Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 It Pierre at the Mac city morning show. Um, we're going to start the show off the same way we start every show off with a moment of gratitude. I know you could be doing a million other things with your time. So the fact that you're spending with us truly does mean the world to me. So thank you. Um, on that note, Tanner hidden,
Speaker 1 00:00:17 She caught me loves you're listening to the next city morning show.
Speaker 0 00:00:26 All right. I totally jacked up that intro Tanner. I do apologize. I'm just excited about our guest, but excited. Yeah. So as you guys know, I don't introduce my guests. I let them do that themselves. So on that note, sir, reintroduce yourself to the world, please.
Speaker 3 00:00:39 Thank you. Hello. My name is Mike Jones, marketing communications at the Canadian mental health association with Buffalo. But, uh, here today, we're gonna talk about a great event happening this weekend. This Saturday, rock the rails.
Speaker 0 00:00:51 There we go. Okay. Let's talk about that. Let's jump right into it. Explain it to me and everybody else. What rock?
Speaker 3 00:00:57 So this is our third annual event. It's a skateboarding and BMX competition, which happens down at the Timberly skate park. We're going to have, uh, some skaters and some riders coming up from Edmonton are going to be doing some demos. Uh, and then all the kids and even the teens, the young at heart, the adults, they get to compete as well. Uh, they get to register, they get to show off their skills, win some awesome prizes. Uh, we have live bands all day long and uh, this year for the first time we're adding in beer gardens. So a little bit extra work on the back end, but, uh, sure it makes for an exciting event.
Speaker 0 00:01:27 Okay. So I just, uh, I, and it breaks my, well, it does break my heart. I'm happy to do it. I'm happy he's into it. But at the beginning of it, I didn't like it. My kid just started skateboarding this summer. So it's my fault because I have skateboards and snowboards. I have lots of boards around the house and when he was growing up, uh, we used to watch like X games and surfing and stuff. So he's been asking for years, dad, can I get on a skateboard dad? And I was like, no, first you need to learn to ride a bike, a scooter,
Speaker 3 00:01:55 Then one step
Speaker 0 00:01:55 At a time, you know, but now he's, uh, now he's riding skateboards and I bought, I bought him a skateboard and I bought us two cruisers. One's called the tug boat. And one is called a dinghy and we've been cruising around Fort McMurray, love and life. So I'm going to bring him to this thing for sure. So he's six. So if you're a youth coming to this event, what could you, or what should you be looking forward to?
Speaker 3 00:02:18 So we have a couple of different age categories. We have our 11 and under category. We have our 12 to 17 category and then our 18 plus category for
Speaker 0 00:02:26 Competition
Speaker 3 00:02:27 For competition. Okay. So that's, if, you know, if they do decide to get a get in and compete, otherwise, you know, you ready to get stoked, check out some cool things. We've got Hazel eyewear is going to be there. A Volcom is actually sending up their big tents. So they're going to be sponsoring the event down at Peter pond mall. They're going to be here, uh, at the event. Uh, they're going to be selling some stuff as well, giving away some prizes. So we've got lots of cool local vendors. Um, we're going to have, you know, the justice slave youth foundation, who of course are the charity that we're benefiting for this event. They're going to be down there showing off all the cool stuff that they do in the community. Uh, same thing with the, uh, Canadian mental health association. We have our new youth hub, uh, which is going to be launching officially.
Speaker 3 00:03:05 Uh, well, you know, COVID is kind of delaying that a little bit, but we'll be launching that really, really soon. So they're going to be there showing off what they're doing. So, okay. It's just a great chance to kind of show off a lot of the great initiatives we have in the community. And, uh, you know, we'd like to have the boys and girls clubs is going to be down there as well, selling their, uh, 50, 50 tickets to their adventure raffle tickets. So they're excited about that. Very cool. So how did this start? How, like, why did you start this? So the first, uh, time was, uh, uh, it's, it's part of the Alberta culture days. So this is something that happens every used to be on a weekend in September, in the last couple of years, they'd been like, you know what, it's the whole month.
Speaker 3 00:03:43 I think that's what they did. They found that a lot of cool events were happening, but they were being sparsely attended because they were kind of competing against other cool events. Right. So what they ended up doing was they made it for the entire month. So it's a province-wide initiative. So the very first year we did it, um, a friend of mine was, was like, Hey, do you want to be on this committee? And so I was like, okay. So I got my friend, Jesse, Stacey from the Tavern on main, we kind of teamed up and we, uh, we, we took on this, uh, initiative called the culture bus. So it was cool. We had like a little tour of, we went to, you know, uh, I think Shrek is on the snide, just opened at the time. And they were doing like some cool bannock things.
