SMUS Review

by Terence Young, Head of the English Department

The reputation of St. Michaels University School as a vibrant and vital place to learn does not depend solely on its musical theatre programme, but it could. Those who attended the school’s recent production of Miss Saigon witnessed a highly polished and professional performance, one that belies the term ‘high school musical’ and could easily attract a much wider theatre-going audience. It was impossible to leave the McPherson without wishing to pass the word to others that this was an experience not to miss.

On Friday night, I had what I considered the best seat in the house: dead centre in the front row, directly behind Donna Williams as she conducted her very talented pit orchestra. From this position, I could alternately watch each spectacular scene on the stage and take in the complex and sophisticated musical score. At points, I didn’t know where to look first, because it was all amazing. From the opening number, “The Heat is on in Saigon,” to the poignant closing song, “The Sacred Bird,” time seemed to halt. The pace was intense, and while I am sure that such consistency and coherence owe a great debt to the composers Schönberg and Boublil, I also know that without talented singers, dancers and musicians, any musical — even a great one like Miss Saigon — can be difficult to sit through. However, David Gauthier’s cast and crew, together with the thoroughly professional musicians under the guidance of Ms. Williams, allowed the beauty of the show to shine.

This particular production was blessed with a brilliant combination of actors in the principal roles. It was difficult not to love the entirely scurrilous Engineer as played by Tom Zheng. His charismatic rendering of this determined survivor brought to mind the true meaning of the term “a man for all seasons” as someone who does not allow moral considerations to get in the way of his desire to make his way in the world. Despicable as he was, one could not help admiring his determination to overcome his past. Even at the play’s end, we are not sure if he is holding on to Tam out of shock at what has happened or because he simply does not want to lose his ticket to America. Despite such ambiguity, he literally sang and danced his way into our hearts. Anybody leaving the theatre that night could not escape replaying “The American Dream,” either humming it in the lobby or whistling it in the car on the way home.

Brian Christensen in the role of the love-struck soldier, Chris, lent his character a painfully believable sincerity, particularly in the song “Why God Why?” where his voice carried extraordinary power, even in the upper register. His portrayal of this torn individual’s desire to do the right thing provided a stark contrast to the motives of the opportunistic Engineer and made me think seriously about the setting of the play, the Vietnam war. I remembered meeting some of its veterans, mere ghosts after their ordeal, and Brian offered a glimmer of what had rendered them so insubstantial.

The scene of the Americans’ abrupt departure from Saigon and Chris’ desperate grief as he is forced to abandon his lover, Kim, speaks to the larger failure of American foreign policy, a failure that became even more painful through Veronica Li’s rendering of Kim, a country girl forced into prostitution after the death of her parents and the destruction of her town. Li’s ability to portray this character’s purity and innocence through the song “Sun and Moon” and her duet with Ellen (Olivia Krusel) left the audience bereft at the play’s tragic ending. Li’s sweet voice and spirited performance clarified the plight of Vietnam’s victims as poignantly as the absolutely heart-rending portrayal of her stage son, Tam, played by Soren Kim, an endearing and amazingly self-possessed young actor.

These central players were supported ably by a host of others. Leo Marchand took on the role of Chris’ friend John, who, through his humanitarian efforts after the war, brings Chris and Kim together again. He also focuses our attention on the difficult lives of children born during the conflict, a situation given its most moving expression in the song “Bui Doi,” which Marchand performed skillfully, soaring to amazing vocal heights with confidence and precision. The refrain speaks of these children as the “dust of life/conceived in Hell and born in strife,” and it quite harshly counters the usual sentimentalism characteristic of many musicals. Kaeleigh Fletcher delivered a credibly seductive Gigi, one the many girls working at the Engineer’s sleazy bar. She painted the sadness of her character’s profession in her stellar rendition of “The Movie in My Mind,” a song that illustrates the pipe dream she and the other girls share. Gigi, like many others since her in other wars, hopes she will find a GI who will help her to “flee this life, flee this place.”

Equally powerful was Hubert Wang in the role of Thuy, Kim’s once-betrothed. He radiated ruthlessness and violence, especially after the fall of Saigon when Thuy becomes a commissar in the new government. Yet, despite his cruel behavior, I was moved by the raw emotion in Hubert’s singing, his sense of loss, not only for Kim, who had been promised him, but for Vietnam itself. Finally, Olivia Krusel, as Chris’s statuesque American wife, Ellen, conveyed both fragility and strength as she tried to cope with the revelation of Chris’ past. She expressed the dilemma of all women in her situation most powerfully in, “Now That I’ve Seen Her,” a song in which Ellen comes to understand what it means to humanize the people we are supposed to hate, a theme that informs the entire show.

