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The AIH transcript for November 24, 2022.

NIL KÖKSAL: Hello, I'm Nil Köksal.

CHRIS HOWDEN: Good evening, I'm Chris Howden. This is "As It Happens."

[Theme]

Prologue

CH: Tonight:

NK: A nearly heart-stopping moment. During Russian missile strikes, a hospital in Kyiv lost power while surgeons were operating on a child. A transplant surgeon describes the calm under extreme chaos, to help save that boy's life.

CH: As plain as covering the nose on your face. The mayor of Burlington, Ontario, says bringing back a mask mandate for city staff was the right call, even if she's getting harassed because of it.

NK: Limiting their limits. Doctors in Canada relax their strict guidelines about how much screen time is good for small children, saying they're more content with more good content.

CH: When they found it, they just lost it. Scientists long thought the black-naped pheasant pigeon was extinct, so imagine the flap they were in when they caught sight of the phantom bird.

NK: Curse, foiled again! After Argentina's stunning loss to Saudi Arabia at the World Cup, many believe the Curse of Tilcara has struck again. Actually, it’s just Chris, but many more believe it has not, and that the team just didn't play well.

CH: And… driving force. Toronto Tesla drivers get the green light to use their self-driving feature downtown. We’ll get hold of a police officer who's famous on a certain app that's big with the kids, who warns that people still need to keep their eyes on the road. As It Happens, the Thursday edition. Radio that's glad we booked him, I mean, he's the TikTok Traffic Cop, give the guy a phone.

[Theme]

Part 1: KYIV BLACKOUT HOSPITAL, TODDLER SCREEN TIME, EXTINCT BIRD REDISCOVERED, ARGENTINA CURSE.

KYIV BLACKOUT HOSPITAL

Guest: Mikhail Zagrychuck.

CH: It was the worst possible time for the power to go out, and the worst possible place. In a video posted yesterday, doctors in Kyiv are shown operating on a child's heart, after Russian strikes knocked out the hospital's main power and water. The surgeons used backup generators and held lights overhead to complete the operation in the darkened theatre. Dr. Mikhail Zagrychuck is a transplant surgeon who was also treating patients at Kyiv's Heart Institute yesterday. We reached him today in Lutsk, Ukraine.

NK: Mikhail, can you tell me the moment the power went out at the hospital, what are you thinking when that happens?

MIKHAIL ZAGRYCHUCK: It was a horrible, horrible moment. First of all, of course, I've been thinking about, oh, my God, what to do? What will happen with the patient? And at that moment, I myself already finished my surgery. So my patient was in intensive care unit. In another two rooms, another surgery still went on. So I've been thinking how to help, what to do, and how to avoid disaster, which probably could happen.

NK: So what did you do in those moments?

MZ: We had a kidney transplant surgery, but at the moment of rocket attack, we already finished it. And in another suite, my boss, cardio surgeon Professor Boristow Doro, he performed cardiac surgery for the child. And during this surgery, the light went off, I mean, after the rocket attack. And the child was on the surgical table during surgery, which still was going on. And it was really horrible.

NK: We saw some of the video, and the surgeons continued to operate. Can you just describe for people who haven't seen this video, how they managed to keep operating?

MZ: So we never experienced such a situation before, and I don't wish anybody to experience the same stuff. But they could manage light from mobile phones, from, from the lights on our forehead, special ones. And they managed to finish this surgery. And fortunately, fortunately, this child survived, and surgery was successful. But first couple of second, of course, because nobody was ready for it, and it was, it was very, very horrible.

NK: Most of us can't imagine being in an operating room at all and performing such an intricate surgery, let alone trying to keep it together. When the power goes out and when there's an attack, it's not just an electrical outage. So how quickly did they act?

MZ: Well, they act immediately. Absolutely nobody was disappointed. Everything was coordinated and nobody panics. Everybody switched all available lights, aiming phones and everything, and started to finish the surgery as quickly as it was possible at that moment.

NK: The hospital, on top of that, was also without water. So how were you caring for your patients in the intensive care unit, for example, when that was happening?

MZ: It's another problem, but about water missing, but for, for that reason, the friends of our hospital and relatives, those who works in the hospital, started to bring the water which was in home, to the ward with basins. We have, this war teach us how to, to get in the trouble together and help each other. It was really very disappointed situation, because we never had water disappeared for, for that long, but we could manage. We could go through, through this disaster for now, at least for now.

NK: What else has this war taught you?

MZ: This war completely changed the life of the country, and changed the life of each citizen. The most horrible thing in life is the war. It changed everything. If you're talking about medicine, about patience, it's always light can go off like yesterday. And we are not pretty sure if the rocket will not heed the hospitals during patient treatment. And of course, a lot of people dying, especially in the east in Kherson now. We all praying for our win, and to stop the war as quickly as possible. And we all asking all the world to help us defeat from this monster.

NK: How do you keep going? This is nine months in now and you've just dealt with a day like yesterday. How do you keep going day in, day out?

MZ: Do we have any choice? We have, we have to go. You know, we are stronger from day to day, and we couldn't even imagine that this is possible. If somebody will tell me one year ago that it's possible, I didn't believe, I couldn't imagine. But we, we still going. For example, now I'm in Lutsk, we’re also been rocket attack yesterday. And for almost a day, there was no light, and half day here, there also was no light in the biggest regional hospital, Volyn regional hospital. But that's, we have light not everywhere. We have heating, not everywhere, but in hospitals, definitely. So what else we can do? We are fighting not only on the battlefield, but in every home, in every city, in every village, and we are confident that we are going to win. But it is, of course, difficult.

NK: Has the war increased the need for your services in particular? Obviously, there are, there are more patients, but transplant services in particular, has there, has that affected your work?

MZ: Of course, it is, it is much more difficult during the war. For example, three days ago, I've been in a City called Sumy, and we had a donor there. We took the organs, and we had the bombs blow up, and, you know, the rockets flying, and we didn't pay attention for it. We, we took the organs, went in Kyiv, and saved the lives of our patients. But we get used to it. We understand that we have no choice. And we had our mission to save the patients this way.

NK: At the Kyiv Heart Institute, is the power back now?

MZ: Yes, it is. Power back is now, water also, and heating also. So everything is okay. But we are not sure if these bastards will not hit us tomorrow, for example.

NK: Well, Doctor, thank you so much for your time.

MZ: Thank you very much for your support. And, and I would like to say thank you for all Canadian people who, we, we, we, we feel your strong support, and we appreciate this.

NK: Thank you, sir.

MZ: Thank you.

CH: Dr. Mikhail Zagrychuck is a transplant surgeon at Kyiv's Heart Institute. We reached him today in Lutsk, Ukraine.

[Music]

TODDLER SCREEN TIME

Guest: Dr. Michelle Ponti.

CH: How much is too much? For years now, that's been the question when it comes to kids and screen time. And this morning, the Canadian Paediatric Society answered it again, and differently. It issued new guidelines around toddlers and screens. And while a lot of the Society's earlier suggestions went unchanged, it did drop its recommendation that parents stick to a hard-and-fast one-hour-per-day time cap for kids aged two to five, encouraging parents instead to concern themselves more with the quality of the material their kids engage with than the quantity. Dr. Michelle Ponti is the chair of the organization's Digital Health Task Force, and the lead author of their new position paper, "Screen Time and Preschool Children". We reached her in London, Ontario.

