AuDN4T

Whoever is reading this. Whatever this all is. This post shouldn’t really be read by anyone, right?!?!

Apparently everyone has some sort of outside joke and I’m in some weird ass place.

I get dysregulated and I become a shitty person that needs to be left. But if my partner gets dysregulated… it’s ok. A door can be punched. A phone can be thrown. The cat can be slapped. That’s fine, right?

It feels like a double standard and I can’t say anything. IDK – EC, you talk to her. Apparently. So go for it. Have that convo because I have no idea what the fuck this is all about and I’m just being gaslit everywhere.

Funny – I can’t even mention a story without being fucking scolded. So I’m supposed to hold things back then? I understand shits scary. But fucking come on. I can have dysregulations. She’s had dysregulations. Mental health isn’t linear where you’re constantly progressing. There are days where shit is terrible.

Like even in therapy it feels like something is off or weird. Even with friends it feels something is forced and not true or genuine. Like I fucking can’t. It feels like everyone is beating around a bush and I have no idea what the fuck it is.

Even with the landlord – dealing with BS.

Dealing with WSIB and Service Canada and TD. Moving money in the TD app and making a mistake and being charged 100$. COME ON?!!!!!!! Are you fucking kidding me? What a fucking scam.

You’re telling me to be optimistic but WHY THE FUCK IS THE WORLD WORKING AGAINST ME?!

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Thinking back to COVID – I think everyone had some whirl wind story around it – it felt like some weird ass foggy dream, no? I know some have said COVID had impacted a lot of people’s mental health.

I didn’t really think about it at the moment – but I can admit it did impact me.

Coming from a science background – having exposure to public health topics like biostats, epidemiology, infection control and communicable diseases – you had profs emphasize that every 100 years there was always one big flu that wipes out a huge portion of the population. Statistically, this is something that comes up, is based on how diseases mutate and jump from communicability between animals to humans and from humans to humans. T.Sly spoke often talked about the avian flu – the right still is there and can be more deadlier than COVID which worries me about how people will truly take its seriousness.

Profs also talked about how important it was to have proper communication about the facts around public health topics so that you don’t lose that trust from the public. What I don’t think we ever considered (or even predicted at the time) was disinformation from others and how social media could swing views so drastically. After all, when we entered university, Facebook was just starting off. People were just concerned about posting pictures from their university parties. It turned into some weird beast afterwards with algorithms and creating polarized views. You couldn’t even argue with dumb thoughts because half the time they were bots.

I’m not an epidemiologist but I understand how important public health is. They are not there to protect the government but rather protect the people – through potable water, food, STIs, exposures to communicable diseases (restaurants, healthcare, long-term care facilities, tattoo parlours, flu clinics, etc.), health in general (educating the public about various topics like dental, smoking; we had public health dentists visit our elementary school). When we remove resources from public health we are removing guardrails to protect the public. These are not people out there to control you but protect you with education and prevention… like the Ministry of Labour.

Seeing the disinformation online – on Facebook. It was bothersome. Having family members repost content that was very incorrect was so harmful and disturbing. People ended up being armchair epidemiologists and thought it was just a hoax or communism or whatever bots spewed out there. I had family members block me on Facebook because I spoke facts about other family members getting COVID and their grandfather passed away. It was fucked up. People ended up dying but people were so stubborn in believing this garbage. The ironic thing was this individual ended up on a ventilator and luckily they came out alive after 3 months. Having my MIL’s partner on a ventilator was also a messed up situation.

All the while, meeting every week with our HSE team at work to document and track COVID cases in the workplace and trying to mitigate along with various provinces and states COVID protocols (some were stringent while others not at all).

Some may argue that it targeted only the older population – but you saw cases of young individuals who did pass away. You had people losing their parents way too young.

