seattle
Seattle’s Vietnamese Community Rallies Around A Village Called Versailles
Our panelists (l. to r.) Nanette Fok, Thao Nguyen, Trang Tu, and Trong Pham
Despite another unusually gorgeous sunny day in Seattle, we had 130 people attend our recent free Community Cinema Seattle premiere event for A Village Called Versailles. Eight people showed up just for the panel discussion. The audience loved the film finding it humorous, touching, and inspiring. There were big reactions to the story and the people in the film. The audience laughed, gasped, and were silently moved by the inspirational residents of East New Orleans’ Versailles.
We were lucky to have Trang Tu on our panel. Trang, an urban planner, is featured in the film. She spoke eloquently about Versailles and then about plans for development in Seattle and how the community can support or protest the new development in Little Saigon. Trang was integral in the development of the master plan for the rebuilding of Versailles.
Repeating that message was Thao T. Nguyen of the Vietnamese Friendship Association and Neighborhood House. Thao is a young board member who gave the audience some great tips for local activism and community support.
The Vietnamese feast provided by the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce
Our moderator, Nanette Fok, is a local activist and community organizer who drew fascinating opinions and stories from our panel. She asked how the lessons learned in A Village Called Versailles could be applied to Seattle. The audience decided that the film was an excellent catalyst topics like disaster preparedness on the community/neighborhood level.
Also on the panel was Trong Pham, President of the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce, who spoke about the robust Vietnamese business community in Seattle. He and the Chamber sponsored a Vietnamese feast in the lobby after the event. At least 50-60 people stayed after the panel discussion and mingled and networked in the lobby.
Seattle Really Loves Its Dirt
March in Seattle has historically been notoriously wet and gray. This past Saturday was the perfect cloudless day to enjoy Seattle Center's International Fountain and lawns.
This past Saturday a diverse audience enjoyed part of their day at the free Community Cinema Seattle premiere screening of Dirt! The Movie at Seattle Center. On an unusually gorgeous sunny day in Seattle – especially odd for early March – the audience was eager to discuss what was being done to help Seattle’s ecosystem heal itself and ways they could help. The speakers kept offering to move the discussion out to the sun-drenched lobby, but the entire audience stayed for the entire discussion. Many stayed to ask questions and the topic quickly turned to chickens and worms, but more on that later.
Our panelists and local event partners are inovators in an already crowded field of bioneers in the Seattle and Puget Sound region. We were so fortunate to be joined by Kathryn A. Gardow, Executive Director of PCC Farmland Trust and Brad Halm, a farmer and co-owner of The Seattle Urban Farm Company, which has garnered quite a bit of press for its creative and friendly approach to urban gardening and farming.
Kathryn started by thanking the audience for showing up on such a beautiful cloudless day. She enjoyed the film and asked for a show hands from the audience if they agreed, and every hand shot up. She went on to explain what PCC Farmland Trust is and what it does. PCC Farmland Trust secures, preserves and stewards threatened farmland in the Pacific Northwest, to ensure that generations of local farmers productively farm it using sustainable, organic growing methods. The Trust takes its mission one step further than most land trusts by working to place farmers on the property, actively producing food for the local community. The PCC Farmland Trust is an independent, community-supported non-profit land trust. It was founded in 1999 by PCC Natural Markets as a separate, non-profit organization. Since inception, the Trust has saved four farms totaling 549 acres. What is now PCC Natural Markets began as a food-buying club of 15 families in 1953. Today, it’s the largest consumer-owned natural food retail co-operative in the United States.
Brad Halm (left) and Kathryn Gardow (right) spoke passionately about organic farming and farmland preservation after the Seattle Premiere of Dirt! The Movie
Brad Halm of The Seattle Urban Farm Company is a native of Ohio. He developed an interest in sustainable agriculture while helping tend a garden with housemates at Denison University. That interest has since grown as he has worked on a number of organic farms in Ohio and Pennsylvania, and was most recently employed as the manager of the Community Supported Agriculture program at Village Acres Farm in Mifflintown, Pennsylvania. The Seattle Urban Farm Company uses only organic methods to manage their clients’ gardens, so the soil will be healthy and productive for years to come. Vegetables will be free of herbicides, synthetic pesticides, and genetically modified organisms. By bringing farmers into a yard, it helps share the risks of growing food. If the weather is poor, a garden is not as productive as it might otherwise be. If the weather is good, a garden can produce a bumper crop of delectable vegetables. And your chickens and worms can eat the rest, but more on that later. › Continue reading
Seattle’s Raging Grannies Stay Young At Heart By Staying Active As Activists
Seattle's Raging Grannies Keep Young at Heart By Performing Humorous Songs About Current Events
This past Saturday Community Cinema Seattle presented a special holiday season screening of the film festival favorite YOUNG@HEART at the SIFF Cinema at Seattle Center. I am Patrick, the National Community Cinema Coordinator for the Northwest, and I also keep the Community Cinema Blog online and updated. I am pleased to share my thoughts on this past Saturday’s event.
It was unusually brisk for Seattle and great “movie weather.” Seattle Center, Seattle’s cultural hub, was bustling with people headed toward the Pacific NW Ballet, the Seattle Children’s Theatre, and our free screening of YOUNG@HEART.