NK: Dr. Ponti, you seem to be backing away from, from the recommendation of that one hour a day cap for, for children between the ages of two and five years old. Why did you want to do that?

DR. MICHELLE PONTI: Well, we changed the language in the recommendations just slightly from the 2017 screen time guidance. While we recognise most kids two to five are getting way more than the one hour limit, the pandemic really hit home. How much we rely and depend on screens for work, for school, right? For connecting, for entertainment. But at the same time, paediatricians were also seeing an increased use of screens, even pre-pandemic. And so we went from the guidance of limiting routine or regular screen time to under one hour per day, and just slightly softening it to limit routine or sedentary screen time to about an hour or less per day. So it's very nuanced.

NK: Can you, can you explain a little bit what that new recommendation is, and that, that nuance for parents who are listening?

DMP: The nuance is that we really want to alleviate any parental guilt. Parents are feeling really overwhelmed throughout the pandemic and beyond, and paediatricians are seeing screen time and screen use issues on a daily basis in our practises. At the same time, we don't want to give out false information that excessive screen time is okay, because it's not. The caveat is that it's the quality of the content that our children are consuming that is much more important, than worrying about whether it's an hour, or two hours, or an hour and a minute, an hour and a half, we don't want to really get too hung up on that. We want to emphasise that excessive screen time, hours and hours of screen time, purposeless screen time, we know can lead to delayed language skills, delayed social skills, play skills, as well as difficulty with self-regulation. And this is what we're seeing in our practises. But here's the good news. We do know how young brains grow and develop the best. And so we thought this is a great opportunity as Canadian paediatricians, to reaffirm the screen time guidelines, and help parents, and caregivers, and early educators, continue to help brains grow and develop, with real life back and forth interactions with a loving caregiver, parents, siblings, relatives, teachers, friends, right? We need kids, you know, we, we need to talk with them, and read with them, and sing and play with them.

NK: So have the screen time, you know, with a caregiver, or a loved one, or if it's going to be a video chat, you know, catching up with grandparents. Are those the kinds of things you want parents to focus on?

DMP: Absolutely. Yeah. And that's another caveat, right, it’s the video chatting. So under two, we know that babies do not learn from screens. Their brains are just not ready to learn from a screen. But with a parent or caregiver, sitting on their lap, and, you know, introducing them, or engaging in long distance relationships via a screen, has been a really healthy use of screens, especially through the pandemic.

NK: What do you say to parents who want to do what's, what's best for their children, but they just don't know where to start in terms of putting on the brakes? And you mentioned guilt. And I think no matter what, parents will find something to feel guilty about, because they always feel like they're not doing enough. But, but it's hard to, to set those limits, right? So what would you want to say to them?

DMP: So I think there's a few simple things that we can start doing today. Number one, we can take stock of how we use screens in our lives and in the lives of our children. We can start thinking about how can we make a plan for using screens in a more purposeful way? One easy thing is to just turn off the TV when it's not being used, because we know that background TV can lead to language delays or attentional impulse control issues. And so if it's not being watched or used, just turn it off. That's a very simple thing that we can all do starting today. Another thing parents can do starting today, is to just take stock of when their child is using a screen throughout the day. And, you know, these hours and minutes, they add up. So if a child is using a screen, say, in the morning while a parent's getting ready for work, or after school for supper time preparations, or even during commute. Choose one of those times and say, hey, you know, maybe I can set my child up with another activity during that time. And an easy one is that commute, right. Does my child really need to be watching the screen in the ten, 15, 30 minutes from home to Day-Care, for example.

NK: Some parents might say, yeah, if they're going to act up on the, on the TTC, I have to let them watch something.

DMP: And that's okay, right? If that's, if that's what that parent is, is using to, you know, get through the commute, and that's working for them, and they're right there beside their child, maybe engaging in the content together, co-viewing, it's a fun show, it's entertainment, it's educational, there's nothing wrong with that.

NK: What should parents themselves be aware of how they're using the screens?

DMP: Try putting your phone away at mealtimes. Try putting your phone away an hour before bedtime. And here's a challenge. Try putting your phone away for a whole day. You know, can, can you do that? You know, think about how much we can cut back on that.

NK: Dr. Ponti, I really appreciate your time and the tips. Thank you.

DMP: You're more than welcome.

CH: Dr. Michelle Ponti is the chair of the Canadian Paediatric Society's Digital Health Task Force, and the lead author of its new position paper, "Screen Time and Preschool Children". We reached her in London, Ontario.

[Music]

EXTINCT BIRD REDISCOVERED

Guest: John Mittermeier.

SOUNDCLIP

[two people exclaiming excitedly]

CH: That was the moment John Mittermeier and his colleague realized they had discovered, or re-discovered, I should say, an extremely rare species of bird. Mr. Mittermeier and his team took bird-watching to another level, when they embarked on an expedition to Fergusson Island, Papua New Guinea. They were looking for a bird so rare that the last documented sighting was in 1882. My research tells me that's 140 years ago. The black-naped pheasant-pigeon had been lost to science until recently. And now, thanks to some fancy camerawork, the bird is in the hand, figuratively speaking, and there are probably more than two in the bush. John Mittermeier is the Director of the Lost Birds program at the American Bird Conservancy. He was the co-leader of the expedition. We reached him in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe.

NK: It's such an amazing moment to watch and to hear, John. What was going through your mind when you saw that image?

JOHN MITTERMEIER: I think just absolute disbelief. A combination of disbelief, enjoyment, excitement, and then relief. You know, we had been working incredibly, incredibly hard to try to find this bird. We had tons of doubts going through our mind at that point, thinking that we might not be able to find it, wondering if it even existed, and to so suddenly have that moment of seeing it, is kind of like all our dreams coming true, and just this incredible, incredible relief that we’d actually found it.

NK: But you caught the image. You got that image just a couple of days before you were set to leave, right?

JM: Yeah, that's exactly right. Literally two days before we were planning to leave. And so we really, we really had our doubts. We were really thinking that we might not find the bird at all. Actually, the morning before we saw that image, just a few hours before that video clip was taken, I've been doing some interviews with other members of the team, talking about how we felt having not found the bird. So we fully expected that we weren't going to find this thing, given the, given the amount of time left.

NK: What was the game changer, though, after all that time and all that effort?

JM: Yeah. So the game changer in terms of finding it, was really some leads we got from some local people there, particularly this one man, Augustine Gregory, from a community called Duda Ununa, and he reported haven seen this bird on multiple occasions. He had some locations where he, where he had seen it before, and he took us to those places. We spent a lot of time with him in the forest, searching for the bird. We didn't actually see the bird as we were walking around with him, but he pointed out some spots where we set camera traps, and those ended up being successful in eventually getting a photograph.

NK: Now that I've seen an image of the black-naped pheasant-pigeon, as it is known in English, I can see the allure very regal, I think, my first impression. But what makes it so special to you?