It did trigger rigidness in me. I think this is where the ASD really showed it’s ugly head. I did wash my hands more frequently. I disinfected my phone and keys after coming back from walks or the store. I refused to touch the elevator buttons (and still do). I’d use my key to press the buttons. I remember walking to the park and losing my mind as cyclists would pass by on bikes worried this would result in some sort of exposure. Maintaining physical distance became like a ritual. When people approached too close you got super uncomfortable. When people coughed, you got nervous (and the funny thing is during SARS we joked that if you wanted the subway all to yourself, you just cough). Fun fact: the school of occupational and public health intrigued me because of the experience with SARS… but I didn’t want to do public health lol.

The ironic thing is when it all started I don’t think I took it initially seriously. I also questioned how effective masks were due to their filtration (surgical vs N95). I think when things get super serious and we know how critical this communicable disease is, anything will help… even surgical masks. I remember conducting a project at a psychiatric hospital and seeing employees getting training on hooded SCBAs and realizing this is serious… how will we actually be able to protect ourselves. This is where public health information (regional, country, global, etc.) is so critical in informing us. It determines on how we can protect people and how much strain we put on the healthcare system.

I can’t imagine what it would have been like a healthcare professional during that time. Seeing some share their experiences – being tired and having mask indentations on their faces, I can sympathize with them. My mom’s healthcare colleagues shared their difficulties navigating through this time. One individual ended up leaving because it was too difficult. I remember reading news stories about healthcare professionals commuting suicide (this was also the case of one of my mom’s colleagues/friends). I can’t imagine what they went through – if they had to isolate from their families to ensure they would not infect them or seeing patients dying in front of their eyes so frequently and you can’t do anything about it. Some could have been desensitized and made comments about people not making it. Do we know how their mental health is now? Have they processed all of this? Listening to some of the stories my mom has as a nurse – I think these moments stick with you a lifetime. I remember her telling me some while we were camping years ago and it sounded like she needed to get it out of her system. She’s admitted that she’s overprotective due to the things she’s seen in healthcare. She did have a fear of bringing home some sort of communicable disease… even with SARS.

My rigidity also extended to travelling abroad. People talked about wanting to go places and they did and I got angry with them, without actually telling them… like my best friend. I think I had to process it without saying something I’d regret later. I guess I am my mother’s daughter… in a different sense.

Getting the vaccine was a difficult thing to do – despite my mom being a nurse, she still has some reservations around vaccines (including the flu shot; historically it has always made her feel unwell). I’m not sure if she read disinformation on the vaccine. Reading abstracts on studies about some vaccines attributing to myocarditis and pericarditis)… I wasn’t sure what the risks were for females.

Re-entering large crowds got very odd when things levelled out. I never realized how much difficulty I had with that. I felt very uncomfortable. Going to the exhibition was… a lot. Trying to get onto a train when they weren’t arriving was a lot as well. I did get emotionally dysregulated; one might find IG stories in archives on this.

Above all – I feel really sad about how we treated our healthcare workers and public health leadership.

What the “freedom convoyers” did to Ottawa… blasting truck airhorns for long periods of time and causing sleep deprivation. 90dB inside homes is unacceptable. For someone to be able to sleep they need about 30dB(A) or less. This is a basic necessity for people to get proper sleep. This continued for 3 weeks. I can’t imagine how they did get proper sleep. Did it cause psychosis? I’m surprised no one went out there and drove a car at the “freedom convoyers”. I feel like this would cause anyone that sleep deprived to lose their sanity. Wearing a mask was never about taking away rights. Getting a vaccine also is not taking away your rights. This is not the equivalence to communism. This is basic science. Facts. Communism, Stalinism is something different that I don’t hope anyone has to ever endure. No one is sending the KGB after you for speaking poorly about Trudeau. I’ve had family friends lose their grandfather because he talked Lenin for not having food. The KGB came in the middle of the night and took him away and he was never seen again. My cousin’s grandmother’s family was packed into a train and sent to a labour camp to Siberia. Her grandmother died along the way and they had to throw her off the train car… having a dead body in the train car for 2 weeks would have caused some sort of disease. That is communism. My great uncle was sent to a labour camp and was there for 25 years. He fought against Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia and Poland. He fought for a free Ukraine; for people to speak Ukrainian, for Ukrainians to exist despite hundreds of years of genocide and repression.

