The Vancouver Sun Run

Dear Dianne Garrett,
Another Vancouver Sun Run has come and gone. This year's 54,317 participants was breaking new record, exceeding last year's 50,746. As usual it was a wave starts, 5 all together. Each wave was marked by coloured balloons high above their starting lines. Yellow balloons for fastest runners, followed by greens, whites, purples and reds. The fastest runners starting first then the slower ones. It was done to prevent collisions and accidents. The starting gate was marked by the noisy chip sensors to detect individual numbers on the chip placed on runners' shoes, and recorded the starting times. Similar sensors were placed at the finish line to record finish times. The race started from West Georgia at Burrard heading west to Stanley Park, continued to Beach Avenue, Burrard bridge, West 6th, Cambie bridge and finished at BC Place Stadium. The route was dotted with big numbers from 1-9 indicating the distance in km to the finish line.

The winner this year for the men section was Soloman Tsige from Ethiopia with time of 29:23 and the prize $3000. Dylan Wykes won $1000 for 2nd place + $2000 for top Canadian, Ryan Hayden won $500 for 3rd place + $1000 for 2nd top Canadian. The women section was won by Teyiba Erkesso Wako also from Ethiopia with time of 32:05 and receive the prize of $3000. Lioudmila Kortchaguina won $1000 for 2nd place + $2000 for top Canadian, and Lisa Harvey won $500 for 3rd place + $1000 for 2nd top Canadian. The Kenyans that dominated the event 11 times in the last 13, did not participate, so the Ethiopians took over. People from East Africa seem to be very good at distance running.

And what was my time? It was a "decent" 154:15, about 2 1/2 hours. I was keeping my neighbour company participating for the first time. It was a very nice day, and we had a leisure walk. We visited nearly all of the water stations, and stopped at nearly all of the pit stops. If you had to go you had to go, I guess. A day later, she called me to complain about not being able to get up because of sore body, even after taking Tylenol 3. And added that this would be her first and her last. I just laughed and said that first time Sun Runners always said that, and next year they will be back again. I also pointed out to her that the Sun Run is all about participation, exercises and healthy living. No pain no gain.

Let's play Chess

Dear Inna Suvorov,
I have not played in any chess tournament for a very long time now. I used to play chess with a co-worker of varying shift over the phone, or met occasionally over coffee. We both had magnetic chess sets, and left messages on the answering machine for the moves. We kind of on the same level of skill, with him winning 60% of the time. We completed a game in one week, sometimes longer. Then I lost interest and stopped playing. And after we moved on in different jobs later on in life, we lost track of each others, and that was that. The last time I heard from him, was that he was joining an Internet chess club with opponents from all over the world with equal or higher ratings. He suggested me to join, but declined.

A few weeks ago I read this article in the newspaper about a chess tournament in Mexico the "Morelia / Linares Super GM Tournament". It was Grandmasters only tournament that participated by the top 8 Grandmasters in the world, so the "Super GM" name. Each player played each other twice, 14 rounds in all. Evidently they played in 2 countries, the first 7 rounds they played in Morelia, Mexico and the last 7 rounds played in Linares, Andalusia, Spain. The tournament was amazingly won by Indian chess Grandmaster Vishy Anand. And because of his win, he became the highest rank grandmaster in the world with FIDE rating of 2816. This is better by 15 points over 2 grandmasters with same ratings of 2801: Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria and Vladimir Kramnik of Russia, both participated in that event. This is the first time ever that the best player in the world hold by a "non white", and people in India took a very great pride and joy because of his achievement.
And that piece of news, all of a sudden sparked some interest in me to play chess again. So I did some inquiries and located a chess club near my place, a 10 minutes drive away. They meet 3 times/week from 7-11 pm. I also inquired the British Columbia Chess Federation (BCCF) and got some website addresses about chess in BC and Canada in general. And to my surprise they still have my name on their players list with my old rating of 1875. But that is way too high now, probably my rating now is 1600 or less because of inactivity for a very long time. Although my highest rating was 1985 when I was a member of "Perth Chess Club" in Western Australia.
In Canada, I used to be a member of "Port Coquitlam Chess Club", and competing in regular tournaments there with mixed results. But my best result was second place at "New Westminster Open" awhile back. I joined chess tournaments at "British Columbia Institute of Technology" a few times in the past with also mixed results, no prizes to show for. You need to be in top 3 from 25-35 players competing to have a prize. I played a couple of times at the prestigious "Keres Memorial" chess tournament which is conducted every year in May at the Hungarian Cultural Centre in Vancouver. I had a very strong results from the 2 tournaments I entered that gave me the good rating of 1875. Although still no award or prize to show for, I managed to beat some very good players and felt that I accomplished something. Now come to think of it, I definitely will be going to see this year's "Keres Memorial" tournament in May 18-21,2007. But not playing in it, just watching it, because of lack of preparation I will be just embarrassing myself if I play. Check mated in 5 moves or something. It is a very strong tournament using 7 round Swiss system over 4 days during Victoria day long weekends. Many players from all over Canada and United States come to play.