JM: Yeah, I think there are a couple of things that make this bird really special. You know, from a scientific perspective, it's a part of an incredibly evolutionarily distinct lineage of birds. This, these pheasant pigeons are really unlike any other pigeons anywhere in the world. They're terrestrial. I mean, they're actually pretty well named. They're these terrestrial pigeons that behave a lot more like pheasants, than the normal pigeons that we would, that we would think about. It's one of about 20 birds in the world, that have been, that were lost for more than a century. So it's really a rare situation, where we have a bird like that that scientists haven't documented for so long. And so to have the opportunity to find it, you know, that, that also adds a lot to that kind of special history, adds a lot to the experience.

NK: Yeah. What first got you interested in taking up this expedition? You know, there was a sense that it might have been extinct, you know, not just lost.

JM: I work at American Bird Conservancy, where I helped to lead our Lost Birds programme, and we have a partnership called the Search for Lost Birds, with American Bird Conservancy, Rewild, and BirdLife International. And the goal of this partnership is really to try and find all species around the world that are currently considered lost. And the definition we used for lost is birds that have no confirmed documentation. So that could be in the form of photographs, audio recording, or genetic samples, in the last ten or more years. And so our mission is really trying, trying to find all of these lost birds. There are about 140 to 150 of them around the world. And so in thinking about these different lost species, you know, that's what initially put the pheasant pigeon on our radar. And in particular, the pheasant pigeon really stood out, because it's, it's one of the birds that's been lost for the longest period of time, or I should say, it was one of the birds that had been lost for the longest periods of time.

NK: Yes, it's now been found. But until you got that image, it was last documented 140 years ago. You hinted earlier at how little information there is to go on. But what did the documentation that exists, what does that look like?

JM: Yeah, the initial description of the pheasant pigeon was, was pretty sparse. Literally, all it says on that front, it provides a brief description of the call, which was, which was helpful. But in terms of habitat, all it says is that two birds, two pheasant pigeons were collected on an extremely rugged ridge on Ferguson Island.

NK: You talked about the locals being so helpful in, you know, one local man in particular. So was your technology, their local know how, what did they make of your expedition?

MJ: Many people hadn't, we interviewed, hadn't even seen this bird themselves. And so a common response we got is that people hadn't realised that the bird existed. They didn't know about this special bird from Ferguson Island, and they were really excited that they had a bird on their island, that an international team of researchers and people from other parts of the world were interested in learning more about and interested in, and coming to go to come find.

NK: Now that you've been able to prove they're here, what do you hope for this, this black-naped pheasant-pigeon? It's not easy to say, but it's a beauty.

MJ: No, it's, it's a, it's a long name. It's a bit of a, bit of a tongue twister. My first hope is really that we're going to have an opportunity to learn more about this bird, get a better sense of where exactly it occurs on the island, what its population size might be, and what potential threats it could be facing. And then the next hope is really that we're going to be able to turn that from Asian, into a great collaboration with some of the local communities there, and find a way to protect this bird. And so I hope that we can bring all those things together to accomplish some successful conservation, and make sure that the, that the pheasant pigeon doesn't become lost again.

NK: John, thanks so much.

JM: Great. Thank you.

NK: Take care.

CH: John Mittermeier is the Director of the Lost Birds program at the American Bird Conservancy. We reached him in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe.

[Music]

ARGENTINA CURSE

CH: Nil, can you pass me the flashlight?

NK: The one from the emergency kit? Like the one we're supposed to use in emergencies, Chris?

CH: Yes.

NK: Are you just going to put it under your chin and tell a scary story, Chris?

CH: Nnnno.

NK: Right. Okay. I trust you.

CH: And can you turn off the lights?

NK: Sure.

CH: Thanks. Because it's time for… the tale of the curse of Tilcara!!

NK: I knew it.

CH: Marco, can you play that spooky music I sent you earlier?

[Song: “Baby Shark] by Pinkfong]

CH: Oh, No. Marco, sorry. I'm sorry. I did not mean that music. Yeah. No, the other less spooky music.

[less spooky music]

CH: Yeah. Yeah. That's it. Thank you. The year was 1986. The World Cup was being held in Mexico City. And Argentina's soccer team went to train in the small town of Tilcara. The wind blew cold the day the players arrived, and lightning split the sky into sharp fragments, like the devil himself was…

NK: We are a little short on time, Chris. We have a programme to, to put on. Maybe you could, I don't know, make up less stuff.

CH: Okay, I'll just, I'll skip all the atmosphere. Now, according to some townsfolk in Tilcara, the Argentinian players visited the statue of the blessed Virgin of Copacabana. They asked for her blessing. And they promised that if she helped them win that World Cup, they would return and thank her. And they did win! But!

NK: They didn't go back and thank her.

CH: They did not go back and thank her. And Argentina has not won a World Cup since. That… is the curse of Tilcara!

NK: Can I turn the lights back on now, please?

CH: I guess.

NK: You know, every player on Argentina's 1986 World Cup team, you've done your research, right? They say that the story is not true, that they never promised the statue of the Blessed Virgin anything, Chris.

CH: Well, they would say that. But there's only one explanation for the fact that they've never won another Cup, and for their shocking loss to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday. And that explanation is, a curse!

NK: I don't know. Or that the best soccer teams in the world beat them by playing better?

CH: That is a weird theory.

NK: Yeah, you're right. It is probably the curse.

CH: I knew it! Now, here's Das Mortal… with "The Curse".

[Song: "The Curse" by Das Mortal]

Part 2: BURLINGTON ON MASKS, EMERGENCIES ACT FREELAND, TORONTO TESLAS, UN ON IRAN.

BURLINGTON ON MASKS

Guest: Marianne Meed Ward.

CH: Earlier this month, Ontario's Chief Medical Officer of Health, said he "strongly recommended" that people in the province resume masking in all public indoor settings. But he stopped short of introducing mask mandates. Now, the city of Burlington has done that anyway. Officials there are pointing to increased staff absences due to sick leave. So for the next six weeks, all city staff have to mask up. Marianne Meed Ward is the Mayor of Burlington.

NK: Mayor, why did the city make this decision to bring in a six week long mask mandate for city employees?

MARIANNE MEED WARD: We were seeing an increase in absences due to illness, that was having a domino effect on the remaining staff who were picking up extra duties. That was at risk of burning them out. They took time away. We were really challenged to be able to then to continue to deliver services the community relies on. So this became a health issue, a health and safety in the workplace issue for our staff.

NK: Is that a hard and fast six week period? Could it be extended or end earlier as needed?

MMW: It can end earlier, absolutely. We will look at the indicators the same way that the staff looked at them to implement this in the first place. And it was really seeing the increase of that triple threat of RSV, flu, and COVID in the community, coupled with increases in mental health concerns. And we've seen really, a secondary pandemic throughout the COVID period, of mental health concerns. And this is really about being able to continue to serve our residents.

NK: How does that fit in with, with the mask mandate, the mental health aspect?

MMW: Well, when people aren't feeling well or they're sick, that has a mental health impact, of course, too. So they're very related. If you're, if you're out because you have COVID and you're not feeling well, you get behind at work, you get stressed, you get anxious. If your co-workers are out of the workplace because they're ill, and you're taking on extra burden, that creates anxiety and stress for those employees. So they're very related.