Imagine being a restaurant stating that you will not follow public health protocols because it is communism and damaging to your rights. If you are a patron of the restaurant, would you feel comfortable about eating there where they refuse to refrigerate food or notifying people about someone handling food with a cut has Hep B? As a restaurant owner – would you feel comfortable about making people sick? Where do your rights end with other people’s rights to health?

Was it a messed up time? Yes. Was the mess worth it? No. People who died could be alive today if we were more stringent.

Did it affect my partner and I? It did. It hit my partner more than myself. But it was still not a fun time.

The crappy thing is – I always said when this is all over and done with, our first vacation would be Iceland. Except it wasn’t. Still need to add that to our plans when things level out.

Moving between three organizations during this time was interesting as well. Having cautious projects in the first org, then the second org had a more structured process in mitigating risk and having full on shut downs (while some states ignored them) and moving into a third org when things easing off. I still ended up travelling to California with an N95 mask on a plane. It was tiring and did ended up causing an itchy throat because of whatever particulate was in the mask.

Did I get sick afterwards? Yes. And it kind of felt like COVID, but I’m not sure. Not sure how much it has levelled off now. But I think we need to process it and understand how it did impact us.

Unfortunately, there is proof that the Kremlin did have a hand in much of the disinformation around these topics and the freedom convoy… to some extent.

I just wish the science is understood and if questions come about… further discuss the possibilities around it. What do we know and what we don’t know and why we are make a decision based on the current information in place.

It’s kind of annoying that you bring up an issue and the landlord does not seem to care for the state of the building. I don’t think we’ve seen this individual at the building once; has this individual seen the things their employees have to endure when moving garbage? I’d like to see this individual step into the shoes of their employees. The previous individual would dress up in a Tyvek suit because of roaches in the garbage room (which is likely the source). Does their employer care?

Speaking with a tenant who has lived here for 30 years, she’s stated that it’s never been so bad until about the last 5 years… and the super didn’t really do anything about it. It made me wonder if they just didn’t have the resources to fix these issues and left the super hanging, resulting in them dodging tenants.

The past super also had the ability to do basic maintenance – which the previous super didn’t have the experience – i.e., having the hot water tank restarted when it crapped out. These things should be basic training for the super.

Getting an email about a contractor coming to the unit didn’t even give any information on how to prepare for the work being performed. It just asked for confirmation. I could have left the bathroom as is and wasted the contractors time clearing the space so that he could do the work. I had no idea if he’s doing work to the tub? or the sink vanity? or the ceiling? or putting in a towel rack holder. How do I accommodate myself if I don’t know what is going on? Having silence from the landlord is telling of where this individual stands on providing a reasonable liveable space in Toronto. Zero care.

Update on door handle? Silence. So in the event of a fire or we get locked out, we will have to call the fire department? We have to pay for this apparently too? There was no acknowledgement on these items or comment.

It’s exhausting when you have other things you need to deal with.

…ooderham.

Reflecting on one of my orgs where I was one of three women in a male dominated workplace. You look at how leaders tease employees about things they do, why they might be single or living in their parents home, having expectations that they should have their own place all the while they had a step up with owning a home and purchasing another property for profit.

The weird dude mentality of getting this individual to date all the while swiping with him on tinder. It’s a bit weird when you see male leaders oogling women on tinder as married men. I mean, then there’s also the half naked women’s calendar.

Did I tease this individual for throwing out a sample? I don’t know if it was teasing but more so trying to understand in disbelief that a sample was thrown out. I think I understood the business that having samples is critical otherwise it results in lost billable hours. I think his leader should have educated him on the types of samples out there and that they weren’t always visible – like a tape sample in a clear ziplock baggy.

Also – having this leader push you to come out to your parents and tease you about not being able to do it or understand the situation. But also making sexual harassment jokes. It was messed up. But I guess this goes down to the “Neanderthal” mentality another leader tried to excuse his behaviour with.

