By Barry Whelan Feb 8, 2010, 8:28 GMT
Vancouver - You don't have to go far to see the Vancouver that Vancouver would rather you didn't.
Just a few minutes from downtown, walk a mile or so of East Hastings Street and the misery is all too apparent.
The homeless, the poor, the destitute and the drug addicted make it abundantly clear why there are many Vancouverites - a majority if you believe the resistance - who oppose the Olympic Games.
The contrast between the haves and have-nots in the host city is crass and makes you wonder. Wonder about the cost of the Games. Wonder about its legacy. Wonder about a world-class city.
At the Spartacus bookshop they are preparing for another opposition meeting. A few days ago the Pink Resistance was billed to discuss 'the impact of the Games on queer and trans people.' They, too, are wondering about the Games, about cuts to HIV/AIDS services.
The list of the disgruntled is nothing if not disparate. Various indigenous groups, unionists, anti-capitalists, ecologists, civil libertarians and other activists have reasons to oppose the Games.
Now members of the Olympic Resistance Network, the umbrella organization for the various protest groups, are here in the Downtown Eastside collective to discuss the way forward.
Friday is the big day. It's the day the Games open, the day the anti-Olympics resistance movement plans its big rally, entitled '2010 Heart Attack: Clog the Arteries of Capitalism,' to raise awareness of the cost - the sheer waste, in their view - of it all.
There are many charges to answer: alleged exploitation of indigenous lands, increased poverty, the criminalization of the poor in Downside Eastside and a massive cutback in public spending.
'I don't have anything personally against sport. We are not fighting against athletes, we are fighting the corporatization and the effects the Games will have,' says resistance network member Caitlin Ffrench.
Ffrench, like her husband Arlin, marvels at the money spent on the Games - the bill comes to 6 billion Canadian dollars according to the critics - and the way the budgets set out in the bid book have run well over.
Meanwhile, they claim, police have been cracking down on the homeless, the promised social housing projects have hardly materialized and the Games have been sucking up the resources which could and should go on welfare projects and lower-income groups.
'I don't see any evidence that ordinary people are benefiting from the Games. Shopkeepers are losing money because of the security zones and lack of parking. The corporate sponsors are the only ones making the big bucks from this,' says Caitlin Ffrench.
The hangover will really come once the Olympics juggernaut passes, says Arlin.
'I think a lot of problems are going to come after the Games when the government says there is not any money for social programmes.
'People are going to come to the realization of how much this has cost and they see this money is no longer available for the province.'
Both will be at Friday's rally, Caitlin acting as a medic for the protesters who fear police strong-arms tactics and the use of agents provocateurs. Vancouver, says network spokesperson Harsha Walia, has sunk 1 billion US dollars to turn itself into 'a military-police state.'
Police though have been playing down any fears Friday's demonstration could get out of hand and express confidence they can deal with a crowd expected to number around 1,500.
'We think the overwhelming majority who act peacefully will likely rule the day,' the city's deputy police chief Steve Sweeney said.
It's late Sunday afternoon at the Spartacus bookshop. The US Super Bowl is live on televisions everywhere. The 'poverty Olympics', a now annual Vancouver event designed to embarrass national, provincial and city governments into addressing poverty, has begun.
But for the destitute on Downtown Eastside, it all means nothing.
Vancouver, surrounded by water and snow-capped mountains, rated one of the world's 'most liveable cities', the beautiful Vancouver that Vancouver would rather you did see, is for them but a mirage.
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