In the past I had good results from playing chess. I received a few trophies and cash to show for. In Australia I won once the "Fremantle Open". Came in 1st and 3rd in "Western Australian Open" Reserve Division 2 years in a row in a strong fields. My rating then shot to 1985. There was an Indonesian Obstetrician from Jakarta participating with me in those 2 years. He was an avid chess player doing specialized Obstetrics training in Perth, and a very good player himself. I also joined the prestigious "Perth Chess Club" and played a few tournaments there with mixed results. I won the "Perth Muslim Students Association Chess Tournament" once with strong fields. In Indonesia I won 2 years in a row at "Rumbai Chess Club" tournaments in Sumatra with moderate fields. In Canada I came in 1st and 2nd at the "Indonesian Independence Day Chess Tournament" in Vancouver organized by the Indonesian Consulate with moderate fields from Indonesian students at UBC and SFU 2 years in a row. So I have some credentials in playing good chess. I used to play Ruy Lopez variations for playing white pieces and Sicilian Defence for playing blacks. But I am kind of blurred now how to play them effectively.
By the way the most Grandmasters in the world are from Russia with 164, highest rank is Vladimir Kramnik (2801 rating). I do not know why the Russians are so good in playing chess, maybe something to do with their harsh winter. At one time they had more Grandmasters than the rest of the world combined twice over. Imagine that. Canada has 5 Grandmasters, with highest rank Kevin Spraggett (2611), followed by Alexandre Lesiege, Mark Bluvshtein, Dmitri Tyomlin and Pascal Charbonneau. And Indonesia has 4 Grandmasters, with highest rank Utut Adianto (2587) followed by Susanto Megaranto, Cerdas Barus and Edhi Handoko.

(Photo): "Final" at Rumbai Chess Club, Sumatra, Indonesia. This photo was supposed to be in color, but our Rumbai Photography Club of which I was a member, could only process in B&W print.

Training time

Dear Hilary Trotman,
The 10 km Vancouver Sun Run will take place on Sunday April 15, 2007 at 9 am. The results of the race will be published on the daily newspaper "Vancouver Sun". I am doing my training every other day around my neighbourhoods. I have a few routes for my practise run that I do alternately each time. It is about 6 km distance that takes me 45-50 minutes to complete, mostly by running and walking. I am passing by 3 neighbourhood parks on all the routes and do stretching exercises in 1 or 2 of those parks. I try to choose the routes through residential and avoid the car's fumes from the main road. But unfortunately for 5 minutes back and forth I have to run beside the main road. I am really all set to Go!
Here I attached a couple of photos of locations that I pass each time on my run.

(Bottom photo) Going out of residential neighbourhoods into main road. This one with Vancouver city skylines at the background.

(Top photo) Coming back on the home stretch, I will pass a parking lot of a Community College that now has been turned into a construction zone. The parking lot is slated for expansion to the Community College with a 6 story tall building. The existing College are the 2 buildings shown at the back. I usually stop at the site and do stretching exercises on the pedestrian look-out provided, whilst watching all the activities there. I am always fascinated by construction activities.

Simon Fraser University

Dear Dr Tomas Tarigan,
There are 2 universities in the Greater Vancouver area, University of British Columbia (UBC) and Simon Fraser University (SFU). A few years back I took a very good friend of mine Mintayu br Sembiring visiting from Jakarta (bottom photo), I am sure that you have met her before, to tour SFU main campus in Burnaby, a suburb of Vancouver.