Also insinuating that you like an intern in the workplace in a teasing way and expect a fight of sorts with this intern. You’re expecting Turkish oil wrestling? Like is this something you want? Treat women as meat? You expect us to show up but at the same time treat us as less than – as something to use in your effed up fantasies.

I look back on the different means of onboarding at 3 different companies.

Org 1

It was kind of all over the place; you were kind of taught how to do timesheets (excel format type of timesheets performed every 2 weeks) which included expenses. It was kind of frustrating. You typically would track as you went with projects but also you’d shift overtime to the next pay period and miss when you double charged your timesheet (I think it happened once or twice) because you forget to remember if you billed your hours or not. If you didn’t have projects that amounted to 80 hours… you were fucked. There were slow periods where I had may be 40 or 50 hours and our payroll person was concerned. Computers were not quite new. There’s a joke that the Principal would get them off the back of the truck. Trackpads on the laptop would or wouldn’t work. Having to log into a VPN to have access to Outlook was stupid because it wouldn’t always connect. Switching over to another laptop eventually made it work, but it was a dumb system. Going to different projects, you had a differing style of training; some managers or leaders would outright say “yeah… I should wear a respirator but I won’t”. BUT you learned a style of how to perform the tasks. In terms of H&S training. I think it lacked. There were moments of working alone and you’re not sure if you should be there or not. No violence and harassment in the workplace training. Contractor management wasn’t in place and considered an annoyance; though I understand the significance of it. Resources were provided to the team for reference and a system was in place for project control. You were somewhat taught how to manage this.

Org 2

I had a more structured orientation with my leader. She told me to meet at the office on a specific day and at a specific time. She walked me through how to do travel and expenses and corrected me when I did it incorrectly (there was an issue with Concur for vehicle travel). The leader gave me kind of a “low down” of the org, who you could talk to, who you could not (because they didn’t care about HSE). Explained how HSE culture works here and how it should work. The leader did truly bring me under their wing and taught me the ins and outs of a larger org and how to navigate through it as a female. She showed me the HSE system in place and how to navigate through it. She introduced me to the team that I would be working with. She also did talk about how to make sure to plan with sites about site visits. She asked me to review the HSE elements in place and understand the org’s HSE process. It was very organized and followed by people; however, some locations struggled with knowing where to find the documentation. It may have been too complex at times. I think it’s more so documentation for the HSE Team to follow with all the complex laws in each province and state. There was other training/orientation around the organization and understanding the business and what is manufactured and sold that was performed by an HR Partner.

Org 3

It was all over the place with getting to the org. From getting documentation sent in and the 3rd party performing the background check (they would call my previous place of employment around 7am before anyone was in the office). I didn’t quite have contact with a leader in having an orientation performed – how things are done; how to expense things; what to do if purchases (CSA Standards) needed to be made for HSE programs. One kind of feels like they need to fend for themselves, so does it with their own money. The culture training was cool but at the same time it was kind of annoying that no one informed me that I had to do pre-reads before hand and I ended up looking like I didn’t really give AF about the orientation. Not a great impression to make on your first day. So you end up wasting your evening to consume all the fuse training (which is a lot and not a great format when you’re crunching on time). I won’t go on about the HR BP. That’s been already mentioned. It wasn’t fun when you feel disconnected by others about getting company clothing while you’re like what? You got clothing? I don’t have a shirt or jacket? I got a jacket from a closet that people didn’t want or didn’t fit someone. Is this how you feel part of an org? You also hear about how nice people are in the two other offices in the US while in Canada people don’t talk to each other or are very standoffish. You try to defend people your cubicle area because HR is trying to claim it as theirs and wonder why this person sits here. If directors in the office speak to new people, they don’t quite do it with you. They won’t introduce themselves but more so say “who are you?” Being introduced to the new GM, I could sense my Canada leader was hesitant to introduce me… was it cause of my grandpa hipster sweater? What’s the dress code anyways? I had my second leader tell me what you could and couldn’t wear. But they’re people, you don’t have to bow to them. She was straight up real and told you what was ok and not ok. It’s like she knew I was autistic and didn’t know the social cues. Meeting with my new leader was a bit of a times way after my orientation – I think a month after? The 1:1 was good. But I mean it didn’t really have a component of orientation or how this team should be structured, meetings (or what I can recall from the convo at the time). Meeting with the VP, was confused as to the meeting set up – was told about a specific time but wasn’t sure if anyone was in the room or not or if anyone was waiting or if the meeting from before was still in progress. So I ended up interrupting a meeting. It was awkward and felt like I was scolded lol. but the AuDHD kicked in. Fun times.

