From BCB... http://bestofbcb.org/spec-003-david-gutersons-march-2015-address/

In this podcast, the third in our new series of BCB Bainbridge Island specials, we offer award-winning local author David Guterson's reflections on the writing of Snow Falling on Cedars, from a talk delivered at Bainbridge Performing Arts on March 22nd, 2015. This talk is introduced by Kate Carruthers, Director of BPA's Book-It Theater production of Snow Falling on Cedars.

As part of their March presentation of Snow Falling on Cedars, Bainbridge Performing Arts invited Guterson to give a special presentation prior to a matinee performance of the play. Reading Snow Falling on Cedars twenty years later, its author encountered an unexpected mixture of emotions. In this talk he shared these, along with his thoughts on the influences, ideals, and ambitions that led to its writing and what the book means to him now.

It took Guterson five years to write Snow Falling on Cedars, in part because he was teaching full time at Bainbridge High School, and in part because of the extensive research he did on salmon fishing, strawberry farming and the internment. To describe the anti-Japanese hysteria that prevailed in the 1940's, he steeped himself in about 600 pages of oral histories compiled by elderly internees for the Bainbridge Island Japanese-American Community Association. 

And while the fictitious San Piedro Island of Snow Falling on Cedars drifts at some distance from Bainbridge -- on a real map of Puget Sound it would lie in the San Juan Islands -- it is populated by some authentic Bainbridge characters. The literary model for the book, however, was more remote -- Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, the 1960 novel Guterson regularly assigned to his high school English classes. 

Guterson, then 39, received the 1995 PEN/Faulkner Award for Snow Falling on Cedars – a remarkable achievement for a first novel. Even more remarkable was the fact that it went on to be not only a critical but also a commercial success: with over four millions copies sold, it has generated a Hollywood film, a stage play, and countless high school student essays. Ironically, it is his novel that is now showing up in high school curricula – if it hasn’t been banned.

Listen here to hear Guterson's reflections as he looks back 20-30 years at the young man who wrote his book and how it all came to be.

Credits:  BPA audio tech Alex King; BCB audio tech and audio editor Lyssa Danehy de Hart; BCB publisher Diane Walker.

From BCB... http://bestofbcb.org/wu-130-spring-exhibits-at-bima/

In this podcast, Greg Robinson, Executive Director and Curator of the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art, tells us about the new spring 2015 rotation that recently opened.  

There are over 10 exhibits, more than usual, featuring Rosalyn Gale Powell, furniture craftsmen, Raymond Gendreau photography, a group exhibition of metal artists curated by guest curator William Baron-Mickle, chapter 4 of artist’s books, a group show of artists that work in very small scale, and additions from the museum’s permanent collection.  These unique exhibits will be in place until June 7th.

Greg also shares with us his and his team’s process for putting together a new rotation of exhibits three times a year, and their vision for the next few years.

Check back soon to the art museum’s website and the BCB website for more podcasts on Art and Artists, and Curator’s Conversations with Artists.

The Bainbridge Island Museum of Art is conveniently located at the corner of highway 305 and Winslow Way, a short walk from the ferry. Hours are 10 a.m. till 6 p.m. daily, and admission is free.  For more information about the museum and the exhibitions and artists, go to BIMA’s website:  www.biartmuseum.org 

Credits:  BCB host and writer: Channie Peters; BCB audio editor Tim Bird; BCB publisher Diane Walker.

From BCB...http://bestofbcb.org/wu-129-sacred-sound-workshops-at-the-bodhi-center/

The era of health care through sound has arrived.  For three evenings in April, Jennifer Waldron, Ph.D., will be leading a workshop called "SACRED SOUND HEALING FOR PRACTITIONERS.”  

To be offered Thursday evenings, April 2, 16 and 30 from 7-9 pm at the Bodhi Center, this workshop is for people who use sound therapy in their practice or for anyone who would like to know more about how to use sound healing in their daily life. 

The workshop is highly experiential and will use a medley of sacred sound healing tools, from vocal toning to recorded music to sound instruments -- some of which are heard in this podcast. 