Speaker 3 00:04:17 We went to points. North gallery was open at the time. Still, they had a few other art places, cattle theater did a little tour and people could sign up and take their family on a free tour. And, you know, a few families took advantage and we thought it was, it was kind of cool, but a lot of folks were kind of like, we really like it, but we also kind of are aware of what all these places are and we kind of want to tour them on our own and we want to take them out on her own. So I remember there was yeah, a few things with like, we didn't, maybe we didn't do the best job. Uh, it was sort of a learning curve for both of us, like of getting the announcement out and getting the word out there. So I remember going to the next year's, uh, culture days meeting with the full intention of being like, Hey, uh, you know, I just have too much on my plate.
Speaker 3 00:04:57 This is what I learned. Here's yours. Here's what you can do if you want to, if somebody else wants to do the culture bus tour and, uh, you know, take on that initiative, here's our, here's what we learned. And then something that, uh, I've lose Jessica from the arm WB was saying in the event, she was like, we're really looking this year to kind of focus on some underrepresented cultures. You know, like we do, we always have a really cool theater component. We always have a good visual arts component, but maybe some other, uh, components or some cultures that aren't represented. And immediately, I kind of thought back to where I was in high school, where I did do a little bit of drama towards the end, but I certainly wasn't like a theater kid back then was not good at sports. Not great at academics could have been applied, applied myself. Thanks, mom.
Speaker 3 00:05:42 That sounds like mine Tanner's scorecard. Exactly. Every, every kid, right. I could have applied ourselves better. I'm sure I would have been smarter, but you know, not my siblings, they were always, they applied themselves. I applied like my siblings. I would do great things. Exactly, exactly. Right. So, um, yeah, we just wanted to, um, I remember like I was, I was big into skateboarding and like punk rock and stuff like that. And I kinda thought like, what if I'm a kid growing up in Fort McMurray? There's an amazing, there's so many amazing theater camps, the Kiano and sec pod do here in town. There's an amazing opportunities for kids to play sports. Uh, you know, we have organizations like kid sport and stuff where even if they can't afford those organizations, help them play. And of course, academics, there's so many smart kids that come out of this town and get like, you know, every other, every year you're hearing these stories about these kids that get a hundred thousand dollars scholarships.
Speaker 3 00:06:34 Right. Right. So, but what about the other kids? Like kinda, you know, the kids, the skater kids, right. The kind of kids that are just sorta like, you know, we're just doing our own thing. And I was like, yeah, yeah. I know some of that is, is, you know, the scene kind of organizes itself and it has their own events, but, um, I kind of was inspired right there. And I was like, you know what? We haven't had anything like that really. Especially for youth, um, we have our own like punk rock scene in town and there's, you know, a lot of shows at the Tavern on main and stuff. You're towards adults. Right. Let's get the youth involved and on for the extreme sports side of thing, you know, um, guys like, uh, Kevin and stuff, like when they had a cousin back in the day, they obviously did a lot of great stuff. But once that business went down there just wasn't really, there was an opening there, there wasn't really events like that. So cool. They're there all of a sudden, uh, my meeting of, uh, just going in for a quick debrief of a massive event and, uh, here we are three years later still doing it. That's awesome.
Speaker 0 00:07:31 So when I grew up here, I remember when they opened the first skate park down at Borealis, but now we have a number of skate parks here. Um, so which I know you said the one in Timberly, but I think there's more than one in Timberlands is
Speaker 3 00:07:46 Which one are we talking about here? It's the synchrony athletic park. So there is, there is the one Parsons as well. That's kind of in between the houses there, which is kind of a cool little spot, but there's just not a lot of room not to do extra activities there. So, whereas synchrony athletic park really gives us now, we actually ended up moving it downtown last year to the Borealis park for a couple of reasons. We were like, you know, downtown needs the love. Let's show them some love. Um, the Hazel guys, the guys that come up, they're like, Hey, the Bowl's a lot easier to do, you know, bigger tricks on cooler tricks on. And the other thing is there's a nice stage downtown, the, uh, Borealis bath, uh, bandstand, or the Bob lamb bandstand. I shouldn't say which 10 times fast exactly which did flood, but they were able to, we were able to get some generators and still be able to put on a show.