The Seattle Raging Grannies opened the show with a few humorous ditties they’ve written about the issues of today. The Grannies say on their web site, “In the tradition of wise women elders, the mission of the Seattle Raging Grannies is to promote global peace, justice, and social and economic equality by raising public awareness through the medium of song and humor.” The audience in the crowded theatre applauded after each of the Grannies’ numbers. Though they rarely all perform together, the Grannies chorus has over 20 members throughout the area. They told us, “We sing out to gain respect for all persons and encourage everyone to grow above their prejudices.” Please enjoy a few clips from the Seattle Raging Grannies performance ripped from the headlines.
The Grannies were followed by our special free Community Cinema screening of YOUNG@HEART. We rounded out the day with an inspiring audience discussion about aging, keeping active, and staying young at heart.
Following The Film We Spoke With Local Active Seniors Who Also Took Questions From The Audience
Our speakers (pictured left to right) included local 89 year old writer and comedienne, Georgie Kunkel who shared her excitement about her upcoming stand-up comedy gig. Her friend Christine shared her stories about being a riveter on the assembly line of the B-17 bomber during World War II. She was quite proud of their ability to build 3 massive steel B-17 nose cones in a day. Following the war, she told us about being the 1950′s equivalent of today’s “Super Mom.” We were also joined by two members of Seattle’s Raging Grannie’s chorus who talked about how writing and performing song parodies about current events keeps them on their toes even when medical conditions keep them off their feet. “Our mission as a chorus,” they explained, “is to challenge our audiences to work to bring about the social changes that are required in order to end economic oppression, particularly of women and children. We also sing to end racial inequality, environmental destruction, human rights violations, and arms proliferation.” The Seattle Raging Grannies are always looking for new members, so if you’re interested they would love to hear from you.
Georgie was adamant that everyone – not just senior citizens – stay active both physically and mentally every day to keep young at heart.
Community Cinema Seattle Partners With PAPER
Members of the Puget Area Paperfolding Enthusiasts Roundtable (PAPER) assisted audience members in folding a range of origami pieces following the free screening of the paper folding documentary BETWEEN THE FOLDS shown Saturday, November 21 in Seattle at the SIFF Cinema. There are dozens of free screenings of BETWEEN THE FOLDS remaining around the country in November.
Community Classroom Engaging Seattle Teachers Through Film
Community Classroom currently offers a diverse selection of FREE DVDs and online modules designed with teachers, students, classroms, and community learning in mind.
The Seattle International Film Festival presents myriad year-round events, workshops, and films
On Tuesday, Dustin Kaspar, Educational Programs Coordinator for the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) presented Community Classroom to a group of teachers from various Social Studies departments throughout the Seattle Public Schools system. Local ITVS National Community Coordinator, Patrick Baroch, provided each teacher with a free DVD and information about upcoming events. Free Community Classroom materials feature curricula paired with specially edited video modules taken from the best of Independent Lens and other cutting-edge documentaries, Web original projects, and online activities. All activities incorporate national standards, teaching strategies, worksheets and extension ideas. These FREE resources are a powerful tool for teaching and learning around issues crucial to educating young people in classroom and community settings. Kaspar said, “The training was a rousing success, and teachers were very excited about the availability of the free DVDs.” Teachers learned about the diverse calendar of films at SIFF Cinema, the film festival’s year-round cinematheque who also partners with Community Cinema. Kaspar shared a clip from Community Cinema selection MARCH POINT (which was shot by teens north of and in Seattle and Washington, D.C.) as an example of youth using film to tell their story. The teachers took their materials back to their schools to share with colleagues and students. Turn your classroom into a Community Classroom.
Seattle Has Something To Say About COPYRIGHT CRIMINALS
KUBE 93 FM is Seattle's #1 Hip Hop and R&B Radio Station
This past Saturday, Community Cinema Seattle presented COPYRIGHT CRIMINALS at the SIFF Cinema at Seattle Center, a 74-acre campus at the north end of downtown home to more than 30 cultural, educational, sports, and entertainment organizations. The film, about sampling in music and who really owns a sound, resonated deeply in a town with so many musical interests. Seattle is the birthplace to grunge but is also one of America’s urban centers where positive hip-hop is drawing a large following (Blue Scholars, Gabriel Teodros, and others). Music in Seattle is a true mash-up. We screened COPYRIGHT CRIMINALS in the lecture hall theatre shared by the Seattle Opera, the Pacific Northwest Ballet, and the Seattle International Film Festival. One of Seattle’s foremost hip-hop DJs, DJ Hyphen of KUBE 93 FM, talked to us about a few of the film’s topics in the lobby before the film. He observes, “There is a fine line between borrowing and stealing.”
The film suggests that sampling is similar to other forms of reproduction in art, but DJ Hyphen suggests that because the art – in this case – is hip hop music that the same rules do not apply.
DJ Hypen also introduced the film for the entire audience and left them with a few things to consider while watching the film.
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communitycinema: #Compost THIS! Cow/horse manure (outdoors only), cardboard rolls, chopped leaves, coffee grounds (worms love these) MORE: http://dld.bz/kSXD
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Simon Kilmurry: RT @communitycinema: Women's Engagement Film Series NEXT MONTH! Partners incl @unfpa @CARE @unifem @povdocs http://dld.bz/nQbH #FF Thanks!