It is not possible to talk about this production without mentioning the superb sets, the costumes and choreography. The shifts from the bar to the American embassy, from Kim’s sparse apartment to post-war Saigon took place seamlessly and imaginatively, thanks to the skilful carpentry of David Fisher and Peter Leggatt. Even if we couldn’t see the famous helicopter taking off from the top of the embassy, we were caught up in the desperation of the South Vietnamese left behind an iron fence to fend for themselves as Ho Chi Min’s troops entered the city. We also marveled at the precision of the dancers in scenes like “The Morning of the Dragon,” a brilliant combination of stylized martial arts and modern dance that takes place under the stern gaze of a gigantic, golden Uncle Ho. Once again choreographer Kim Breiland has worked her magic with our students. If the scenes in the bar/brothel were a little disturbing, it was because the skimpy costumes worn by our students were not far from what girls their very age are compelled to wear. Some might argue that these scenes weren’t disturbing enough.

All these elements, in conjunction with some very creative make-up, all came together through the hard work of stage managers, assistant directors, sound and lighting technicians and a host of volunteers. The effort demanded by this year’s musical of everyone involved was immense, but I, for one, can attest that it was well worth it.

by Jason Chiu, Grade 9 mathematician

The Math Challengers competition began long before February 12th. The Match Challengers team spent several months, beginning in November, studying different mathematical problems. Our team this year consisted of seven members: Oliver Huang, Tom Kim, Richard Cunningham, Jeffery and Vincent Wu, Jinsu Park, and myself (unfortunately due to scheduling conflicts Richard could not join us on the competition date). We concluded the contest preparation with a presentation from Dr. Chan (a math-challengers coach with perfect winning record).

The day of the competition the five of us headed to Camosun College. My heartbeat must have been 200 beats a minute as we entered the competition room. The competition looked fierce. My heart sunk as I saw last year’s winner take his seat. After a quick explanation of the rules, we began writing. My heartbeat quicked as I flipped open the packet and began writing. After finishing the contest booklets I looked back towards my teammates, who seemed to be pretty confident, making me even more nervous.

We returned to the contest room where the “face off” match was to begin. I stared anxiously at the finalist board as they wrote out the names. I was surprised to see myself seeded as second, but even more surprised to see that our entire team had qualified for finals! Oliver Huang climbed up the finalist ladder until he was defeated by Tom Kim; but what shocked me the most was that Tom was beaten in his second round leaving him in fourth place. Unfortunately, I too lost my finals match, after a careless mistake, leaving me in 3rd place. As a team, we came in second place regionally.

I was filled with happiness from achieving the highest ranking from SMUS and third place in the competition. People might think that third place isn’t that great, but it just means I have to strive to get better. Who knows? Maybe with a little more work, I could be first too.

by Matt and Ben, Grade 5

“Jump rope for heart was an event where two classes would go into the gym and skip rope for exercise and to help your heart. There were three different stations, and at each station there would be different activities like Japanese jump rope, double-dutch, free skip, etc. After the two classes were done jumping, the leaders would go to another classroom and take those students to the gym. I even had the privilege of bring a Jump Rope for Heart leader. We also got a pledge form to put money in and raise money for hospitals to take care of patients and if you raised say, 30 dollars, than would win a jump rope or if you raised $70 you would get a soccer ball and a jump rope. But at the end of the day, I think everybody had fun and I think that is all that matters.” - Ben

“It was amazing! We did all sorts of activities using a skipping rope, including helicopter, skipping and double-dutch. It was a blast! We did this with our buddy classes. My buddy class was Kindergarten and my buddy student was Marcus.” - Matt

by Richard Boness, Miss Saigon’s Assistant Commissar

Miss Saigon, another great creation from the minds of Schonberg and Boublil, is set to grace the stage at the McPherson playhouse, courtesy of the dedicated musical theatre group at St. Michaels University School. It is set in war-time Vietnam just at the end of the American involvement and opens with a night club scene full of rowdy marines (myself included) just a few days before the fall of Saigon, when all the marines are looking to live large as long as they can.

At this point, we are introduced to Kim, played by the very welcome newcomer Veronica Li, where she is being forced into prostitution by the local hustler, a French-Vietnamese bigshot known as “the Engineer,” played by the one and only Tom “DJ Legit” Zheng, who dreams big of moving to America. The Engineer tells his best girl, Gigi, played by none other than the ever-surprising Kaeleigh Fletcher, to show Kim the ropes. One of the marines at the bar, a high-flying, straight-shooting American officer, named John (embodied by Leo Marchand) aims to get a gift for his best buddy Chris (played by the amazing Brian Christensen), a washed up, ex-stoner sergeant who is starting to see the terrible wake left by him and the rest of his marines. John ends up purchasing The Engineer’s “little princess” Kim for his friend, which sets in a motion both love and danger.