SFU is located on top of Burnaby Mountain, about 45 minutes drive from where I live. It is the highest point in Burnaby, 1100 feet above sea level and has a commanding view of the surrounding areas, including the Fraser River and Vancouver City skyline in the distance. It is the best and most expensive property location reserved for higher learning to keep students inspired and motivated. SFU was designed by Arthur Erickson a UBC architecture professor and his partner Geoffrey Massey with design for growth in mind. The growth was to be incremental and continuous, and to date is still growing and expanding depending on future programs need. SFU was named after a British explorer, Simon Fraser that could be called the founding father of British Columbia, who explored land west of Rocky Mountains and the Fraser River from 1805-1818.
The SFU was opened in September 9, 1965 with 2500 students. Now there are about 25 000 students across 3 campuses: Burnaby as the main campus and the extensions in Vancouver and Surrey. Simon Fraser University offered students in undergraduate and post graduate studies in 6 faculties:

Faculty of Applied Sciences with 5 programs.
Faculty of Arts&Social Sciences: 27 programs.
Faculty of Business Administration: 9.
Faculty of Education: 11 programs.
Faculty of Health Sciences: 2 programs.
Faculty of Science with 11 programs ranging from Biological Sciences to Statistic&Actuarial Sciences.
Counting the specialized and minor programs, there are close to 100 programs in total from the 6 faculties with the 25 000 students enrolled in.

As you might have noticed that Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Law, Faculty of Dentistry are not offered at SFU. Nor programs in Civil, Electrical and Mechanical Engineering from Faculty of Applied Sciences among other things not offered at SFU. What you can not get at SFU, you probably can get it at University of British Columbia, because the 2 universities are complementing each other. There are close to 4000 students now are doing post graduate studies from various programs in the 6 faculties. A High School graduate with an average of 75% will meet most of the admission requirements to undergraduate programs at SFU.
SFU also has a program in International Development partnership, to assist developing countries in strengthening their knowledge infrastructure, by offering graduate studies to their professionals in the fields of research and development. I have met a few of students in that respect: one Indonesian lecturer from University in Menado doing post graduate studies leading to his MSc in Statistics, another Indonesian lecturer from University in Medan doing his MSc in Resource Management, one student from China doing his MSc and continue to do his PhD in Mathematics and one student from Peru doing his MSc in Physics.
The library is one of the best looking architecture at SFU, and matched with good reference books that are available there. It is an active learning place in itself. Every summer SFU is conducting a lecture series by inviting prominent scholars giving lecture that is open to general public. The prominent Scientist and Conservationist Dr Birute Galdikas an expert in primatologist giving such lecture a few times in the past. She has been over 25 years involved in research and preservation of endangered "orang utan" in Tanjung Puting National Park, Kalimantan, Indonesia.

SFU also has a very good sport programs available to students ranging from basketball, cross-country, football, golf, soccer, softball, swimming, track&field, volley ball and wrestling. A pity that they don't have badminton, my favourite. But they do have regular competition with other universities across Canada in many of the sports above, which organized by CIS (Canadian Inter universities Sport) and NAIA (National Association Intercollegiate Athletics). It is important to have a sound body to have a sound mind by exercising regularly.

(Top photo): Academic Quadrangle, contains major lecture halls, classrooms, offices, corridors and large outdoor gardens. Convocation takes place twice a year one in June and another in October. The parades of Graduates begin at the AQ gardens.
(Bottom photo): Convocation Mall, has a glass roof that covers the entire area. It is used for graduation ceremony, rain snow or shine.

Get Set

Dear Tatang Hermawan,
Every year since 2001, I have been participating in the "Vancouver Sun Run", a 10 km run sponsored by newspaper Vancouver Sun and the HSBC bank. The Vancouver Sun Run was started in 1985, and now well into it's 22nd year is the largest 10 km event in Canada, and only second in North America. No doubt with over 50 000 participants in 2006 was the largest ever. The route begins at downtown core at the corner of Georgia and Burrard Streets, continues through Stanley Park, then follows the shoreline of English Bay and finishes outside BC Place Stadium. This year will take place on Sunday April 15, 2007. As usual in the morning the whole blocks of downtown Vancouver and part of Stanley Park where the run is conducted will be closed to traffic except only to emergency vehicles.