NK: Yeah. You're seeing that domino or that pylon effect.

MMW: Absolutely.

NK: What if a city employee says no at this point, I'm not wearing a mask?

MMW: Well, this will be treated the same way as any other health policy. So if somebody is asked to wear a safety goggles and they don't, then we would, the staff, the human resources would initiate, first implement education, and a period of progressive discipline as needed. So we don't have a special protocol. If they say no to masks, it would really be the same way we deal with all requirements and employee policies. And I think it's really important to point out that this was not a political decision. This was not a decision I made as mayor. It was not a decision the council made. This was entirely a health decision that was made by our human resources staff, and our health and safety staff at the city of Burlington, to protect our employees.

NK: Are you worried, though, that you may pay a political cost for, for supporting this mask mandate?

MMW: Well, I've learnt in my 12 years as an elected official, that there is no decision that is unanimous ever. So you will pay a political cost and you do the right thing regardless. And I can tell you, and I'm pleased to see this, that the vast majority of our staff, as well as members of the community, are supportive of this. They are actually hoping that other municipalities where they live will follow suit. And, you know, these are never easy decisions, but we follow the science, we follow the health. And our first priority is to our staff, ensuring they come to a safe workplace, and to our community, to ensure that we can continue to serve them and deliver services to them.

NK: How many people do you know at this early stage, have, have said they don't want to wear a mask or they won't.

MMW: I don't know that number. They would have communicated that directly to our human resources staff. But there are human rights exemptions, there are health exemptions and there are limited workplace exemptions. So if you are a swim instructor, you will not need to wear a mask if you're riding alone in a Rosa Parks maintenance vehicle and there's no one with you, you know, you won't need to wear a mask. So this is truly based on what is required as an additional layer of protection, when people are in close proximity or indoors, to protect each other.

NK: You mentioned the support you've been getting, but I know you've, you've been getting the opposite of that as well, from some who are vehemently opposed to mask mandates. So what kinds of things have you been hearing from those who, who don't like the idea of this?

MMW: Well, what has been really shocking throughout the debate about masks, is it's been politicised, and it's been weaponized, and it's become a symbol for things that have nothing to do with health. I have received anonymous emails very recently after this announcement went out, threats, things that have nothing to do with, with health, and, and very egregious conspiracy theories that have no basis in fact. So, so that is a disturbing trend that, that we've seen a rise over the last year. And, and so I'm hoping the focus, we just keep the focus on health and safety. Masks are one level of protection. They're not going to solve all of our health problems, but they are one additional tool, along with hand hygiene, getting your flu vaccine. We are also asking staff, wherever possible, to do their work remotely for the next six weeks. So to avoid coming into the office, we've had a hybrid work place for a number of years where there was a choice. We're asking folks to cancel any non, non-urgent, you know, get togethers, social gatherings. I guess we'll all celebrate Christmas and the holidays in the spring, as we did last year, and to find ways to do their work virtually, so that, you know, then, then obviously if you're working from home, you don't wear a mask.

NK: Do you have a message for, for other leaders across the country who may be weighing the same decision?

MMW: Always put the health and safety of your, your workforce and your community first. Follow the science and make the decision that is, is best for your circumstances, based on the health indicators that you're experiencing. For us, the message was very clear. The data was very clear that unless we stepped in to do something, we were going to have a very difficult time delivering services. But, but more to the point, justifying to our staff why I wouldn't take additional measures to protect them and their safety.

NK: Are you surprised that other municipalities in Ontario or across the country haven't taken the same step?

MMW: Well, mask, a requirement for masks has, like I said, it's become politicised, it's become weaponized, it's become a discussion about everything but health. We need to go back to first principles. And I think, I think the first one is keeping, keeping the focus on the scientific evidence that masks help reduce the spread of infectious disease. They do help. They are not the only tool. And so let's keep the focus back where it belongs, on, on health and on all of the tools available to us to keep our staff and our community safe.

NK: Mayor Meed Ward, thank you for your time.

MMW: Thank you so much.

CH: Marianne Meed Ward is the Mayor of Burlington, Ontario. That's where we reached her.

[Music]

EMERGENCIES ACT FREELAND

CH: I guess if someone were going to get emotional about the Canadian economy, it would be… Canada's finance minister. In any case, that's what Chrystia Freeland did today. Minister Freeland was testifying before the Emergencies Act Inquiry in Ottawa. She was asked about an exchange with a banker at the height of the protests and border blockades. She said that the banker told her, "this is a national crisis, you need to act immediately.” And according to Chrystia Freeland, the same banker had told her about a conversation with a U.S. investor who had said, "I won’t invest another red cent in your banana republic in Canada.” The commission lawyer suggested that might have been hyperbolic. Here's how Minister Freeland described her response.

SOUNDCLIP

CHRYSTIA FREELAND: That quote relayed to me, really made me realise I had a duty of stewardship. I have a duty, I had at that moment, a very profound duty to Canadians, to stand up for them. And I'm surprised that I'm getting emotional, but I really felt it. And I felt like, you know, the Canadian economy, it could seem like this amorphous thing, investment, it can seem amorphous, even incentives amorphous. But when I heard that, I realised I'm the finance minister, I'm the deputy prime minister, I have to protect Canadians, I have to protect their well-being. It’s being really, really damaged. So yeah, that was a meaningful conversation for me, and that was a very memorable quote, and for sure, a spur to action.

SHANTONA CHAUDHURY: So maybe in the end, not so hyperbolic, in your view?

CF: Well, look, I, I can't comment on what that investor was thinking. It's second hand, right. That was what a bank CEO reported to me, an investor said to him. But it is my job to ultimately, what's the job of the finance minister? To make sure Canadians have a good life, right? And part of how Canadians have a good life is, capital is invested into the Canadian economy, so they have well-paying jobs. And what that quote said is, something is happening in Canada, that very profoundly hurts Canadian jobs.

CH: That was Finance Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, taking questions from Emergencies Act Inquiry lawyer, Shantona Chaudhury, in Ottawa today.

[Music]

TORONTO TESLAS

Guest: Sean Shapiro.

CH: Everyone who has driven a car around downtown Toronto winds up asking themselves the same question: "how could I not be driving a car around downtown Toronto?" And for a while at least, it seemed like Elon Musk had an answer. In the form of the self-driving technology imbedded in cars made by his company, Tesla. But like some other notable Musk endeavours, reality posed some significant problems. In Toronto, the problem was streetcars. It turned out Tesla's self-driving technology couldn't recognize the city's famous red-and-white streetcars stopping to let out vulnerable passengers in the middle of the street, as they do every few blocks. Tesla's solution was to turn off that technology in any cars driving in the downtown core. But then, this week, suddenly, the company just turned the tech back on. Sean Shapiro is a Toronto Police Constable… also known as the "TikTok traffic cop". We reached him in Aurora, Ontario.

NK: So Sean, how are things on the streets now that, now that these Teslas can drive themselves around?