This play surrounds the lives of several normal people, corrupted by betrayal and ignorance, and illustrates some of the painful experiences many Americans and Vietnamese people had during the war. This play focuses on a love story between one young Vietnamese girl and an American GI that penetrates the darkness of war and the veil of manipulation and captures the undocumented side of the Vietnam war, which was not deemed fit for television news at the time. This production isn’t lighthearted and cheery, but passionate and full of emotion: a must-see for any theatre enthusiast, office worker, bus driver, fisherman or CEO; anyone who enjoys an excellent love story or anyone who’s a fan of good music. Schonberg and Boublil outdid themselves with Miss Saigon. We aim to honour their names.

Come out and enjoy Miss Saigon — you will not be disappointed.

Miss Saigon
March 3-6, 2010
Buy tickets

by Erin Anderson, editor
Chris Darimont ‘92, an alumnus of SMUS and an award-winning conservation biologist, returned to SMUS to talk about his latest research on humanity’s effects on evolution. In addition to his public talk, Chris dropped in on a few classes.

Currently featured in Maclean’s magazine, Chris’s latest work suggests humanity is causing rapid evolutionary changes in many species. His findings have shown that creatures from fish to rams are changing in size, altering travel patterns, and reproducing earlier in order to adapt to humanity’s presence. Typically, in the wild, a deer or stag that is smaller would be a likely target for a predator, due to their being weaker than the rest of their herd. In contrast, a human hunter would be more likely to target a larger animal, because of both hunting regulations and the desirable size for keepsakes such as antlers.

The way these patterns are impacting evolution, is that the survivors of predation determine which characteristics are passed on – namely, their own. For example, under many current fishing regulations, younger fish must be tossed back, but older ones are allowed to be kept. Thus, fish that reproduce at a younger age are more likely to be able to reproduce before they are caught.

Since humanity is responsible for as much as 80-90 percent of the annual harvest in some animal populations, their impact significantly outweighs that of natural predators, and animals are adapting to make themselves less likely targets for humans. Rams, for example, are producing smaller horns, making them less attractive to hunters. In salmon populations, the spawning fish who head back to breed later in the season are more likely to be caught than those who arrive first, so they are heading back earlier and earlier each year.

Though humanity impacts animal species in a number of ways, such as altering natural environments, Chris’ research shows that the populations that are targeted for predation adapt much more quickly than animals affected in other ways and even faster than animals living in the wild. However, his research also suggests that while animal populations change rapidly in response to this predation, once the predation ceases, animals are slow to rebound.

In general, animals that reproduce at a young age produce much fewer offspring than they would at a more mature age. So, when animals adapt to harvesting by reproducing when they’re younger, they don’t produce as many young, and not only does it take longer for the population to return to its original size, but without the impetus of predation, the population will take even longer to return to its original rate of replenishment.

Because of this, Chris believes that the best way to combat these effects is to alter the size and age of the animals we harvest as well as decrease our harvesting of animals as a whole. His research has also been featured in the Times-Colonist and Discover Magazine, which named his work one of the top 100 stories in 2009.

by Jo Lunn, Middle School mathematics teacher

Some of our keenest Grade 7 and 8 math students recently took part in the regional Math Challengers competition. Organized in teams of five, students answered a series of timed math questions. In the first two rounds, students worked individually on as many questions as they could answer. The third round (co-op) saw students working as a team to answer a series of questions.

Part of a winning strategy was deciding which questions to answer, as it was nearly impossible to answer all of the questions in the time allowed. All of these scores produced nine finalists in the Grade 8 face-off round. Then, in front of a live studio audience (!), students were pitted one-on-one in elimination rounds. Four of the nine Grade 8 finalists were SMUS students: Paul Choi, Jason Wang, Jacky Joe and Jennifer Park.

By the end of this buzzer round, Jennifer Park rose above all others as the best in Grade 8. Indeed, Jennifer’s score was the highest of any Grade 8 student in any regional competition in the province! Jennifer is eligible to compete at the provincial championships at BCIT during the spring break.

Congratulations to all of our participants: Nicholas Loughton, Zack Kahn, Stephanie Wong-Harrison, Nghi Nguyen, Shinai Sorensen, Vivian Lam, Jordan Lane, Kalkidan Amare and those mentioned above.

by Larry Borgerson, staff

One of our transportation staff, Larry Borgerson, has been working for the past few weeks as a driver in Whistler for the Vancouver 2010 festivities. Throughout the games, he’s been keeping his colleagues up to date on all he’s seen and done. Here are some excerpts from his adventures.

