inspire anyone to support farming as a way of life forever.

Fowl/Fall suppers report: if events rooted in this season are all fantastic in my mind at some level, none of them provide the satisfaction of an old-fashion meal cooked and served by rural folks in a community hall. Fowl suppers may be fundraisers for local projects, such as keeping the lights on in the hall in question. Their significance is much greater as a celebration of the harvest; as the Fall homecoming of relatives and friends from other towns and cities. They are truly authentic with the turkey, stuffing, pumpkin and berry pies that we stuff down our bellies, but also in the friendliness of the improvised car park attendant or waiters who will fill up your coffee cup between sips as if you were just part of the family. That is priceless!

Lastly perhaps, I shall lump in all the indoor rodeos, crafts fairs, livestock sales and threshing days events into authentic experiences that need to be promoted more effectively. For they show a bit of the essence of life on the Great Plains, a sliver of the prairie dweller's soul. Each of these events is a window to the community spirit garden out of which our towns and cities have evolved. They are pivotal in the way our collective identity should be reflected in the tourism images we generate for the Plains region.

The Organic Gallery

I'll admit willingly that investigating the perceptions we have of places and spaces gives me great pleasure. So when a recent guest from New York shared with me how she had loved her visit to the MacKenzie Art Gallery, I absolutely had to go experience almost immediately some of the sensations she had enjoyed.

The MacKenzie figures on my list of local places to revisit two or three times a year. It is easy to forget that this is a remarkable facility. It's just the right size. Not so big that it challenges our capacity to take in all its offerings in one visit; yet, it is large enough a public space to allow for a certain "atmospheric" quality to emanate with each exhibit. In this sense, every visit nourishes the mind.

There is nothing quite like standing in front of a painting that could cover entire walls of your living room and feeling that you can fully appreciate some of the impact the artist wished his or her work to have on the observer. Endowed with high ceilings and plenty of display space, the "New" MacKenzie really does take after the expansive quality of the plains landscape. Something the old location on College Avenue could only aspire to.

The MacKenzie grounds us into the territory we inhabit through the personal interpretations of the Saskatchewan artists whose work is lovingly displayed here. The current Land Titles exhibit on show until September 26 is an eloquent statement to that effect.

The journalist in me is always seeking to experience the "lived reportage" of the exhibits and events we are invited to attend. This is the themed and articulated story that informs us on a range of topics. In this case we are invited to share worldviews that stem from the relationship to the land Prairie settlement has engendered. Land Titles succeeds.

And until December 3, the exquisite new exhibit of prints and still life paintings by Canadian artist Mary Pratt allows us to dwell even further on our relationship with commonplace objects. Pratt's hyperrealist renderings keep you thinking about the companion things of sedentary life.

In an unusual development, guests are invited backstage into the printmaking process itself. Between 1993 and 2003, Mary Pratt worked closely with Japanese master print maker Masato Arikushi, based in Vancouver. This collaboration culminated into Transformations, and a rare opportunity to see the actual woodblocks that are used. Apparently, print makers usually destroy them. As you scan the woodblocks on the wall, you start to understand how print images come together.

True to form, the MacKenzie is offering school tours to interpret the exhibit free of charge. For more information contact Marina at (306) 584-4292. These public interpretations always add value to the exhibit itself by making it more accessible. They always help bring the art to life; they help keep the MacKenzie organic.

Where the Arabian Horse is King

Regina has once again been turned into the Arabian horse capital of Canada since earlier this week. The 47th annual Canadian Arabian Nationals, affectionately known as "The Royal Red," kicked off at Regina Exhibition Park.

This week-long event is amazing, not just because it features top-level horse show competition and a commercial trade fair that drew more than 25,000 spectators and brought in approximately 1,000 horses from Canada and the United States... or because the economic impact to Regina is estimated at $5.5 million (U.S. dollars). It is amazing because of how the Exhibition grounds are used to create a miniature city where the horse is king.

The barns take on the flamboyant colours of stables from around North America. Banners unfurl, benches and plants are artfully displayed in a symphony of landscape productions intended to celebrate the oldest known breed of riding horse. While the Arabian hails from the ancient deserts of the Middle East, it has become one of the most popular breeds in North America.

Sure enough, the people who own such noble animals take great pride in their relationship with them. They will spare no expense. Inside the barns and outside, sod is brought in, lumber is purchased to build walls and partitions. Furniture is rented, light fixtures are installed, and soon, the strangest and eerily beautiful horse-friendly indoor environment emerges. People set up luxury dining rooms, living rooms with television sets, playpens for children. Within feet, a rider puts bandages on the feet of his horse; another adjusts her breeches and boots, while yet another climbs on her mount and heads to the ring.