SEAN SHAPIRO: Well, it's funny. I think if the media never reported it, we wouldn't be any wiser, because it's not an autonomous vehicle at this point. It's just a driver assist level. That's a little more along the lines than what we've been seeing. So where most vehicles will keep you in your lane and maybe follow the road, now they're capable of following the destination a GPS coordinates. But they still require the driver to be very involved in that process.

NK: Is that reassuring to you at this point?

SS: Absolutely. I'm not ready for the computers to take over the world. I like the fact that drivers are responsible, that they have to pay attention, and that they're there for when beta software, and this is beta software, doesn't work.

NK: Yeah. What are people telling you? You know, corresponding with you online, no doubt you have such a, such an online presence. What are they telling you?

SS: Well, we've heard that it's just not where, it's not ready, or that it's, it's still learning. Very often they're finding it where someone wants to make a right turn, and it's going left, and then correcting. So, so it's working out the kinks.

NK: Are you concerned, though, that, that, you know, the people you've spoken to seem to understand the limits, but are you concerned that some people feel like they're going to, they can be on their phone, they can be distracted while they're doing this, because they think the car is going to do the work?

SS: I can tell you that we've had this problem since day one, of autopilot features across multiple platforms, or multiple manufacturers. Anytime a car seems to be doing the work, there is this, this belief that they can do whatever they want. And I very often pulled up when doing enforcement, beside Teslas, and that was the first thing I'd look for, a cell phone. And I had it very often. That was a ticket I was ending up writing for that, because many people are taking advantage of these, these technologies, that are not intended to take over, just to assist and reduce fatigue. And they're utilising them as though they were autonomous. And that's not what they're for.

NK: And for those who don't own Teslas, just, just take me through what these cars, you hinted at this already, about what they're capable of doing, but what the driver is still responsible for.

SS: So in Ontario, and actually it's everywhere, there are six levels of autonomy. Zero being zero, one and two are, and even three, are really just assistance mode. They require the active participation of a driver. So if the computer misses a stop sign and doesn't stop, you're still required to stop the car. If it confuses a green light as a red light and stops your car for no reason, you need to take over and make sure that you tell it to continue. So it's very much a very basic level. Now, with the full self-driving mode, specifically this latest big, big update, is that it now recognises stop signs, it recognises traffic signals, the geofence problem or the GEOFENCE was lifted because it now recognizes, it knows what to do with street cars. That was the big problem that prevented Tesla from releasing Toronto.

NK: Are you comfortable now with, with the street car addition, with the update?

SS: I've not tested it. I've not seen it in action in person. And I'm looking forward to getting behind the wheel of one of these so I can have some firsthand experience. But I'm comfortable in that it's not, it's not autonomous. And the people who are, that are opting in, that are choosing to be part of the beta, are supposed to be warned that this is something that requires their full and complete participation, and that it's not autonomous. In fact, it's right on the website. If you look at the different levels of drive feature for Tesla, they say this is not an autonomous vehicle, this is just driver assist, and that it could be dangerous if it’s, if it's not treated as such.

NK: Now, our colleagues at CBC News Toronto, have been trying to get some answers from Tesla and Elon Musk, about why this technology came back this week, why this update happened now, and haven't, they've not been able to get an answer. I'm wondering if Toronto police got a heads up.

SS: Well, we've, they didn't have to give us a heads up. The reason being is, level three has been legal in Ontario for quite a long time, even though manufacturers haven't made a consumer vehicle available for purchase. With that feature set, it's still been approved for use, so they wouldn't have to give us any special heads up. Level four and level five however, are still under a pilot project, and require special authorisation in order for them to operate on the road. So in situations where you look at Gatik and their partnership with Loblaws, Gatik operating vehicles are on special routes that are approved. The municipal government's been notified, the local law enforcement’s been notified, they have special insurance to operate, and they have far more going on. That's a truly autonomous setup, where the person sitting on the steering wheel is just there for emergencies. They don't have to ever touch the steering wheel unless something goes wrong. Whereas with the Tesla, you have to constantly check in, your eyes have to be on the road, you're, you have to consistently check in on the steering wheel and show that you're there.

NK: You mentioned Gatik. Can you just explain to our listeners what that is?

SS: Well, Gatik is, is a technology company that has been working on autonomous vehicles. They've been operating in the United States for quite some time. And they are one of two organisations in Ontario, that currently have approval to test autonomous vehicles level four and five in the province. In level four, someone has to be in the driver's seat, waiting for something to go wrong essentially. And in level five, they can be at the passenger's seat. There is physically no driver behind the wheel, but there is somebody there with an override switch, if something were to go wrong.

NK: Do you want it to stay at level three? Do you think level four and five fully autonomous is safe, especially in big cities like Toronto?

SS: I have, I have very mixed emotions, because I love the idea of being able to get into the car, programme my destination like it is in time cop, and take a nap. I think that would be the best thing ever, but I don't think it's there yet. I think we've got a long way to go before this technology is going to be safe for wide release. And, and when it does go there, I think we have the potential of making the roads safer, because if you think about these vehicles, if they're following the law, if they're all governed by a set of rules, the rules are the rules that coincide with the law, no one's going to speed. No one's going to make unsafe lane changes. No one's going to hit a pedestrian because computers know better. And people who are just rushing to work and make poor choices behind the wheel, well, those choices won't be theirs to make anymore. So I think there's a tremendous amount of potential for, for safety for all road users with autonomous vehicles. But there's also a tremendous amount of risk when, you know, when computers go wrong.

NK: Well, Shaun, thank you very much for your time. We'll see. More conversations to come.

SS: Time will tell. And yes, absolutely a pleasure any time. Take care.

NK: Thank you.

CH: Sean Shapiro is a Toronto Police Constable. We reached him in Aurora, Ontario.

[Music]

UN ON IRAN

CH: Iran is in a "full-fledged human rights crisis," and the current situation is "untenable." That's how the UN's High Commissioner for Human Rights put it today. Volker Turk addressed a special session where the Human Rights Council adopted a resolution, to establish an independent fact-finding mission to the country, to investigate recent alleged human rights abuses. Since protests began in Iran in September, Mr. Turk estimates there have been at least 300 deaths, including 40 children, and more than 14,000 arrests. Iran has responded by calling the resolution "politically motivated" and "arrogant". But the 25 states that voted in favour clearly disagree. Among those who spoke today was Amnesty International's Raha Bahreini. Here's what she said, for the record.

SOUNDCLIP

RAHA BAHREINI: [foreign speech] In the name of the God of Rainbow, is how ten year old Keyon Pugh started his video for a school project, capturing the hope of Iran's children for a brighter future. Kian is one of at least 43 children killed by Iran's security forces since late September. I spend my days speaking with normal people in Iran. Their stories, however, are not normal. Imagine that security forces kill your child. Imagine that they then threaten to kill your remaining children if you speak up, or that they will arrest, prosecute and sexually assault you. This is the reality for relatives of children who was six years old. The Islamic Republic of Iran talks here in Geneva of restraint and de-escalation. Killing more than 300 victims is not restraint. Seeking to execute protesters is not the escalation. We echo the findings of the UN Secretary-General and a Special Rapporteur, regarding a structural impunity in Iran. Before security forces killed him, Rahmani wrote to his mother, I'm deeply sorry, but I want to step onto her path, which perhaps means you will not see me grow up. He was 16 years old. People in Iran are risking their lives and liberty to demand their rights. They expect this council to support them, and establish a meaningful investigative and accountability mechanism. Such a step is not just essential, it is long overdue.