February 5, 2010
Yesterday felt more like the Spring Olympics in Whistler. Once the sun came out, by noon it was close to 10 degrees Celsius. There is still plenty of snow but a “freshie” would really pretty things up and do honour to the term “Winter Olympics.” The village lights really are beautiful. I see them because I go on duty anywhere between 04:45 to 05:15.

I’m glad I’m doing this. As we’ve all heard, it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity. The excitement and energy is definitely building.

February 19
I spent some time in the big city of Vancouver last week on my days off – it was a lot of fun with big crowds. We looked at visiting a few pavilions but the lineups were too long for our liking so we soaked up the feel. There was lots of action on Robson Street as many blocks are currently just pedestrian only.

We were walking along Georgia St. and in front of The Bay, sitting on a bench, was Michael Ignatieff. My opening line was, “I saw you on 22 Minutes.” We chatted informally with him and his wife about how many millions of Canadians had watched the opening ceremonies the night before.

Whistler is, of course, also abuzz. Sometimes there will be three events on at one time (sliding, alpine skiing and nordic) so bus loads can be incredible (yesterday I had to pass up customers on one run because all the standing room was taken). Of course, there are still many locals and tourists skiing at the same time.

We have really got a stretch of amazing weather now. I’m happy for all involved because it really is magical with the snow-clad peaks against the blue sky.

February 21, 2010
I spent just over 28 hours in Vancouver on Friday and Saturday and the crowds were unbelievable and the festive feel palpable. Don’t miss it if you can find the time. Of course, the weather truly adds another element altogether. It’s a “proud to be Canadian” scene, without a doubt.

After my shift today, I took a leisurely stroll through Whistler Village. It’s different than Vancouver, but closer to winter with Whistler/Blackcomb and the other Coastal Mountains so dominant against the sky. However, it is just as electric as Vancouver.

As always, I really enjoy interacting with people whether they are local, regional or foreign. The Norwegians and Swedes are easy to identify as they love to wear their countries’ colours. However, if you’ve watched any TV coverage of the Olympics you’ll know that we Canucks love to wear a Canadian hockey jersey. Guess I’m a bit like that myself. No, I’m not wearing a jersey, but I turned down overtime work this afternoon so I could be back in my hotel room to watch the Canada/US men’s hockey game.

Come soak it up if you can.

by Lincoln Welsh, Grade 12

On January 16, 2010, a group of 15 SMUSdents and friends from other schools banded together in response to the recent earthquake crisis in Haiti. Bringing along any bucket they could get their hands on and, in some cases, any instruments as well, they set up shop at various points downtown, and, through the kindness of random strangers making small pocket change donations, managed to make well over $1000 in just under six hours.

The students, in association with Red Cross, continued to create an “I Haiti Earthquakes” service initiative at St Michaels University School wherein they continued to amass over $500 dollars in “Positive Change For Haiti” from their peers at school.

The grand total of money collected by the Donate-y For Haiti team came to $1713.69 and, once donated, was doubled through positive efforts put forth by the Canadian International Development Agency, totalling $3247.38. This total is only a fraction of the total amount donated by various clubs and individuals associated with SMUS.

The team consisted of myself, Leo Marchand, Mina Phaisaltantiwongs, Irene Evans, Priya Mulgaonkar, Selby Knudsen, Kaylynn Purdy, Zac Benloulou, Yoon Ha Chung, Giuliana Bianco, Laura Dale, Sky Richards, Will Jevne, Oliver Brooks and Rowan Mackenzie, as well as Brian van Wyk and Connor McCleary of Claremont High.

by Erin Anderson, editor

Some service-minded students spent last weekend brightening the days of anyone who was lucky enough to be strolling through Victoria’s downtown waterfront. With signs proclaiming “Free Hugs,” our Senior School students offered anyone interested a brief embrace. The Free Hugs days are becoming increasingly popular, and are a nice break from the more traditional areas of service, such as fundraising and promoting awareness of international issues. As much as the passersby enjoy getting a free hug (or sometimes just watching the fun unfold), the students may get even more of a lift out of the afternoons, since they get the most free hugs out of anybody.

by Grade 2 students Ben Lupin, Julian Fitzgibbon, and Jonah Wilmott

The Grade 2 class went on a pyjama party field trip to the Symons and Timmis Boarding Houses. When we got there, we gave our big buddies some bubbles. We had some too. We went to the balcony of the Crothall Centre and we filled the air with bubbles. There were bubbles everywhere!

Next, we went to our buddies rooms for a few minutes. Then we went to the Timmis House and made Valentines. We were very lucky, because there was a special dinner in Brown Hall for Chinese New Year. It was delicious.

The best part of the pyjama party was meeting lots of teens from lots of different countries, such as the USA, Mexico, Japan, Germany and China. We hope we get to see our big boarding buddies again.