Jennifer Waldron, Ph.D., has been studying and practicing sound healing for nearly 20 years.  At her Bainbridge Island studio, she offers monthly chanting, toning classes, speech consulting and energetic healings. 

To register, please contact Jennifer at 206-855-1088 or jenwaldron@comcast.net.

Credits:  BCB host, writer, and audio tech Sandy Schubach; BCB audio editor Tim Bird; BCB publishers Chris and Diane Walker.

From BCB... http://bestofbcb.org/wu-128-end-of-life-conference-april-4/

Following last month’s popular and sold out Aging-in-Place & The Villages Concept workshop, Sue Barrington invites the community to discuss and discover the options available, legal requirements, and benefits of planning for the end of our own lives at an End of Life Conference. To be held from 9 to 3 on Saturday April 4 at the Community Center, the conference offers an opportunity to join with others and learn how end-of-life planning can be the greatest gift we can give both ourselves and our loved ones.  

During the course of the day doctors, lawyers, educators, and many others will offer insights in their areas of expertise. Among these will be Luke Carpenter of the BI Fire Department  (explaining the rules and regulations that make up the protocols that emergency responders must follow when 911 is called); Dr. Dick Baker, a retired teacher of family medicine at UW & UNC who currently volunteers as Medical Director for Compassion & Choices;  and Dr. Jeannette Franks, a passionate gerontologist who has taught ethics, grief and loss, and courses on geriatrics and gerontology for over 20 years at UW.

Everyone attending will learn about and receive an official POLST form (Physicians Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment) and by day’s end, can leave with a legal document ready for use. This form can provide security for patient and physician that patient’s wishes will be carried out.

The $40.00 conference fee includes a binder of information, official documents, & lunch.  For more information, visit www.biparks.org or call 206-842-1616.

Credits:  BCB host, writer, and audio tech Joanna Pyle; BCB audio editor Lyssa Danehy de Hart; BCB publishers Chris and Diane Walker.

From BCB... http://bestofbcb.org/wu-127-april-at-the-bainbridge-public-library/

In this podcast library experts John Fossett and Tressa Johnson present an overview of April events at the Bainbridge Branch of the Kitsap Regional Library.

First off: LIBRARY U

On Saturday April 4 at the BIMA Auditorium from 9:30-11:30, filmmaker Cameron Snow & geologist Gregory Geehan screen their work-in-progress-documentary, “The Geologic Formation of Bainbridge Island.” A discussion of the island’s ancient past as represented by its present geology will follow. 

On Saturday April 11 at the Library from 10-11:30, Hugh Shipman, Coastal Geologist at the Department of Ecology, will discussBainbridge Beaches & Bluffs: Geology on the Edge.

On Saturday April 18 at the Library from 10-11:30, Barnard Hallet, UW Professor in the Department of Geological Sciences, will explain Glaciation.

On Saturday April 24 at the Library from 10-11:30, Dennis Lewarch, Tribal Historic Preservation Office, Suquamish Tribe, will give apresentation interweaving ancestral stories, archaeology, and the geology of BI & Kitsap peninsula.

TRAVELOGUE:

On Wednesday April 15 at the Library from 7:30-9 pm, five master women rowers from Bainbridge Island Rowing will speak on Rowing the Danube: participating with sixty others in an International Rowing Federation trip.

WHAT DO YOU KNOW? 

On Wednesday April 22 at the Library from 7 to 8:30 pm, prepare to be part of Bike to Work & Bike to School month (May) by attending an evening of presentations and hands-on learning with Squeaky Wheels experts B. Sue & Jenny.

OPERA PREVIEW

On Saturday April 25 at the Library from 2:30-4pm: Big voices and belly laughs are on the menu in the Richard Strauss opera Ariadne auf Naxos.  Presented by opera aficionado Norm Hollingshead and funded by the Bainbridge Island Friends of the Library.

Credits:  BCB host, writer, and audio tech Joanna Pyle; BCB audio editor Lyssa Danehy de Hart; BCB publishers Chris and Diane Walker.