I’m a weird kid. I dress how I dress. I see myself as a child at times because I had to parentify. If there’s a theme in the office, I’ll take it to the next level. Beach day? I’m there with my life jacket, sunnies, paddle board paddle and beach chair. I want to bring the silliness because why not? Everything is serious sometimes, where’s the fun? The fun brings engagement. I was that hipster in consulting wearing all black, skinny jeans, a black hoodie and skater shoes. I mean I was also teased for looking like a hipster in the workplace. My outfit changed slightly in the next org and again in the third org.

Navigating through workplace dress codes can be hard. I know my colleague at the third org was a bit thrown off by what the dress code was. My other female colleague in the US was called out for her shoes despite the dress code said they can wear sneakers. But our male colleague would wear sweatshirts that were maybe unprofessional in a sense and wasn’t ever called out for it. So it’s kind of a double standard?

Organizations can be weird and hard to navigate as a neurodiverse person. I’m glad I did have a leader who helped with that in the 2nd org though. I think orientations need to be more clear and leaders need to be more clear on expectations how the org might work. If their TM experiences unsafe psychological environments to loop them in and see how to navigate it together.

I find it upsetting this is how we treat architecture. The only positive thing about Guild Park is that you have these pieces here and are to some extent preserved. But you still see them just sitting on pallets with sections of damage. Some areas feel like a degradation of the architectural pieces. This isn’t to put city workers in a bad light; they are there to do their job. Rather this is a criticism of how the government has decided to protect and maintain these pieces. They just end up being forgotten and end up looking like a graveyard of architectural pieces.

You look at Raymond Moriyama’s Ontario Science Centre and it likely will not get the same treatment. The province wants this land for development. How does one move an entire building? It wouldn’t be feasible. From a financial standpoint, how the Premier is planning to build a new building is a waste of money when there are other more pressing concerns in this province.

How the government treated Moriyama’s Temple Bell (funded by Japanese Canadians) and was to celebrate the centennial of Japanese Canadians in Canada on a land for Ontarians – Ontario Place – to only move it into a storage… and sell off the land to a developer (not from Canada), all the while selling a service to the upper class and taxpayers pay for it. The premier talks about Ontario not being for sale yet this is exactly what he is doing. Selling off land (precious land where we grow our food), educational institutions, healthcare institutions all the while promoting the arrests of drug users. We just had a TTC subway track level injury today. Was his plan to arrest that individual as well? Do we arrest workers on jobsites for injuries? They don’t require healthcare, right? Are we promoting systemic racism by making post-secondary school inaccessible due to costs and making OSAP unattainable? Why would a person representing a province do this? What message are we giving to all people in the province? BIPOC people shouldn’t receive post-secondary school education and should do precarious work? Who does the Premier serve then?

While going through Guild Park (and kind of mourning and annoyed with how we have double standards for architects and how we’re treating facades), I ended up checking out the Clark Centre for the Arts. It was a pleasant surprise. Kind of walked around a bit on the exterior (and questioned some architectural design considerations like exterior drywall on the soffit… but that’s just who I am, lol. Sorry, not sorry).

Stepping into the building, the people who worked there were super nice and welcoming. I liked how they have a gallery space for artists in the open corridor area. It works in the space. And it’s a 3 storey art gallery.

They’ve utilized rooms on the south side and core for courses.

I’m glad the city and neighbourhood nearby has such a space like this for people to utilize.