CH: Iranian-Canadian human rights lawyer, Raha Bahreini, with Amnesty International, speaking today at a special session of the UN's Human Rights Council.

[Music]

Part 3: FOA: MARCH ORGANIZER, CBC POETRY PRIZE, OTT HEALTH CARE WEEKEND WORK, ISLE OF MAN LANGUAGE + MUSIC.

FOA: MARCH ORGANIZER

CH: Protesters in Mission, BC, expected the person who drove a truck at them this summer to be charged. And he has been, almost six months later. The march took place down a highway near the site of the former St. Mary's Residential School in June. It was thrown into chaos when the truck plowed into the crowd, injuring several people. Marchers said the driver made racist comments before the hit-and-run. And they criticized the police response, saying the RCMP downplayed the driver's actions. Now, half a year later, the RCMP has charged the driver with dangerous operation of a motor vehicle. In June, we spoke with Chris Robertson. He helped run the event, organized by a drug and alcohol support group called the Crazy Indians Brotherhood. He told guest host Tom Harrington, what he experienced that day.

SOUNDCLIP

CHRIS ROBERTSON: We were just getting close to the driveway at the former school grounds. One of our other brothers had come up and grabbed my arm and spun me around really quickly, saying, Troy got ran over. Troy got ran over. And he was in a bit of a panic, and he turned around and ran.

TOM HARRINGTON: So when you heard about this kerfuffle at the back of the march, what did you do?

CR: As I made my way to the back, I was approached by a friend of our group, and she had told me that Troy was put into her car. And she started helping me make sure the elders and children and everyone was kind of getting off the road. At that point, the brother that informed me, Ashton, and he made his way back to me saying, I just got hit. That's the truck right there.

TH: So when you got close up to that truck and that driver, tell me about that.

CR: So at that point, I just kind of pointed at the truck, and we made eye contact, and it was kind of like, you are stopping. At this point, I'm using a nice, loud voice. So I just kind of said, you, you're stopping and pulling over. And now at this point, everyone was kind of off the main eastbound lane, so the traffic started moving. Once the car in front of him had passed me, I stepped right out into the middle of the lane. I caught out the corner of my eye, somebody else stepping up beside me. It was another one of our brothers, Jeremy. Him and I started walking towards the truck, to make sure he would stop. This gentleman had then put his foot down. He pinned it. He started flooring it towards us. I jumped to the side, but not fast enough. And Jeremy jumped upwards. Thankfully, he jumped, and Jeremy ended up rolling over the hood of the truck. And when I jumped to the side, the passenger side of the bumper clipped my right knee and it spun me around. And as it spun me around, I noticed another one of our brothers, Nick, was behind, and he got clipped with the mirror, as he was trying to grab the passenger door to see if he could get it open.

CH: That was Chris Robertson, speaking to guest host Tom Harrington, in June.

[Music]

CBC POETRY PRIZE

Guest: Bren Simmers.

CH: It’s been more than five years since Barb Simmers was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Since then, she’s progressively lost her memory, and her ability to communicate. But while her words have slowly disappeared, her daughter, Bren, has been documenting them, turning her mother’s experience into a collection of poems. Today, that collection, "Spell World Backwards", has won Bren Simmers the 2022 CBC Poetry Prize, which includes $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, and a two-week writing residency at the Banff Centre. Her poems have also been published on the CBC Books website. Here is Ms. Simmers reading the title poem: "Spell World Backwards".

SOUNDCLIP

Reading:

BREN SIMMERS: It began with the notes on the kitchen counter. Date scratched out and rewritten on the calendar. Doctor’s mini mental exams, draw a clock, spell world backwards. The diagnosis took away your driver's licence. By spring, you're in a home. Husband visits every Monday like a metronome, but not enough to keep steady. Days off with nothing familiar to anchor them. It began with the notes taped to the wall, I am 74 years old. The phone, green to talk, red to stop, taped to room 126. So when you wake up alone, you'll know home is where you wait for the notes to pile up, until you can't read the letters anymore.

CH: Bren Simmers with "Spell World Backwards", the first poem in a collection that has just won her the CBC Poetry Prize. We reached Ms. Simmers in Charlottetown, PEI.

NK: Bren, I want to say congratulations, first of all.

BS: Thank you.

NK: How are you feeling now that the news is public?

BS: I'm thrilled. I'm gobsmacked. I feel like I drank six cups of coffee. I'm so excited. Yeah, it really was quite thrilling to find that out.

NK: We just heard, along with our audience, the first of these prise winning poems, and they described your mom's illness. So I hesitated, sort of, to even say congratulations, because it's a wonderful thing that you've won this award, but the poems themselves cover a difficult time for you and your family. So thank you for, for talking about that and sharing that with us too. And I wondered when you realised something was happening to your mom.

BS: It was probably around 2017. We started noticing she was losing her memory. She was using notes a lot to write things down. And if we didn't leave a note for her telling her where we were or what we were doing, she, she'd get upset. She wouldn’t know where we were. So we started to realise that something was wrong, and it took a bit of convincing to get her to go to the doctor, and to, to take that, you know, what they call a mini mental exam. And that's when she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's shortly after.

NK: Then you started writing. At what point did it switch from a personal reflection to something that you wanted to share with others? That's not an easy decision, even for a writer.

BS: No, it's, it's not. And I really wrestled with it, because at first, it was, it was for myself. It wasn't something that I was trying to write about. I was upset. And writing is often a way that I process emotions or make sense of the world. And so that's sort of what I naturally turned to. And then it was after a couple of years that I looked at the entries, and realised that these were poems, that they had a resonance for other people. And, and then I began to do the hard work of turning them into poems. When I first started writing these, I had to write them in the third person. I had to say She. I couldn't address my mom as a you in the poem until about a year ago. It was just too painful. So it's taken time, time and distance, to look at this as an editor, and not, not as a daughter.

NK: For me, it's the word was, that is impossible to say.

BS: Yeah.

NK: So I can relate. You didn't just want them to be about what your mother was experiencing. You wrote the format to mirror what she was experiencing. Can you describe that to, to our listeners who haven't seen your poems yet?

BS: Of course. So the poem is four prose poems. And when I first wrote them, there was a clear narrative. And then I realised that I wanted to make it difficult for people to read the poems. Not so much that they wouldn't understand them, but too complicated. So I started taking some of the, the looping that my mom was using, the repetition. I took out letters from, from the poems, which is hard when you're reading it. It's, you can't, you can't get that. But I tried to make it complicated so that people would struggle to understand it, in the same way that I struggle every time I talk to her, to try and figure out, what is she saying?

NK: What do you hope the readers and our listeners take away from your poems and how you've structured them?

BS: I hope that people will connect to it. I've had a lot of people reach out to me today, and say how much those poems affected them, that they're going through something similar in their family. And I know that talking about these hard things, talking about diseases that take away people we love slowly, can help us feel less alone and feel more connected. So I hope it will, will start a conversation, and people will open up to others and get the support they need for going through this journey themselves with their loved ones.