Speaker 3 00:08:31 The problem was the band sand and the skate park or a fair distance apart. So we had people come for the shows and people come for the skate park and we only were allowed a hundred people because of COVID last year. So it wasn't really that we didn't really get the synergy between the events. There was a few people that would walk back and forth. It was a bit of a hike. And, you know, for the most part, people would just stay where they were comfortable, where they were sitting. Whereas when we first did it in Timberly, we had the band playing literally onto the skate park and everyone's rocking out and having a blast at the same time. So to be able to pull that off again this year, I think we were like, let's go back to Timberly to our roots and make it all one big event where everybody's kind of clustered and we can have a, have a good time and rock out while you're skating at the same time,
Speaker 0 00:09:15 Years ago. And it was thrown by Kazam. There was a, um, a concert slash skate competition held down at Borealis. And what they did was they put the stage in the parking lot. Yeah. But then you lose parking. Of course.
Speaker 3 00:09:31 So like it turned into that parking has been, even now they've made it so you can't even access it. You have to go all the way around just the flood Burma. Totally understand that that kind of takes precedence.
Speaker 0 00:09:39 The majority of people live in Timberly. So this is closer
Speaker 3 00:09:42 To them, to exactly our thought processes. A lot of people, um, you know, when they used to do events like the east coast garden party, they used to be, uh, tremendously successful when they were there. Um, you know, they would sell advance tickets and then they would have a ton of long walk up as you do in this town. Right. Blur having a backyard fire. And they're like, you know, guys, like I can kind of hear the truths playing off in the distance. Would it be more fun if we actually went over there and went and rocked out to the truth? That's right. So, um, that's what we're hoping is going to happen here today. Uh, and our event of course is free. So we're hoping the whole family will come out. Like I said, we've got the beer gardens. If you're interested, if not, lots of places to, uh, uh, set up a picnic blanket or a chair, we'll have some tables onsite as well this year, because we've got some really good food service happening. So cool.
Speaker 0 00:10:25 No, in regards to the competition, where are we talking? Are, is there going to be a half-pipe? Is it streets like
Speaker 3 00:10:31 Kind of, um, basically anything within the park is up for grabs, so there's no actual, uh, half-pipe per se, we have a couple of quarter pipes. We've got a couple of mini bulls, couple of Rams, a couple of kickers. So basically anything within the parameters of the skate park is up for grabs. They get 90 seconds on the clock to show us their best moves. Um, the judges will evaluate, they'll pick the best kids or the best adults, and they get to get invited and move on to the finals a little bit later on. So,
Speaker 0 00:11:00 So, and here's the real question. And I'll give you my answer to this question afterwards. Do you still skateboard? No.
Speaker 3 00:11:08 I had a couple of a bad experiences, just, you know, skin knees, twisted, ankles, nothing serious, but a couple of bad ones as it went on and then got a little bit older. I think I broke my board at one point and then I had another one. It was just kind of tucked away, tried to sort of get back into it a little bit later. And like, I remember like just at a party, like even actually wasn't even a skateboard, it was a long board. We were evacuated from the fire. We're in Colona at my friend's like, let's go longboarding. And like, there's a lot of Hills in Colona. So I got on a bit of a hill and I got freaked out and I was like, Hmm, this doesn't feel the same. You know, like things hurt a lot more, you know, cancer, you know, bendable, a little resilient. They're resilient adults. I'm a Louis.
Speaker 0 00:11:50 Okay. I put my, I put my skateboard and I, and my longboard away in my late twenties. Cause I took an epic fall on a longboard out of all places in thick wood just going down and I just caught an edge. Yeah, I am. Yeah. So I was like, I'm too old for
Speaker 3 00:12:09 This. Not worth it. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:12:10 Yeah. But this year, because the little guy I picked it up again, man, here we go. And so, uh, I got the cruiser, so it's not quite a long board. It's like a little smaller longboard. Sure. He's still carved and stuff and it's cool. But then he's just like, Hey dad, you want to do some tricks on the skateboard? And I was just saying, all right, give me the board. And yeah. And uh, I did a one or two tricks and I was like, okay, I got a little, so I was into it. I was doing it for like a week down in Edmonton with them and I got cocky. And then all of a sudden I didn't have a major fall or anything, but like I twisted my ankle a little bit and it's like, what the hell am I doing For this? So I'm cruising again, which I'm loving cruising. So if anybody sees me in my little boy cruise and give us a honk, give us a peace sign, but yeah, I'm too old to skateboard like that pavements,
Speaker 3 00:13:02 No, I have been getting on the lawn board a little bit more, you know, work just starting on the driveway and then into the cul-de-sac a little bit. And I haven't really, I, I wrote to, uh, I wrote to the, uh, the max, uh, during COVID last year at one point there's a max like blocks from my house right there. And then I was kinda like, ah, I might walk it back. Cause I was a little, I was a little nervous, but you know, I don't think it's going to be my main form of transportation again for a while. But uh, you know, it's enjoyable to get back on there. It gives you a nice little euphoria and I still will rush.