From BCB... http://bestofbcb.org/wu-126-intimate-music-march-29/

The Intimate Music Series at St. Barnabas will be showcasing a world premier at its next concert at 7 pm on Sunday, March 29th.  

Canadian composer Arthur Bachmann had Bainbridge musicians in mind when he wrote Wood Poppy and Wild Iris.  The concert, titled Conversations: Music for Strings and Winds, will include a serenade by Ludwig van Beethoven as well as music by 20th century composers. 

This concert features the following musicians:

Stephen BryantViolin

Sue Jane BryantViola

Virginia CziekonskiCello

Suzanne BurtonFlute

Amy Duerr DayOboe and English Horn

Judith LawrenceBassoon

Sponsored in part by St. Barnabas Episcopal Church and BI Arts & Humanities Council, the series is in its second season.  More information at www.intimatemusicseries.com

Credits:  BCB host, writer, audio tech and editor Sandy Schubach; BCB publisher Diane Walker.

This second show in the new podcast series of BCB Bainbridge Island Specials is a recording of Part 2 of "Dear Editor: Letters to the Bainbridge Review", by the cast of Island Theater.

This rendition is a documentary for radio recorded on March 1, 2015 at the BCB Studios, and it was also presented to a live audience in February 2015 at the Bainbridge Island Public Library.  The performance is part of the Island Theater's 20th anniversary season.

This 2-part recording is read aloud by the following Island Theater cast members:

• Diane Bankart
• Charlie Hamilton
• Debbi Lester
• Fred Saas
• Tell Schreiber
• Pat Scott
• Diane Walker

The Director of the production for Island Theater was Tell Schreiber.

In this part 2, there is one last letter from the era of World War II, and the remaining letters in this 30-minute podcast are from the ensuing decades.

For Part 1 of this reading for radio, see BCB's first Island Theater podcast.

Credits: BCB producer, editor and publisher: Barry Peters

In this podcast, Clarence Moriwaki, who is the president of the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial Association, describes the upcoming March 30 anniversary commemoration at the Exclusion Memorial.

Clarence, Japanese Americans residents, the Interfaith Council, government officials and many community members and nonprofits have worked 14 years to create and develop the Memorial.

The day marks the 73rd anniversary of the tragic day in March 1942 when more than 200 Japanese American residents of Bainbridge were forced under military guard to leave their homes and lands behind. Bainbridge was the first west coast community to suffer from the forced exclusion of Japanese Americans at a time marked by wartime fear and shock over Pearl Harbor.

This year, the theme of the day is "Service and Community." To show community solidarity, the public is invited to come to the Memorial in work clothes as early as 9am to pull weeds and generally improve the look of the grounds.

Then, 11am will mark the time when the troops forced Japanese Americans onto a waiting ferry that took them to trains and trucks that eventually led to internment camps.

Our local US Congressman Derek Kilmer plans to attend the event to pay his respects. He recently obtained an act of Congress to add the word "Exclusion" to the official name of the Memorial.

The event is scheduled to end at 1pm.

See other BCB podcasts on several community and theater events that are currently commemorating the painful lessons of the Exclusion, such as "Snow Falling on Cedars", "Dear Editor: Letters to the Bainbridge Review", and interviews with Donna Harui and Lilly Kodama.

Credits: BCB host, editor and publisher: Barry Peters.

In this podcast, Ken Pyburn calls in by Skype from Portland Oregon to discuss the advisable next steps for forming a "village" organization on Bainbridge to provide services to members to help them age gracefully in place.

This podcast conversation is in light of a very successful and well-attended public meeting at the Waterfront Community Center for four hours on Saturday February 28, where about 60 people brainstormed and considered forming such a village.  He notes that it would be the first village to form for an island community.

A "village" isn't a physical neighborhood -- it's a membership organization that provides needed and desired services, often at a group discount, or through the generosity of volunteers. Villages provide the services that its members have outgrown their willingness to do or their ability to do as they've aged.