I joined the North Vancouver Running Club (NVRC) when I started running in September 2000. There are many running clubs in Vancouver, but I chose NVRC because they are better organized. They practise 3 times a week, but I usually join the Sunday morning practise, because it suits me better. I practise my run during the week on every other day around my neighbourhoods for 45-50 minutes. We are not all runners though, depending on the skill and endurance of individuals, from walkers only, walkers and runners only, and runners only. I usually join the walkers and runners only, it means we walk and run alternately, each week progressing to become full runners by April, a 3 1/2 months training. First week in January starting with run 1 minute and walk 5 minutes, repeating that run/walk ratio 1/5 for 50-60 minutes practise time 3x a week. It keeps progressing to the following weeks from run/walk ratio of 1/5 to next stage of 1/4, 2/3, 3/2, 4/2, 5/2, 7/2, 10/1, 20/1, 22/1, 25/1, 40/1 and 50/1 by April. At ratio of 50/1, run 50 minutes and walk 1 minute, we will be able to beat the magic number of 1 hour time for the 10 km distance. But I could not keep up with the progressions, by the time 25/1 run/walk ratio, my legs and lungs start complaining, so 25/1 kind of my maximum. I often join the runners only group, but only as stragglers always behind with 1 or 2 others. There will be stretching up exercises before and after the run to prevent muscle injuries. The total practise time will be about 1 1/2 hours. My best time for the Vancouver Sun Run was 62 minutes for the 10 km distance, that was when I ran for 54 minutes (actually 2x27 minutes), and fast walked 2x4 minutes. We usually practise our run in different location each time to make it more interesting. So everybody meet at the scheduled time and location. We practise in these locations regularly: Lynn Headwaters Regional Park, Capilano River Regional Park, Ambleside Park, Seymour Demonstration Forest, Bridgman Park, Mosquito Creek Park and Kirkstone Park. Every year after the Run my legs felt sore without fail. The first year I have to take off sick from work for a couple of days, and took me 1 week in total to have my legs back to normal. But now I am used to it, even though after the Run I still feel sore, after 1 day my legs will be back to normal again.

There are many other races other than The Vancouver Sun Run. Some of the members went to Victoria to join the 10 km race there, or to Kelowna, or to Seattle in the States, to Los Angeles, or even to Hawaii. They combine it with their vacation times for sure. I join mostly the one in Vancouver at least one other race a year. I like the "Pacific Spirit Run" in mid May, "Coho Run" in mid September, "Turkey Trot Run" mid October and "CIBC Run for Cancer" in mid October. I follow very closely with great interest the "Vancouver International Marathon" at the beginning of May each year. It is a 42 km marathon that attracted runners from all over the world. No it is not for me.

Spring Flowers

Dear Eka Mustikawaty,

This shrub with yellow flowers is called Forsythia. Forsythia is very well known and flowering very early in the spring. Because of winter in Vancouver is not so severe, and it feels spring like weather already, you can see them blooming everywhere. I took this photo today just in my neighbourhood. Spring is more brighter with the presence of yellow flowers of Forsythia that cover the whole tree. The leaves come later just before the flowers fall to the ground. Forsythia can grow as high as 3 m.


This is Flowering Cherry. This tree can grow to 30 m, and typically flowering very early in the spring also. I took this photo a couple of blocks away in front of a Nursing Home. This tree is native to Canada. But the profusely flowering Japanese Cherry tree is more common now in Canadian gardens, because it gives abundance of bright flowers, not too tall and requires smaller space to grow.
I noticed also that there are other plants starting to bloom too: heather is a ground cover with white and purple flowers, camelia is a shrub with yellow and red flowers and some species of rhododendron, Japanese pieris and magnolia with flowers in purple, red and white.

Spring time

Dear Tiur br Tarigan,
It is still winter in Vancouver, up to March 21 where spring begins. A few days ago I went for a walk to New Brighton Park, near Port of Vancouver, and took this picture overlooking North Shore Mountains. You can see the snow line half way up the mountains indicating the 0 C freezing level, about 500 m above sea level. There are a lot of snow in the mountains, good for skiing especially in the 3 ski resorts nearby ranging from 30 minutes to 1 hour drive away, where the snows are thicker helped by snow making equipments: Grouse Mountain, Mount Seymour and Cypress Bowl. This time of year all of them packed with cross-country and downhill skiers. I used to do cross-country skiing myself mostly at Cypress Bowl, a 1 hour drive away from where I live. I am only a beginner skier, but learnt fast and in the process of perfecting my "telemark" turn technique. But not anymore since I hurt my back 3 years ago at work. My back is better now, and considering doing it again and I still have my skiing equipment in the storage. Maybe next year if I feel fit I will try cross-country skiing again, it is a lot of fun.

Vancouver winter is usually less severe than the rest of Canada, although it will still be cold, wet and windy. It is seldom snowing, perhaps 2-3 times a year, but more often in higher elevations. Now it feels like spring weather already, day time temperatures hovering around 8-10 C. Spring always come early, usually towards first week of March. This is due to the warm current coming from the Pacific Ocean. The plants are already budding, raring to grow. Spring is the time for dormant plants to come to life again. There are already a lot of them starting to bloom. Funny though when the plants awake from their winter sleep, they show flowers first then leaves. I guess that's how nature works, and the blooms make spring time even more beautiful.