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PANTS OFF FOR CANCER One in seven Canadian men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime.
Hoping to shine a spotlight on the below-thebelt cancer, Pants Off for Prostate Cancer was created to lay bare the stark reality of the disease.
A national fundraising initiative taking place across the country — in major cities like Toronto, Montreal and Halifax — Vancouverites got to show some leg recently at the event’s fourth staging on the West Coast.
No strangers to the cause, Taylor Scholz, Yongku Jung and Will Konantz led the effort. Five years ago the university students, studying in Ontario at the time, cycled more than 4,500 kilometres to Vancouver to raise money for prostate cancer research and awareness of the disease.
Their month-long trek, in honour of Konantz’s dad Don who was battling the disease at the time, generated more than $250,000 for Vancouver’s Prostate Centre, a world renowned research, treatment, and education facility at Vancouver General Hospital.
The young men enlisted three more friends, Mikhail Zalesky, Mitchel White and Stefan Lillos, to front this year’s prostate cancer fundraiser at the Vancouver Rowing Club. Some 200 urban professionals checked their coats and pants at the door for the fashionably fun evening.
Leaders from all industries mixed, mingled and celebrated the night with pant-less abandon. The night of philanthropy would raise more than $110,000 for Prostate Cancer Canada.
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer to affect Canadian men, says Mark Mahl, executive director of Prostate Cancer Canada, Western Region. He adds that this year nearly 25,000 Canadian men and their families will face a prostate cancer diagnosis.
While the disease can be deadly, the survival rate for prostate cancer can be over 90 per cent when detected early. Keynote Dr. Graeme Boniface of the Vancouver Prostate Centre recommends men get tested regularly.
THE L WORD When Craig Stowe created Luxury and Supercar Weekend in 2010, an event that would showcase the best in luxury cars, fashion and food, he had more than a few detractors.
After the world financial crisis two years earlier austerity was de rigueur and the ‘L’ word — luxury — was considered almost taboo. It was a bad word, said Stowe.
How times have changed. Today, multimillion-dollar detached homes are being snapped up, new condos are selling from $1,700 to $2,500 a square foot and Vancouver’s Alberni Street has been transformed into a luxury row of global fashion houses.
Defying the naysayers, Stowe’s Luxury and Supercar Weekend celebrated its eighth year. Last weekend, 7,000 people took in the two-day garden party of exotic cars and other fine things at VanDusen Botanical Garden.
Stowe drove in more than $250 million worth of luxury vehicles for the much-anticipated affair — everything from a $200,000 Karma Revero to a $750,000 Rolls-Royce Phantom, and a 2018 Pagani Huayra roadster, with a jaw dropping sticker price of $4.5 million.
High rollers not only took many pictures at the ticketed show and shine, but they also got the chance to purchase 25 high-performance vehicles that went on the auction block. They included a 2012 Maserati, 2015 Aston Martin DB9 and 2016 Mercedes Maybach.
Another sign Vancouver is a high-end car marketplace, businessman Michael Hungerford launched his luxury automotive storage facility TROVE at the car rally.
Sales of his 45 car-condo units — essentially a man-cave for car fanatics — were brisk. Offering highly secure, individually customized, luxury storage spaces for auto aficionados and their multimillion-dollar vehicles, two-thirds of the auto condominiums were reportedly sold.
SEEDING FOOD LITERACY In 2009, Gray Oron, Ilana Labow and Marc Schutzbank wondered how much food they could grow for their friends and East Vancouver neighbours.
It turns out — a lot. Their backyard experiment was soon full of vegetables. Fresh Roots was founded, and more gardens sprouted. One shared a fence with a local elementary school garden that had grown into disrepair. The principal asked the three friends if they might be able to help the school.
They transformed the grounds into an edible schoolyard and educational farm facilitating experiential hands-on lessons on farming, food and nutrition. Students experience the full cycle of how their food arrives on their table, and gain an appreciation of good food.
A seed of an idea, the project expanded to other schools in Vancouver, Delta and Coquitlam. Putting his knowledge of finance to work, Schutzbank helped turn Fresh Roots into a non-profit organization.
Today, with five engaging gardens on school grounds, more than 5,000 students visit Fresh Roots fields — outdoor hands-on learning classrooms — annually. Youth take away valuable lessons that foster leadership, self-confidence and employment skills. And teachers learn how to use the community gardens to achieve core curricular objectives.
The produce grown is sold to school cafeterias, restaurants and local families. In the summer, Fresh Roots employs high school students to garden and sell the food at farmers’ markets.
Recently earning charitable status, Fresh Roots hosted its Schoolyard Harvest Fundraising Dinner at David Thompson Secondary, home to one of the educational gardens.
Inclement weather brought the alfresco community long-table dinner inside. But that did not dampen the party spirits of 140 guests who gathered to meet some of the young farmers, learn more about the innovative school initiative, and enjoy a multicourse meal masterminded by Chef Juno
Kim, a champion of the Fresh Roots Program.