The Five Stages of Grief

December 25, 2010 - In 1969, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross introduced what has become known as the five stages of grief. The five stages are:

1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance

The model was originally used to describe the process that people go through when suffering from terminal illness, but was later expanded to other personal losses such as death of a loved one, break up and divorce, job loss, etc. Kubler-Ross explained that while not everyone will experience all five stages at a time of loss, most people experience at least two of the stages and many experience a roller coaster effect - that is going back and forth between the different stages.

I don't know where I am on this spectrum. Over the past 12 hours, I think I have experienced all five stages. There were times when I'm definitely in denial. I was angry at times but mostly just sad and disappointed. I've cried and yelled. I've tried to tell myself it will be okay and have tried to understand it, but I'm still confused as ever. Then it goes back to the denial stage all over again.

I feel like a part of me died. And I'm in mourning.

Its weird that I'm coming back to blogging after a few years away, but I think writing about the end of this once very important, if not the most important part of my life will hopefully help me deal with it better.

Olympics Wrap-Up

August 24, 2008 - So after 2 weeks of watching more sports than I have in the past 2 years, my Olympics watching officially came to an end with the Closing Ceremony (which I had to watch on youtube!). Surprisingly, I watched way more of the Beijing Olympics than I thought I would, thanks to the CBC online streaming site that allowed me to watch pretty much every sport and almost every race or competition that I want. With the end of what may be the most spectacular Olympics ever, I thought I would share three of my most memorable moments of these games (at least the moments that I managed to watch):

- Matthew Mitcham of Australia wins gold in 10m diving and kisses his boyfriend in front of tv cameras

This kid (only 20 years old!) managed to beat the heavily favourite Chinese divers with an amazing final dive and won the only gold medal in diving that did not go to China. How did he celebrate his win? by running to the stands and kisseing his mom and his boyfriend! Aww. He is also the only openly gay male athlete out of the 11,000 at the Olympics. Kudos to him for 1) winning the gold medal; 2) being openly gay in a field that's still homophobic and 3) for making his sponsors fly his boyfriend over from Sydney so he could watch him compete. It doesn't hurt that he's super cute as well.

- Matthias Steiner of Germany cries on the podium holding a picture of his late wife after winning gold

No one really thought he would win gold in weightlifting after he failed to lift the two lighter weights. In his final shot, he decided to go for it and raised his weights by 10 kg - to 258 kg. He groaned, yelled and lifted it over his head. The announcers were clearly shocked - no one thought he could do it. On the podium, as the German national anthem played, and with tears flowing down his face - he took out a picture and smiled at it: it was a picture of his late wife, who died a year ago in a car accident. On her death bed, he had promised he would make their joint Olympic dreams come true. And that he did.

- Natalie du Toit of South Africa swims in the open water race with one leg

For many, it's hard enough to swim with two legs, but this girl from South Africa became probably the first one-legged swimmer to swim in an Olympic competition. Her determination and grits are hard to match. She finished 16th in the race, but she is definitely inspirational. Anyone who came back from the shock of losing their leg to training for the Olympics deserves our applause.

The excitement of winning medals at the Olympics are truly memorable, but what I think makes the Olympics special are these truly inspirational stories. I'm sure I missed a whole bunch too, like that story of the US swimmer who has testicular cancer at 24 and still swam in the Olympics, or the story of the Somalian girl who came in last in the 200m race but still got a standing ovation. It's great that for 2 weeks every 4 years, the world focuses not on multi-millionaire baseball players or hockey players, but on real athletes that show what true sportsmanship is all about.

Am I Moving to Vancouver?

August 21, 2008 - As some of you know, I have been applying for jobs for months now. My theory is that it never hurts to see what's out there, cause you never know what could happen. So to my surprise, on Monday, I got a call from TransLink, the regional transit authority in Vancouver, asking me to do a phone interview with them for a Transit Planner position!!

To say I was shocked is an understatement, given the fact that I have applied to out of province (and out of the country) jobs a number of times and have never gotten an interview. To have the opportunity to interview for what sounds like my dream job in my dream city is really truly unbelievable.

Of course, even if I do get the job (and I don't think I will based on my interview today), it's not like I will take it. Yeah, it's great to imagine how cool it would be to move to Vancouver, but really, am I willing to give up everything that I have now and start fresh in another city? I think the answer, at this point is no.

Oh well. At least I tried!

Montreal is the new Boardwalk?

August 20, 2008 - Back in February, I blogged about the new Monopoly "Word Cities" edition contest where voters can choose which 20 cities will make the board for this new version of the game. Today, the full list of cities were announced: Montreal shockingly will become the new Boardwalk, with Riga, Latvia as the new Park Place.

I'm not sure how Montreal became the most expensive real estate (over London, Paris and New York?) but I guess kudos to Hasbro (the folks behind Monopoly) for sticking to the results of the voting by fans. Still, if it was really based on a list of world cities, I highly doubt Riga, Kyiv, Taipei and Gdynia (I had to look up where that is - it's in Poland) would ever make the list.

It's a bit disappointing - but at least two other Canadian cities made the list: Vancouver (as the new New York Ave) and Toronto (as the new Virginia Ave). But no South American cities? or any other American cities other than New York? a bit shocking.

The board game itself is pretty though - each block has a picture that features the city and around the blocks are pictures of the 68 cities that didn't make the list. Definitely a more worthwhile collector's item than other editions I think.

Here's the full list of 22 cities that made it into the game:

Dark Blue: Montreal, Riga
Green: Cape Town, Belgrade, Paris
Yellow: Jerusalem, Hong Kong, Beijing
Red: London, New York, Sydney
Orange: Vancouver, Shanghai, Rome
Magenta: Toronto, Kyiv, Istanbul
Light Blue: Athens, Barcelona, Tokyo
Brown: Taipei, Gdynia

I got 11/20 from my list - not too bad I guess! The game will be on sale starting August 26.

(Photo credit: Kris Abel/CTV)