Category Archives: Your Island Guide

Your guide to the best our islands have to offer.

11.01.17
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The Post-Halloween Blues? Thoughts on RBCM’s Night Shift Series and Nov 3 & 4th in #YYJ

IMG_20171028_201614920Post-Halloween, I’m not sure what I want to do next. Thankfully, the season is not over with Last Chance Productions bringing Evil Dead the Musical to town November 3rd and 4th to the Metro Theatre! You can click here to buy tickets. I mentioned them in an article last year about them finally coming to town, and this show is worth revisiting since it’s bloodier than Rocky Horror. As with live theatre, there will always be refinement. It’s not often audiences get sprayed than toss stuff in celebration of a scene in the latter.

Honestly, I should not have to leave my hometown of Victoria, BC to have some spooky fun. Usually, I’m tempted to go to Vancouver so I can enjoy Fright Nights at Playland. With this island community, a few events are more or less going to be the same year-after-year. Sadly, Rocky Horror Show fits under this bill as with slightly different Corn Mazes and variations of the Haunted House to navigate through. To get the route you want on Ghostly Walks requires getting a specific tour guide. What I want to experience are the special one-off’s. This garden city is home to an annual theatre production at Craigdarroch Castle which Launch Pad Theatre Company is doing a great job.

About four years ago, the Royal BC Museum (RBCM) experimented with the idea of making a Night at the Museum style fun and having a party like none other — perhaps inspired the film of the same name. Other museums around the world offer something similar, and they are usually geared for the whole family than adults to enjoy. There are even a few which get a touch academic. The articles I read online about these events often makes me think I should travel to check these other options but I always hold back, hoping my town’s museum can offer something similar. In what I’ve experienced at RBCM’s Night Shift, the organizers do a great job. They also touch up a few of their permanent exhibits to get into the spirit.

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10.25.17
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What’s Next after Victoria Nikkei Cultural Society’s 18th Annual Autumn Fair?

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The Victoria Nikkei Cultural Society (VNCS) is active year-round, and in October, their annual fair from last weekend brings the community together — and the curious to learn about the elements of what makes traditional Japan cool. Now in its 18th year, their success lies in how they enrich and entertain the public who do not know much about the Land of the Rising Sun.

For spoiled folks like me who desire more of an academic edge, I’m craving the experience from the University of Victoria’s Pacific and Asian Studies CAPI Conference on Japanese Popular Culture. Two events were held on campus back in the late 90’s and they set the bar. Plus, I visited Japan and experienced the life on the streets that some festivals from afar have no plans to replicate. To sample the unique food from stalls at either a theme park like Fuji-Q Highland Park or at a seasonal event requires travelling back there.

VNCS’ version is quaint. It is worth going to at least once. I’ve been to this event years ago and saw no reason to come back in any regular basis. After James Shaw told me about 2016’s event perhaps offering Ikayaki (squid on a stick), I took a chance at returning. Was he wrong about what he heard? Most likely. This mouth-watering reason was the only reason I trekked out to the Municipality of Esquimalt.

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10.18.17
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Stay Awhile… Stay for The Red Death & Other Stories From Edgar Allen Poe

22218503_1729800080394782_765507268006924604_oTickets available via www.thecastle.ca
or call 250-592-5323 to book

Show times:
October 17, 18, 19, 24,
25, 26, 30, 31 at 8:00pm
October 20, 21, 27, 28
at 7:00pm and 9:00pm

With Performances by:
David Radford, Christina Patterson, Jared Gowen, Trevor Hinton, Diana Nielsen

When mid-October arrives, the Halloween season is in full swing and the terror can arrive in many a form. This week has Red Death & Other Stories From Edgar Allen Poe (Launch Pad Theatre) and Rocky Horror Show (Atomic Vaudeville) opening for residents of Victoria, BC to enjoy. Those unable to get a ticket for the former (it’s nearly sold out) can wait for next year. The latter will always be around because it’s become a staple ever since it debuted on stage with thanks to Kaleidoscope Theatre.

Pardoning the cliché, to experience Poe’s works performed on a dark and stormy night at Craigdarroch Castle is a must. I’ve been a fan of interactive theater for a long time, and to choose between which show to go to get my pre-Halloween funk on was tough. Audiences either get to be part of the show or they are watching it with a slight wall between realities. With this season, the veil is best broken at the edifice upon a hill.

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10.11.17
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Is it One Hungry or Two Blokes for Halloween Fun in Victoria, BC?

The Two Hungry Blokes is not gone. I just have to be more devious in my approach to record and later reveal content from James. We still head out to have a random bite from time to time. For a guy who claims he’s leaving the scene, he’s not doing a good job. He still wants to express what he thinks about a restaurant, its service, its decor or the food to me. He simply no longer wants to write about it, which is fine, and I do not have to put my fingers into my ears and say, “la la la,” to ignore him. Instead, I’ll might as well take notes of his thoughts and report it. Yes, I can find workarounds.

In this Halloween guide, he never said I can not repost his list from our other blog otakunoculture.com here. I present our picks for this year’s local island festivities. Most, I have acquire tickets to, others, I don’t know if I want to take James along anyways. He was a buzzkill (see my report here) when he wanted to join me for the first event on my list. I also have to note for James picks, I went to one and he was nowhere. Did he go phantom on me?
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09.12.17
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[Victoria, BC] Launch Pad Theatre to Turn Poe Over His Head!

Tickets are on now sale for this year’s Halloween shindig at Craigdarroch Castle. Some may say it’s the end of the world and the last days of disco!

Show times:
October 17, 18, 19,
24, 25, 26, 30, 31 at 8:00pm
October 20, 21, 27, 28 at 7:00pm and 9:00pm 

The gothic and the groovy will jibe with this dramatic new staging of some of the most unsettling stories of Edgar Allan Poe set in a 1970’s B-movie horror milieu and amplified with the disco sounds from the era. This show promises to be different than Launch Pad Theatre‘s past works. Kept in is the exploration of this historic venue (more rooms will be opened up) as this play moves from chamber to chamber (yes, a lot of stair climbing will be involved). Different is in the fact several stories will unfold than one!

In order to get the full experience, theatre-goers will have to return. Who knows, maybe you will have a chance encounter with this place’s real ghosts!

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09.02.17
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From Psyops to Cabaret at VCM’s Wood Hall Victoria Fringe Festival

I spent Friday night at the Conservatory of Music‘s Wood Hall for the Victoria Fringe Theatre Festival‘s kickoff into the long weekend. This time will be the busiest for the show, as it is the final weekend. The weather forecast predicts temperatures on the high side and it will be bright; please be sure to put on sun protection. If I can survive the Summer’s last hurrah, then there’s a few more shows I’m interested in seeing. The buzz from the street is to not miss Interstellar Elder, and fortunately that’s taking place at night, when it’s cooler.

To get back into downtown Victoria, however, that’s if I …

AWAKEN (Actually, the show’s name is AWOKEN)

AWOKEN

Remaining Dates:
Sep 2 – 4:30pm

Proper grammar usage aside, if there’s any way to interpret what Ottawa based actor Nick Amottt’s work AWOKEN is about, I’m sure Hideaki Anno, director of the Japanese Animation Neon Genesis Evangelion can make better sense out of it. The characters Amott play are projections from different parts of Todd Silvano’s psyche. Each of them seem to have some kind of complex just like the anime. This nerdy recluse suffers from a condition known as ‘fatal familial insomnia.’ There is no known cure for this brain disease. It eventually leads to hallucinations, delirium and eventually death.

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