Ken has recently retired from chairing the board of directors of Villages Northwest, which is a collection of eight senior villages growing in the Portland Oregon vicinity.  He comments on his favorable impressions of Bainbridge as a place that struck him as very auspicious for creating a village.

He said the Bainbridge volunteer planning group is ready for the "coalescing" phase, leading to the "development" phase and finally the village "launch" phase.

He says that many villages grow out of a program of an existing service organization, while many others form a nonprofit membership organization from scratch.

The village proposal is the brainchild of Sue Barrington of the BI Parks and Recreation District staff.  By the end of the Feb. 28th meeting at the Waterfront Park Community Center, Sue showed the group a nascent BIvillage.org website that she had created in anticipation of a successful meeting.  Additional resources are available from the national Village to Village Network.

For more information about the meeting on senior villages, have a listen to Sue's remarks on What's Up podcast 116 from February 19th, or Ken Pyburn's earlier interview in the February 25th podcast.

Census data suggests that more than one Bainbridge resident in five is over age 60.

Credits: BCB host and publisher: Barry Peters; BCB audio editor: Tim Bird.

This first show in the new podcast series of BCB Bainbridge Island Specials is a recording of Part 1 of "Dear Editor: Letters to the Bainbridge Review", by the cast of Island Theater.

This rendition is a documentary for radio recorded on March 1, 2015 at the BCB Studios, and it was also presented to a live audience in February 2015 at the Bainbridge Island Public Library.  The performance is part of the Island Theater's 20th anniversary season.

This 2-part recording is read aloud by the following Island Theater cast members:

• Diane Bankart
• Charlie Hamilton
• Debbi Lester
• Fred Saas
• Tell Schreiber
• Pat Scott
• Diane Walker

The Director of the production for Island Theater was Tell Schreiber.

In this part 1, there are three segments, each separated by a brief musical interlude:

• Segment 1: A burst of short excerpts from various letters
• Segment 2: Letters from years prior to World War II, as far back as 1928
• Segment 3: Letters from the era of WW II and the exclusion of Japanese Americans from Bainbridge Island

Part 2 is a separately published podcast and includes letters from the post-war era through the 1970s.

Credits: BCB producer, editor and publisher: Barry Peters

Whether you want to publish your travel journals or improve your travel writing for family and friends, this May 15-17 weekend workshop conducted by professional writer Perry Garfinkel will certainly hone your skills.

In this interview, Garfinkel and Alex Edvardsen of the local Fields End writers group tell BCB host Channie Peters about this information-packed, practical and fun weekend.

Garfinkel has been a published travel writer and contributor to the New York Times, Wall St. Journal Asia, Huffington Post blog, numerous national and international magazines. He is also a bestselling author of "Buddha or Bust", which was selected by Shambhala Press for Best Buddhist Writing of 2007.

Learn more about Perry at the Perry Garfinkel website.

In this Fields End workshop, you will experience indoor and outdoor writing exercises, learn how to pitch your idea and article to editorial panels, improve your writing technique, and have a lot of fun with other writers, aspiring writers and travelers.

This is the first time that Fields End has presented a travel writing workshop. It begins on the evening of Friday, May 15th at Bainbridge Island Museum of Art, and continues all day Saturday, through midday on Sunday. The fee includes a Friday evening reception, plus a lunch on Saturday and Sunday at the art museum bistro.

Registration is at the Fields End website. Space is limited to 15 participants.

Credits: BCB host: Channie Peters; BCB editor and publisher: Barry Peters.

In this episode of Community Cafe Bainbridge, we meet Clarice Cutler, the director of the Student Conservation Corps (SCoCo). Joining Clarice is Elan Safford, a senior at Bainbridge High School who is an active and enthusiastic SCoCo volunteer.

They discuss this year’s SCoCo process for recruiting approximately 24 teens for Spring Break and Summer Break work sessions.

SCoCo provides rewarding paid work and volunteer experience for students who are 15-18 years old, who are interested in environmental conservation and stewardship, and who like to work hard outside on gratifying projects.