Royal Red City is not only an amazing display of grace and elegance; it is a temporary human settlement with distinctive rules and behaviours. While the use of cars is discouraged in the alleys and within the barns, the golf cart becomes the wheeled vehicle of choice to shuttle between barns, rings and RV. So many golf carts are needed for the event that they have to be imported from as far away as Calgary.

Royal Red City comes with various amenities. Vendors for straw, hay and wood shavings are conveniently located on site. A sheltered sitting area is established and daily newspaper dispensing boxes are brought in to occupy the more leisurely moment of these honoured guests who come mostly from the United States.

There is real joy for us local folks in walking on these beautiful grounds and in asking these passionate horse people what they think of Regina? Why they like coming back here? Their answers: "people are extremely friendly everywhere"... "We go to restaurant and people are very polite"..."when the show is hosted in other cities, sometimes nobody watches us in the ring. Here they cheer for us".

It is fascinating how the Royal Red enables this city to show its best side to the rest of North America. Perhaps it is not that surprising, given that the horse has historically played such a significant role in the settlement of the City.

There are many yet undiscovered aspects to this annual influx of equine fanatics we don't really understand. We are hosting another society in our midst with its own cultural system. How fortuitous that it is compatible with ours. May these guests come back and mingle with us for many, many years!

Journeys to the Entrails of Prairie Towns Fascinate

Think of it as a visit to the pits at a Formula 1 event or as a tour of a Russian Gulag with a labour camps historian. Exploring the back lanes of railway towns with an anthropologist is like acquiring a new map of Great Plains settlements. It can yield excitement, uneasiness, laughter, and certainly, a new appreciation for laneways. More importantly perhaps, there are paying guests with an appetite for hands on/behind-the-scene experiences great enough to try this out even locally. It's all in how the experience is staged.

"Having recently completed an MA archaeological thesis on urban settlement in Regina prior to World War I with a British university, I wanted to incorporate and interpret some of my more evocative findings through the excursions I have been marketing around Saskatchewan since 1998," said Great Excursions CEO Claude-Jean Harel.

"A couple of opportunities to do just that came up recently. I led a group of Saskatchewan housing experts on a field trip to Regina's Core neighbourhood. We looked at how the Core's grid layout affects activities such as crime, recreation and community development. Imagine 16 people (under a steady rainshower) carrying umbrellas and walking through some of the most notorious alleys in town, being part of an interpretation of the built environment and its significance today."

Harel adds: "in another instance, a group of 40 adult French immersion students were in the market for an urban field trip in a controlled environment -- one where I would communicate with them mostly in French so they could work on their fluency. I had identified a number of back lane types in Regina, featuring some characteristics my guests would find revealing about how the first inhabitants of the city used the lanes to barter, travel, to hide, to meet up, to keep their livestock or to use the privies. In many ways the back lanes were the backbone of the city in the early 20th Century-- all our guests were looking with fresh eyes at an environment they thought they knew."

John Brandon is a fellow archaeologist actively involved in cultural resource management in the province:

"You may know Claude-Jean Harel for his cheerful promotion of Great Saskatchewan places on CBC Radio and as the owner/operator of Great Excursions Travel Company. His training in anthropology and interest in spaces led him to study the layout of Regina and its effects on the perceptions of her inhabitants and visitors. Claude-Jean will show that archaeology, while the study of human behaviour through material things, needs not be limited to artifacts small enough to put in a bag."

The Regina Archaeological Society's Catlinite Tabloid writes:

"Every aspect of urban development throughout the history of the railway towns affected how residents perceived their home, yard, street, neighbourhood, network of friends, family and colleagues. These same aspects of urban development contributed to differentiating communities from the original site and landscape settlers came to populate. Drawing from his thesis, Claude-Jean uses spatial relationships in railway towns, along with the help of early photographs, maps, GIS and analysis to share with participants some fascinating aspects about the places in which they live. These findings may help those who are currently involved in revitalizing their railway towns tap into little known resources than can generate economic benefits locally."

One might say that back alleys are like a book that visitors and inhabitants learn to read over time. Saskatchewan artist Wilf Perreault has built a prolific career laying on canvas scenes of life in alleys. He started his journey in Saskatoon; he painted alleys even in Morocco. His work now on Regina is an important anthropological record; an invaluable gift offered for analysis, which is what the Back Alley Safaris achieve. Those same back lanes are dissected and their entrails exposed, through Great Excursions, as entertaining public interpretations -- as the newest and quirkiest tourism product to hit the market in Regina for quite some time.