Speaker 0 00:13:30 That's it. All right. Tanner's pointing at me. It's a time for the Mac city minute. Okay. Best luck. Tom's going to ask you these questions, you know, the deal. Oh, Tanner.
Speaker 4 00:13:39 All right. Question number one. What is your favorite part of throwing an event in Fort McMurray?
Speaker 3 00:13:44 Uh, definitely the event itself, the preparation is fun. It's really cool to go out, you know, hand out flyers and hang up posters and stuff, but, uh, it's a lot of work. And I think once the actual event happens and after the initial hour or so of kind of the chaos of registration and getting everything set up and ready to go, getting the volunteers where they need to be once the event is actually happening, the bands are on stage. Things are somewhat on time. Yeah. That's when you get to kind of take that moment and breathe it in and be like, all right,
Speaker 4 00:14:16 We did it. Question number two. What is one event other than your own? You love to attend informing Marie?
Speaker 3 00:14:22 Uh, one that comes to mind right away is the, uh, the back to the eighties and they actually incorporated it with rib Fest this year. So, uh, I wasn't involved with her Fest because I had so much other things going on, but, uh, uh, brand connected, everybody involved there put on an amazing event and uh, to bring in Trevor and arsenal effects and have back to the eighties, such a cool event to have two bands on the stage at the same time, duking it out for the title belts. Who's amazing. Super awesome. Banff mountain film festival is another one, which I think is actually happening. Yeah, it's happening soon. Usually Friday, I'm going on Thursday, piano theater. So I'm going to miss out because I'm just neck deep in preparations for everything. But usually that happens in January and I'm hoping that this is just kind of last years and they'll still be able to do it in January so I can actually attend. So that's another one that sticks out for me.
Speaker 4 00:15:10 Question number three. What is one thing you think all of the youth in Fort McMurray sharing common?
Speaker 3 00:15:18 Um, that's a great question. I haven't actually been a youth at a Fort McMurray. I was a youth and the duke, you know, so, but I think that, uh, you know, kind of the same thing that I think adults share sort of we're, we're, uh, a park from a lot of people were a parts, a distance, you know, it's, uh, you know, you're an hour flight away from Edmonton before you even get anywhere else. Right. We're a four hour drive five-hour drive. Um, and I think that that kind of brings us together in a lot of ways too. So I think that, um, events up here because we're not Edmonton where you can drive to any surrounding town and like, well, let's go see a concert Enoch. We're going to go to St. Albert. They have a skate park, let's go to LA duke. There's something cool happening there.
Speaker 3 00:16:02 And then a million other things in Edmonton. Uh, we're, we're all in this together. Right? So I think that the events, when people do do events, people are incredibly grateful and they're more likely, I find, you know, when we do rock the rails, as much as it is for a niche crowd, especially the bands like it's punk rock it's skateboarding, not everybody's into that, but a lot of people come out anyways, cause they're like, we're just looking for something to do some live entertainment, something fun to do on a hopefully sunny day. And, uh, you know, fingers crossed 14 is the forecast right now. And no rain. There was rain in the forecast yesterday. We'll see. We'll, we'll see if that changes,
Speaker 4 00:16:36 Uh, question
Speaker 3 00:16:37 Number four, I realized this is way more than a minute.
Speaker 4 00:16:40 That's the point is in Fort McMurray. Nobody actually takes a minute to do anything. That's true.
Speaker 3 00:16:47 I like
Speaker 4 00:16:47 It. Question number four. What is one skate story you have that sticks out for you?
Speaker 3 00:16:54 Uh, great questions. Great question, man. Um, one that kind of sticks out was I went on this youth retreat, cause I was like doing that to a church thing a little bit earlier on in my life. And it was what did this youth group thing. And we went to this concert, Edmonton, these things think, well, I see you it's like a Rexall place or whatever. They had his big production. Right. And we were staying at this church sleeping over. And so I brought my skateboard cause I was like, oh, dah, dah, dah. And it was like, I think it was like brand new. I just bought it and I'd written it like twice and uh, brought it to this big sleepover. And of course there's a bunch of, uh, 15, 16 year old boys all hiked up on like testosterone and you know, all going through whatever.