SCoCo is currently sponsored by Sustainable Bainbridge, and works closely with the Island’s Parks District, Parks Foundation and Bainbridge Island Land Trust.

Anyone interested in applying must attend one of the four application work parties that are occurring this month and next.  On March 7, interested teens can apply to work at Ted Olsen Nature Preserve from 1pm to 3:30pm.  On April 11, the 2.5 hour application work party will be at Fay Bainbridge Park. And on April 25, the work party will be at Pritchard Park.

Please email program director Clarice before attending a work party. Visit their Sustainable Bainbridge SCoCo web page for more information."

The students volunteer to clear invasive plants from public parks and private lands that have a conservation easement that is overseen by the Bainbridge Island Land Trust (BILT).  BILT has an Americorps intern who works with the SCoCo volunteers during the summer.

English ivy, scotch broom and tansy ragwort are three prominent examples of invasive and noxious weeds that volunteers seek to remove by physically pulling them out by the roots.

Elan reports that the work is hard but also fun, and that it gives a sense of accomplishment. He says of his summer SCoCo work: “I loved it.”

Over the past several years, SCoCo teenagers have cleared over 10,000 Bainbridge Island trees of ivy, especially on public park properties.

The teens in SCoCo are setting a great example for all of us.  As Clarice says: “If every one of us stopped and picked a small Scotch Broom plant every day, we’d truly be set on Bainbridge Island.”

Credits: BCB host: Charlie Hanacek; BCB audio editor: Tim Bird; BCB social media publisher: Barry Peters. Photos: Molly Esteve.

From BCB... http://bestofbcb.org/wu-123-bilt-brown-bag-march-13/

Interested in landscaping with native plants? Join  Bainbridge Land Trust board member John van den Meerendonk for a brown bag lunch on Friday March 13th at 11:45, when John will be sharing his knowledge of unique plant life of the Pacific Northwest. 

Learn why native plants are important to us, which bring color, and which to avoid.  You might even get some ideas for plants in your own backyard in preparation for BILT's Native Plant Sale in April. 

John has a rich background in plant science and horticulture, including five years as the Horticultural and Grounds Superintendent at the Bloedel Reserve. He presently works with Botanica, Inc., a landscape consulting, design, and installation company he founded in 1990.

The Brown Bag Lunch Series is presented by Bainbridge Island Land Trust and West Sound Wildlife Shelter. This free series is a fun way to spend your lunch hour learning about the local wildlife in our community and the land that provides their habitat. Bring your lunch and join us for these interesting lectures. Again, that's 11:45 a.m. Friday, March 13th at the Waterfront Community Center.

Credits:  BCB host, writer, audio tech and editor Sandy Schubach; BCB publishers Diane and Chris Walker.

From BCB... http://bestofbcb.org/wu-122-elisa-romeo-march-8/

Elisa Romeo is a soul intuitive, a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, an author and a speaker. Through her spiritual awakenings and her work as a therapist, Elisa Romeo has become fluent in Soul, and she's prepared to tell us all about it when she introduces her new book, Meet Your Soul, at Eagle Harbor Books, Sunday March 8 at 3 pm.

Highly recommended by Wayne Dyer, Elisa believes that not only do we all have a purpose, but we each hold within us powerful Divine potential that calls out for fulfillment. According to her, each of us have amazing psychic abilities, immense healing potential, and spiritual gifts which many of us have long forgotten. 

Her mission is to help us remember, to connect each of us to our unique Soul voice, and to reunite us with the loving Source of our being. In her private practice, which consists of thousands of clients worldwide, Elisa merges her background in depth psychology with an ability to directly communicate with Soul. Her goal is to remind each of us to listen to the guidance, power, and love of our inner Soul voice. 

Speaking the language of the Soul with humility, humor, and grounded candor, Elisa talks with BCB host Lyssa Danehy de Hart about her work and her new book.

To learn more about Elisa's work, visit http://www.elisaromeo.com  -- and do stop by to meet her on March 8!

Credits:  BCB host, writer, audio tech and editor Lyssa Danehy de Hart; BCB publisher Diane Walker.