While checking out the gallery – they had pieces from Yue Gao. Abstract pieces that are super appealing to the brain. It’s interesting that the space also kind of works with the pieces (i.e., windows) and the artist played around with the space based on the pieces put in place… I really liked that. They also created an interactive station where you can get a postcard and add stamps.

I recommend others to check out the space and art on display.

(I’m not a great reviewer lol. I liked it. Period.)

I took a stroll along the lake today along Sunnyside Beach.

Saw low water levels (visible on the west side of the beach by the Humber River bridge)…. with a lot of sand elevated. In that sand, you see a lot of garbage. Lighters, nitrile gloves, pot gummy bags, meat packaging, bottles, bottle caps, random plastic. It’s super sad to see. You also see a lot of construction waste (concrete chunks, bricks, pottery) thrown out here. Is it acceptable for construction companies can just dump garbage in our waterways. I understand we have allowed for lake filling and there are regulations to ensure that the water is not further degraded with these products. Why do we still see this in our waterfront? You go to Tommy Thompson Park and you see rebar and brick in weird structures… in some situations that rebar can impale someone walking by.

Yes – it may be fun and apocalyptic in creating art with construction waste; however, it does impact the waterways. There are other more safer ways to lake fill. Would it not be more feasible to do this?

The waste isn’t even on the shores, you find nitrile gloves at the bottom of the water bed.

Even then if we pick up this garbage – where will it go? Another landfill that will impact another town’s waterway? I remember the Alliston Aquifer being at risk of contaminated with a garbage dumpsite (that had a liner expiration of 35 years). Why is this the route we want to go with? There is the option for incineration – trying to avoid further impacting the air quality – capturing gasses.

Why can’t we reduce how much single use plastic is used? It’s in everything despite legislation banning it. We’ve banned plastic bags and straws, replacing them with multi-use bags and paper straws but we still have single use plastics. It’s in our food – meat packaging, cereal liners, instant noodle cups, coffee cup liners, water bottles, salad kit packages, packaging of products. How much of that plastic is recyclable? Much of it is not… including black plastic. Let’s not forget about the other health effects associated with paper straws due to PFAS (forever chemicals) that have an impact on immune systems, cholesterol, increase risk of cancer, etc. The difficult thing here is that this isn’t just a Canada specific change that needs to be implemented – we’d need countries around the world to make these changes due to globalization and products being sold from all over the world.

Why can’t we look at the use of biodegradable packaging? Perhaps it might need to have waste management organizations to adapt to the changes of biodegradable packaging. However, if we’re truly moving towards making this world more sustainable and eco-friendly, why are we not progressing into this? Should we be creating standards of what needs to be implemented?

Walking around Jasper National Park and seeing a golf course with numerous golf balls in the lake. Not that I’m constantly pessimistic but I questioned – why? Golf balls degrade plastic into that waterway. Years later I saw golf balls by a Lake Ontario shoreline and made me wonder how many people shoot golf balls into the lake? It’s such a harmful thing to do to this water that literally gives us life every day. We just treat it like nothing – we have so much of it, why should we care? Other parts of this continent have droughts and beg for the water. But here we treat it like it’s nothing. Throw trash in it, flush medications down the toilet.

How do we get action on this?

Organizations, public spaces and governments talk big talk about being accommodating and truly understanding the issues people with seen and unseen conditions and factors . The reality is they are not.

How many women struggle with reproductive issues?

How many struggle finding affordable daycare?

How many parents struggle sending their kids to school before their work hours?

How many women are underpaid in comparison to their male counterparts?

How many travel far distances for work?

How many believe women when they experience subtle sexism that is not easily documented through paperwork. It’s always that verbal conversation that treats a female like less than.

How many believe autistic people when they are bullied?

What about accommodating neurodivergent people? Many workplaces are bright AF. Loud. People are disrespectful with noise levels.

They’re promised training on how to handle violent or harassing incidents and are not provided said training.

All the while they celebrate women being at the forefront on LinkedIn when things are not safe behind closed doors.