NK: When was the last time you saw your mom? How's she doing?

BS: I saw her five times this fall, which was lovely, because she's in BC and I'm on PEI. And so she's doing, she's doing, actually doing okay. She's just entered late stage, so she's starting to have trouble walking, and she needs help getting dressed, and eating, and that kind of thing. But, you know, her smile still lights up the room. And when, when she hugs me, it's the most incredible thing. So I love that I can still hear her voice, that I can still see her. And we had a few slow dance hugs, as I call them, with her, when I saw her last, where we just shuffle our feet, and then make up a little tune, and we just have a little slow dance. And so that's a really special moment that I can still have with her. She loves to dance.

NK: Oh, that's beautiful. And Mom hugs are the best hugs. Like there's just no debating that.

BS: [laughing] Exactly.

NK: The sequence of poems ends with the line, like looking into a window that's usually drawn and seeing you inside still, Mom. When you write that, when you say that, who is the mom you see?

BS: I see her as she has always been. And, and I still get these, these windows where underneath the fog of the disease, underneath the medication, I see that she's still there. Like when I saw her this fall, and she looked up and she looked right at me, and she's like, I know you. And I could see that she's still, she's still in there. And I mean, she's always my mom, I guess, in whatever stage she's at. But I think it's those moments of recognition where I feel like she sees me and knows me, that’s when she's still mum.

NK: I know your mom didn't get a chance to read these poems, but what do you think she'd think about them, and that you've won the CBC Poetry Prise?

BS: She would be so delighted. My mom would be so proud. I was recently reminded by a good friend that my mom would carry around my poems in her purse and show them to people in the grocery store. She would bring my books to her craft group. I know she would be really, really proud and thrilled. She's always been such a big supporter of myself and of my brothers, and I'm so lucky to have her.

NK: Well, thank you for sharing a bit of her with all of us. And congratulations again, Bren.

BS: Oh, thanks so much for having me on the show.

NK: Take care.

BS: You too.

CH: That was Bren Simmers. She's in Charlottetown, PEI. She’s the winner of this year’s CBC Poetry Prize for a collection entitled "Spell World Backwards". It’s inspired by her mother’s experience with Alzheimer’s. We heard the first of those poems earlier… here’s Bren Simmers reading the other three.

SOUNDCLIP

Reading:

BS: Looping. You're going to die in here. Going to go. Not at home or in the car. Watching someone fall in the dining room and be carried off by ambulance. You're going. Going, gone. Die in here, while newbies tour the home, nudged out of theirs by middle aged migraines with daughters in tow. No male, no visitors, no hug, no hello. Die in Here as residents bat balloons around. Sort buttons, pace the halls, drink one last juice on the Titanic, while you fight for lifeboats to get dressed, go to the toilet on your own. In here, you're going, going to, going to go. You're going to die in here. Left in the care of strangers who don't know you're before.

Reading:

The lady in the closet hides your feet on the top shelf. Moneybags under the bed. Things are not good. Not good. The lady stashes ere boards into sock drawers. Rips your photos off the wall. I don't feel safe. Not good. I don't feel safe. The lady steals things when you're not around, berries neck strings in coffee cups, bowls dirty under filters in the refuge. The lady is an angry, angry, don't feel safe angry. Not good. You're afraid to go to bed in case the lady comes back. Can barely use the outhouse. Won't bathe with so many people around. Two little boys and a little white dog have moved in. They’re so hungry. Do you have any food? Because the lady, you're sure it's a lady, won't leave you alone.

Reading:

The new meds have kicked in, and there's a levity to your voice, a box full of bubble wrap. The lunch man couldn't keep his pants up. Either that or he was peeing himself. Perch to compare ourselves never stops. At least I still have control of, of… the word’s gone. But you laugh and laugh and tell me how to dry underpants in front of the round thing with air. Bathroom, now the multipurpose room where you wash white hair, long in the sink. I shall let you go, after months of looping, lashing anger into a raft to remember. It's so good to talk to you. Like looking into a window that's usually drawn and seeing you inside still Mom.

CH: That was Bren Simmers, reading from her CBC Poetry Prize winning collection, "Spell World Backwards".

[Music]

OTT HEALTH CARE WEEKEND WORK

CH: With the spread of the flu, COVID-19 and RSV, Ontario's children's hospitals are overwhelmed. And according to a memo that the provincial health ministry sent out this week, the government wants family health-care workers to shoulder the load. According to the ministry, it's not a directive, but a call to action, asking family doctors to open their clinics 7 days a week, and into the evening, until further notice. Dr. Vandana Parnandi works at a family health centre in Ottawa. She told the CBC why she thinks that plan might not work.

SOUNDCLIP

DR. VANDANA PARNANDI: I think it doesn't address the main roots of the problem that we're facing right now at paediatric hospitals. You know, we have a family doctor shortage. So many patients are going to the E.R. because they don't have a family doctor. And there's a shortage of infant and toddler ibuprofen and acetaminophen. So you can imagine for first time parents, they're understandably very nervous when their young child or baby has a fever. And so they're going to the hospital. And I think it doesn't really address the fact that there's a lot of physicians, not just family doctors, who are burnt out, and working more is not an option. If they work more, they may never return to work. And this would result in less doctors in the long run. Our clinic is certainly open on Saturdays, and works from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., Monday to Thursday. And on Fridays, we're open until 3 p.m.. And we are seeing a crush of patients that we can't keep up with the demand. Not just young patients, but patients who haven't sought care in the last two years.

ROBYN BRESNAHAN: So if the province says the goal is to keep people out of overwhelmed hospitals like CHEO, do you think that expanding clinic hours to evenings and weekends, do you think that would actually help?

DVP: It's hard to say, because if those appointments are taken by non-paediatric patients, and instead by patients who are seeking care for other equally legitimate reasons, then no, I don't think it's going to alleviate the strain at CHEO. But if you are somehow able to restrict those extra appointments to patients under the age of ten, then it may help. Yes.

RB: What do you think about that? I mean, if that was a strategy to restrict the patients to paediatric patients, I mean, there are a lot of ethical questions there. What would you think of that tactic?

DVP: I don't think it would fly.

RB: Mm hmm.

DVP: And I don't think it's fair.

RB: I understand in your own life, you were in a position last week where you had to make a decision about whether or not to cancel your clinic, because of an illness within your own family. Can you tell us what happened?

DVP: My daughter, who's nine years old, was very sick with a high fever that was not COVID. And my husband, who is also a physician, was on call, so he could not stay home to take care of her. And I was faced with the decision of cancelling my clinic where there were children booked, or taking my daughter into work with me. And so I conferred with the managers and owners of my clinic, and asked if I could bring my daughter in, and she would be masked while I worked and saw patients. And so that's what I did. I brought her into work with me, and she lay in an exam room, feverish and unwell, while I saw my patients. And I met my obligations to my patients, which is really important to me too. When the province says, stay home if you're sick, it doesn't apply to a lot of people. I hope it demonstrates not just my commitment, but everyone's commitment to pulling patients through this stage of the pandemic, and primary care is role in that.

