While Olympics celebrations and red and white face painting go on in the center of town, an area devoid of athlete sightings and the ubiquitous Olympic red mittens for sale is just blocks away in Vancouver's eastside. On one street corner a blanket is draped over what appears to be the body of a man who died the night before. Slumped out of a wheelchair and lying on the sidewalk, the body is taken care of by two city workers.

Beset with homelessness and extreme poverty, Vancouver’s downtown eastside is home to some of the “poorest postal codes in all of Canada,” according to Elaine Durocher, who was homeless herself two years ago. Today, she is an organizer of the “Olympic Tent Village,” where homeless and other supporters have assembled on a vacant gravel lot slated to become high rise condominiums after the Games leave town.

At a coffee shop a few blocks from the tent city, I interview Harjap Grewal, an organizer with the Olympic Resistance Network (ORN). We talk about past Olympics and how 34 years later, Montreal is just getting into the black after the debt it incurred as host of the 1976 Games. From a social standpoint, Grewal said, the Olympics are more about commercialism, consumerism and greed rather than peace, hope and athletics. The Olympic Resistance Network, based in Vancouver, is against the Olympics as an industry. “There is an appreciation for sport. It’s not about the athletes.” In his early 30s, Harjap says he’s an active guy. In fact, he credits his seventh grade teacher for instilling his interest in physical education (his favorites are basketball, rugby and running).

Working in the eastside for the nonprofit Council of Canadians, he’s somewhat removed from the crowds, tourists and Olympic hoopla but not totally oblivious of people chanting “Go Canada Go” donned in red and white with maple leaf face painting. “It does disgust me,” Grewal said, referring to the Olympic merchandise enticing further consumerism. “I think people don’t recognize the indigenous people of this country. It does shock me the nationalism that’s promoted by the Games. Nationalism is what launched the war in Iraq. Instead, people need to promote community empowerment.

Run by volunteers, ORN has a website, has staged protests and spoke out against the Games since Vancouver received the bid. Grewal hopes people will think more critically about how the Games affect the host city and society in general. The next Olympic Games are slated for London in 2012. “In future games, we hope they challenge the Games as an institution.”

– Jennifer Karchmer

*1st Place: Social issues, religion, minority affairs, Non-Daily Publication, Whatcom Watch

*1st Place: Illustration/Photo Essay, "Host City's
Homeless Stage Tent Village During Winter Olympics," self-published blog

*2nd Place: Social issues, religion, minority affairs, Non-Daily Publication, self-published blog