HR assumes that people go on STD because they can’t hit their KPIs. Looking at high performing and upcoming leadership – some people are on STD, some changed roles to real estate, some have left the organization. Is it the KPIs or is it the environment or constantly moving KPIs because a CEO does not know how to steer the ship. Shifts the blame from himself to the people doing the physical work. If the CEO is not in tune with the environment/market, how does he expect to profit? If the CEO cannot adapt in the environment, how can he expect positive results?

n|m – do vsioho – vsi ostatni 10 misyatsiv… chomy? vy znajete.

I’ve been thinking about how Toronto tends to demolish many historical buildings. One way to salvage them is to put facades into parks like a zoo or hang signage off of buildings. Or let buildings go into disrepair without proper engineering protocols until they collapse and nearly kill people. Is that how we pay tribute to history?

Europe tries its best to preserve its historical buildings. Even leave buildings ruined by fires and earthquakes as they are. Such as the Carmo Church turned museum. It’s an overly beautiful space with history. The countless castles in Ireland are epic and beautiful, even if they’re just ruins. They tell a story – of their past conquerors, years of decay. Even Ukraine to some extent tries to preserve buildings the best they can – Lviv’s High Castle is a ruin now but it is still there. Kyiv’s Golden Gates are preserved to the best of their ability. Old buildings continue to be maintained as much as possible. Kyiv ended up having to rebuild Khreshchatyk because the Soviets decided to destroy it, preventing the Nazis from occupying the city.

Seeing how Doug Ford’s government has decided to create a Machiavellian solution to the Ontario Science Centre – creating the roof maintenance issue, subsequently demolishing it, give the land to developer friends and build a new building for significantly more is abysmal. Not to forget other more pressuring issues that require that taxpayer money.

The history of the building – is this something we want to erase? The architect – Raymond Moriyama, a man who contributed to this country and endured so much due to WWII Canadian policies seeing Japanese-Canadians as enemy aliens. This is how we treat a home grown person’s work and art? How do policy makers, politicians and developers feel about erasing art all the while not contributing to anything meaningful or eye-pleasing?

Yes, we have beautiful mixture of old and new like Brookfield Place; but seeing what Bathurst and Bloor has changed into… it’s lost an identity. It almost makes me want to cry.

Like with Kensington Market – developers are hoping to erase these spaces to make a quick buck. Even seeing Bloor West Village have numerous mom and pop shops close down. Some spaces remain unoccupied for years which I’m predicting is likely increased and unattainable rent. Seeing my own family relative have to close down his car garage shop because his rent increased from $2k to $10k. This resulted in him attempting suicide. There’s something wrong when developers and landlords falsely and speculatively increase market values and rent to the point where people feel like they cannot afford to live. Who will end up really living there? Who will do the work in the service industry if they can’t afford to live there? It’ll make no sense for them to travel an hour to get to work minimum wage. Will we even have restaurants if they cannot afford rent? There’s some things I can’t make at home because of their secret recipes or I just enjoy their ambience.

Why is the Premier paying developers and removing bike lanes (not in the scope of work of the Premier)? Why is the Premier starving the healthcare system? I’ve seen countless Indigenous People coming into a Thunder Bay hospital going in for dialysis treatment. What about Indigenous Kids coming into cities and being murdered all the while the police ignores the systemic racism? Why isn’t the Premier focusing on these sort of topics? Funding parts of the province that are ignored 99% of the time? Roads in Northern Ontario are not great. Many are not twinned. Many result in vehicle fatalities. Why is the Premier making post-secondary school unaffordable? Why is the Premier forcing people to go back to the office 5 days of the week? Traffic is unnecessary. Why do we have MPPs who are landlords? Isn’t that a conflict of interest? Why was Ontario Place demolished only for some developer friend getting a 99 year contract without public approval?

Why are towns cash strapped and now forcing citizens to pay for this? Shouldn’t the province be funnelling infrastructure funding? What is happening to this money? Who is receiving it?

Why aren’t we holding our politicians accountable?