This comes in the wake of a shift in the interests of travelers who are seeking more and more hands on experiences, even those who travel only locally. We all know that consumers are increasingly better educated. They have access to better research tools such as the Internet. The travel destination choices they make are better informed. If they can be convinced that a local resource such as back alleys can be the scene for a new type of urban adventure that will engage guests at an unexplored level, they will give it a try and willingly dish out what it costs to go on the journey.

There are a number of advantages to a product like this one. First, it provides an opportunity to integrate an additional product to local events such as rodeos, summer fairs or centennial celebrations. It also helps brand a tourism destination as authentic, thereby reinforcing the compelling quality of the tourism images that towns and cities are trying so hard to establish in the Great Plains region. Lets face it; our destination is relatively unknown to the rest of the world.

To dismiss Back Alley Safaris as a niche product that is unlikely to interest a broad range of visitors to the prairies would be to not fully understand why people travel: to escape, to immerse themselves into an unfamiliar environment, to gain new perspectives on life and to accomplish something memorable.

It may take some time before Back Alley Safaris are run regularly across the province, but when they were introduced this Spring to the international travel trade in Montreal at Rendez-vous Canada, the country's oldest and most prestigious marketplace, more than a few buyers gave the nod to this promising new market-ready experience.

By the way, Rendez-vous Canada is coming to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, in 2005.

For more information contact:

Claude-Jean Harel, CEO
Great Excursions
(306) 569-1571
Email: cj@greatexcursions.com
Web site: www.greatexcursions.com

In Praise of Interpretation

"Take scrapings from the driest outside corner of a very stale piece of cold roastbeef, add to it lumps of tallowy rancid fat, then garnish all with long human hairs (on which string pieces, like beads upon a necklace), and short hairs of oxen, or dogs, or both, - and you have a fair imitation of common pemmican." EARL OF SOUTHESK, Saskatchewan and the Rocky Mountains, Diary, Nov. 20, 1859

The Earl, obviously unimpressed with the gastronomical traditions of the first inhabitants of our land, never took leave of his ethnocentric views. He never saw the ingenuity of this food preparation method. The lean dried meat pounded with stone hammers to a soft mass. Berries were added and melted fat poured over the mixture, to make it more palatable. He never understood that dried meat weighing six times less than fresh meat was easier to carry, sewn into leather bags that were walked upon before the contents became hard from cooling, until they were six or seven inches thick. A single sack or ‘piece’ weighed close to 90 pounds. It was ‘pieces’ such as these - traded at forts and trading posts - that the Earl must have unhappily feasted upon while voicing his disgust. Pity!

Our success as ecotourist operators depends on our ability to make our guests forget where they come from for a few seconds, a few minutes or a few hours if we are lucky. There are a number of ways to do this, but there is a common thread. We need to nurture a genuine relationship between our guests and the experience they are subjected to.

A hike into the grasslands need not be gruelling excursion of an hour and a half. It can as easily be a five or ten minute walk to a patch of undisturbed prairie, at the end of which we all sit and explore the richness within our reach: the delicate elegance of the "comb" of the blue grama grass that will take an eyelash-like appearance once it has shed its seeds; the hygroscopic ability of the needle and thread grass to absorb moisture from the air; the overwhelming colonizing qualities of the crested-wheatgrass and its implications for the ecological integrity of the native prairie. How easily an hour goes by when we stop to really look with scrutiny…and forget everything else.

To interpret, to help that relationship establish itself between our guests and the environment - whatever it is ( a museum, a path, a farm) - we must find within ourselves the essence of what motivates us to lead people to that particular destination. What is it that draws us there? Then, we have to do our homework. We have to dig for new information. That's the fun part. The ecotourism industry should attract only curious people… shouldn't it? Let us equip ourselves and grow. Let us challenge our guests and take them beyond their own expectations.

Perhaps you already do this unconsciously. Some of you may already incorporate into your experiences resource people who can lead guests into journeys of discovery. We have, at least, the good fortune of having a number of passionate and eager walking and talking knowledge banks within our midst.

At a recent powwow, I brought a number of visitors who for the first time found themselves alone as non-aboriginals. They were in awe and quite content to sit and listen to the songs and sounds, while watching the vivid colors and movements around them. They didn't ask questions. I took it upon myself to explain to them how I had gone to make a donation to the powwow committee and was offered a cordial handshake in return. I explained the meaning of the dances and songs. I bid them to get up to see for themselves that the drums and songs were not recorded. Before the advent of speaker systems, dancers would have performed around the drums. As we explored the grounds, I asked them if they wanted to try some rice and deer stew with bannock. They dipped their spoon and smiled with pleasure as they enjoyed the flavors of a meal that is savored with tastebuds that had shed their ethnocentrism.