Speaker 3 00:17:34 So, uh, you know, someone's like, oh, let me ride it. Let me ride it. And, and he tried to do a kick flip and oh, my brand new board, like the first day. And we were all excited. Like we were like, we were going to go to the skate park the next day and like hang out. And, and I was, uh, I was pretty choked. I don't remember if he ever, I mean, I don't think he would have been able to afford to pay for it. Cause he was 50. I don't think I ever saw any enumeration, whatever the word is for that heartbreaking. Yeah. And your final question. What is one reason everyone should check out your event? I think it's a, it's just an awesome event. Realistically. I, you know, we're going to have live music. We're going to have, I mean, I realized these are way more than one reason. Okay. One reason it's something to do. What else are you going to do? You know, uh, the summer is fleeting. You know, cold days are coming. This weekend might be one of them. But uh, even though, uh, you know, there might be the odd warm day in October. It's going to be winter soon. You're going to be locked in your house. Even if it's not for COVID reasons, come out, enjoy hanging out, enjoy, uh, live music, enjoy a gathering and to have a good time in those.
Speaker 0 00:18:42 There you go. Great questions, man. Great questions. Thank you. Yeah. Well I hope you're successful, man. I hope a lot of people come out to it. I know I'm going to be there. I'm going to bring the little man out. He's going to love his life. Get some music, get some different culture. I love skate culture, man. It's super fascinating. It's it's awesome. And the one thing I say about skate kids in agree to disagree with me on this one, um, is if you're a skate kid, I believe you're going to be okay in life in regards to, to learn a trick, you got to fall
Speaker 3 00:19:17 And hurt your dedication. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:19:18 And you just got to keep doing it and doing it. And then when you land it, like it's the best feeling in the world. But it definitely like show showcases. Like you got to be resilient and keep doing this because you physically get hurt. So when I see skate kids, like I know like culturally, like whatever, but I'm just like, you know what? In life in general, they're going to be okay. They're good.
Speaker 3 00:19:38 Okay. Yeah. You're going to be okay. One of the other things that really, uh, blows the mind is, is the, the age ranges, uh, you know, for kids, it doesn't seem to matter at the skate park. You see 13 year olds, you see 18 year olds, you see nine year olds and 40 year olds. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I saw you down there last week. Not quite, uh, anyways, but you know, you see these kids, they, they, I always hear stories and it's like, you know, like a mom like takes her nine year old to the skate park and he's like, there's a bunch of old kids and they're all swearing and smoke and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. She's like, but then like my kid was like trying to like land something and like they went over, one of them went over and he's like, Hey man, like try this, try this. And like, so accommodate. I remember when I was like 13 and the 16, 17, 18 year old kids were like super like super supportive and encouraging like, Hey, try this, give this a shot. Like you gotta watch your, like, there it's everybody teaches themselves. But at the same, because you know, there's no formal lessons in skateboarding, but at the same time, you've always got these, this great group of people to kind of fall back on. Right.
Speaker 0 00:20:35 I love it's all love then everybody falls. So they're there.
Speaker 3 00:20:39 And BMX, BMX riders, shout out to YouTube. We have BMX competition and we've even added a scooter Jan this year. I don't think I don't have to rush.
Speaker 0 00:20:47 Well here, we're at the part of the show where it's your shameless shout out or plug. So let's hear about the event all over again, all the awesome stuff you got going on this one
Speaker 3 00:20:55 Again. So it's noon to 10:00 PM this Saturday at the Syncrude athletic park Timberly skate park. Um, we had an after party at 57 north originally, but unfortunately we had canceled that with the new restrictions. So we decided we're going to move the after party straight to the beer gardens. Um, it was going to be ticketed event, uh, for the after party and now it's free. So, which is pretty awesome. We're working on a couple extra sponsors to kind of cover the cost of that. So if anybody wants to sponsor the event, hit me up. But, uh, I think we're pretty good shape now. And like I said, it's going to be a fun day. I think we're going to have a bunch of different crowds. You know, you're going to cut a, see some families during the day and kind of see some of the more of the older punk rock crew kind of come out at night, come out of hiding once it starts to get a little bit darker and uh, once the hangovers, the past when the night before, and, uh, we're just going to have a great time. So I hope you can all check us out, rock the rails YMM on Facebook and Instagram, uh, and a big shout out to noble choice, coaching United rentals, seller direct and all of our other amazing sponsors. Uh, we've got the whole poster. I'll throw that in the comments somewhere. We've got all the, all the sponsors I want to thank all of them. Uh, especially the ones that have come in super last minute, just to be able to help us make sure this event goes off without a hitch. There we go.
Speaker 0 00:22:05 Oh, awesome. There you go. Well, Fort McMurray wood, Buffalo. That's another episode of the Mac city morning show completed, please, please, please go out and check out this event. Uh, you're watching this, I think it's Friday. So you'll be seeing this in lifetime. So go support the event tomorrow. Other than that, hopefully you're having a great day and we'll see you tomorrow. Peace.