CH: Dr. Vandana Parnandi is a family physician in Ottawa. She was speaking with Robyn Bresnahan, today on "Ottawa Morning".

[Music]

ISLE OF MAN LANGUAGE + MUSIC

Guest: Ruth Keggin Gell.

CH: On February 9, 2009, the BBC ran an article headlined: "UN declares Manx Gaelic 'extinct.'" Six months later, it ran an article that said: "Manx Gaelic 'not extinct' … classification will now be changed to 'critically endangered.'" That rapid turnaround by UNESCO was not because a group of people spent six months eating, sleeping, and breathing Duolingo. It was because residents of the Isle of Man, who did indeed speak the language, spoke out in protest of that designation. Including a group of schoolchildren, who wrote, in Manx, "If our language is extinct, then what language are we writing in?" The decades-long effort to make the language more accessible is ongoing. According to a story in the New York Times today, the government wants to double the number of speakers in a decade. Ruth Keggin Gell is a Manx singer and Language Development Officer. We reached her in Port Erin, on the Isle of Man, which is between England and Ireland.

NK: Ruth, How would I say enjoy your evening in Manx?

RUTH KEGGIN GELL: You'd say, [speaks Manx]

NK: [tries to repeat] Close? I have to listen to you say it a few more times. First try not bad. I'm pretty good with languages, but Manx, Manx is, is a little bit trickier than most that I'm used to. But is there another phrase or two that you could share with us?

RKG: Oh, yeah, absolutely. So you could say Ta'n ennym orrym. That means my name is. Ta'n ennym orrym. Literally, it means the name on me is. And then you put your name at the end. So I'd say Ta'n ennym orrym Ruth.

NK: That one's easier. Ta'n ennym orrym

RKG: yeah. Ta'n ennym orrym Ruth.

NK: Ta'n ennym orrym Nil. Nice to meet you.

RKG: [laughing] That's right. Nice to meet you too.

NK: [laughing] I'm sure the audience is loving this impromptu language lesson. Sorry, everyone, for making you sit through that. How different would you say Manx is from Scottish or Irish Gaelic?

RKG: Well, it's in the same family tree, so they’re closely related. The thing about Manx is that it has a different orthography or a spelling sort of system. So it's a different system of writing, I should say. It was written down a lot later than Irish or Scottish Gaelic, so it does look a bit different. And it's sort of got influence of English orthography and, and, and Welsh in there. So they do look different, but the sounds are very, very similar. So if I was to go to like Donegal on the northwest coast of Ireland, I'd say their Irish is probably the closest to Manx. And if I go down to the Southwest, I'd find them a bit more difficult to understand in Ireland, but it's from the same family tree.

NK: So this notion that the language was extinct, this was declared in 2009, where did that come from?

RKG: The language was never extinct. That was erroneously declared by UNESCO. And in fact, at the time, the school had been already going for several years where, it's a Manx language medium school, so all the children at the primary or elementary school study and learn free Manx every single day. So they wrote to UNESCO. And in fact, you know, there's been efforts to promote and protect Manx since the late 1800s. So there’s been people working for the Manx language for a long time.

NK: was their concern, you know, 50 years ago, that the language could die out?

RKG: Numbers did go pretty low, in the sort of middle of the 20th century there. And so, yeah, it was, it was on the brink. And there's been really amazing work done by people who've put their heart and soul into supporting and promoting Manx, you know, and really grassroots work, you know. And without those people, we wouldn't be in the position we are now. People were doing that in their own time, free time, and without government support at that time, you know, in the fifties, in the sixties.

NK: yeah. And was it more than, than just a lack of support? You know, when you think back to the sixties, was it an active pressure to, to speak English and not Manx?

RKG: It's a combination of factors, really. I think you've got all sorts of different reasons for why Manx declined. You had the rise of tourism in the Victorian periods where people needed to be able to speak English to converse with the tourists. And there was all sorts of different factors, economic factors, people moving away, coming to the island. And then I think a bit of a thought that perhaps you needed to speak English just to get ahead in life. And really, you know, we know how wonderful being bilingual is and being multilingual. It's, it's an amazing thing, and it enriches your life and, you know, it is brilliant for the brain. There's so many reasons why speaking more than one language is fantastic. We know that now. And luckily, attitudes have really changed. So it's, it's really celebrated, I think.

NK: Yeah, you're, you're actually teaching people in Canada, if I'm not mistaken. Is that right?

RKG: [laughing] I am. Yeah, I am. So I've got to say, certainly one student in Canada, he's in British Columbia, as well as students in the United States, in Singapore, New Zealand, and of course, closer to home as well. But it's great, you know, having the ability to be able to teach online on Zoom, as well as teaching in person. Literally opens up the world, and means that Manx is accessible to loads and loads of people wherever they live.

NK: What is the interest from the students? Are they, do they have ancestry or they're just into languages?

RKG: It's a mixture of them, really. You know, some of them have ancestry in the Isle of Man, they've got links to the Isle of Man. Some of them are interested in languages, and some of them have maybe learnt some Irish or Scottish Gaelic before, and they found out about Manx that way. And I love finding out what has drawn people to learn Manx, become really invested in the island. It's just another way of, you know, really understanding the fabric of the island, because the language is woven into the Isle of Man. It really encompasses so much of what we are and, you know, the island. So yeah, it's great.

NK: The latest census puts the number of Manx speakers around 2200 people. Are you hopeful that you could, you know, is the goal to double that in the next decade or so? What are the metrics you have?

RKG: We definitely like to try and aim to double it. Absolutely. I mean, that number doesn't actually include any Manx speakers off Island as well. And, you know, you've got different people living outside of the island, fluent speakers and learners as well. I would love to know just how many people outside of the Island speak Manx. I wish there were a way to just find that out, you know, and round everybody off and go, ah, that's, that's the number. But it's growing all the time. Really, there’s a bit of a snowball effect, I think, which is, which is so lovely to say.

NK: We talked about some of the ways you're preserving the language. We're going to play one of your songs in just a moment. So I wanted to ask you what role you think art plays in preserving this language? And then if you could set up the song for us, that would be great.

RKG: I think music is incredibly important. Music and the arts in terms of helping people have a connection with language. So I've seen people come along to concerts who haven't known about the Manx language before, and it really sparks an interest. It gets an emotional response from them as well. And certainly, that's how I got into the Manx language as well. I started learning because I'm first and foremost a musician, and it was a way for me to tap into that. And then I started learning to properly speak Manx as well, and yeah. So this song is called Eubonia Soilshagh, and it's two songs. In fact, they are drinking songs and they're wonderful. And so they're very old sets of lyrics from about 1600s, but set to new melodies. So the new melodies are by Annie Kissick, who is a fine songwriter, Manx speaker, and poet from the island. So she deserves a good shout out.

NK: Thank you for that. And it was really a pleasure speaking with you, Ruth. Thank you.

RKG: You too. Gura mie ayd. Thank you.

NK: Gura mie ayd.

CH: Ruth Keggin Gell is the Manx Language Development Officer at Culture Vannin. She's in Port Erin, on the Isle of Man.

[Song: “Eubonia Soilshagh” by Ruth Keggin & Rachel Hair]

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November 24, 2022 episode transcript

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