Jane Armstrong, Globe and Mail, March 30, 2009
VANCOUVER -- By the sixth day of his week-long hunger strike, Jason Gratl was fixated on food, obsessing about fried potatoes, bacon and eggs.
A few days earlier, he had to halt the law class he was teaching at the University of British Columbia because he was too weak to carry on.
Seven days on a self-imposed fruit-juice diet taught Mr. Gratl, 34, a lot about food, deprivation and the mental exhaustion of chronic hunger.
"I was incapacitated," said Mr. Gratl, vice-president of the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, of his final day of fasting. "I had no concentration. I was wandering around in a stupor ... obsessing about food."
With less than a year to go before the 2010 Winter Games, Mr. Gratl and other concerned citizens are staging their own Olympic-style relay in the form of rolling weeklong hunger strikes. Each week, participants fast for seven days before handing over a symbolic wooden spoon to their successors. Yesterday, the relay entered its 14th week. It will continue until after the Games wind up next year.
Organizers say they want to draw attention to Vancouver's intractable homeless problem; the number of people living on the streets has more than doubled since 2002, rising from about 1,100 in 2002 to 2,660 in 2008.
They say it's shameful that Canada's Olympic city, which is spending millions on the 2010 Winter Games, can't properly house its poorest citizens.
Many stress that their protest is not against the Games. But they say more time and energy should have been funnelled into finding permanent housing for the poor.
University of British Columbia professor Michael Byers, who completed the fast in January, wants to draw international attention to Vancouver's housing shortage.
"I personally think it's shameful that we have a homeless crisis in one of the richest and most beautiful and admired cities on Earth," said Prof. Byers, who holds a Canada Research Chair in global politics and international law.
"And yes, we are attempting to hang out the dirty laundry for the public to see, not just in Canada, but internationally. I'm very proud that the Olympics are coming to Vancouver. But I don't think we should allow social problems, which can be fixed, to be avoided because of some concern that we'll embarrass ourselves."
The group wants Ottawa to commit to spending 1 per cent of its annual budget on affordable housing programs across the country.
The relay's organizer, Am Johal, was inspired to act after he spent Christmas Eve volunteering at a church in Vancouver's poverty-stricken Downtown Eastside. It was an unusually cold and snowy holiday by Vancouver standards and the church was filled to the brink with people ill-equipped to deal with the cold snap.
"People were sleeping too close together. They were cold. They had frostbite and trench foot," Mr. Johal said. "It was miserable.
"I thought: 'This is a national embarrassment.' "
About two dozen people - including doctors, lawyers, teachers and even an 85-year-old nun - have participated. Some found it harder than others to abstain from food for seven days.
Some grew lethargic and weak. Others found it was nearly impossible to concentrate on their work.
Prof. Byers said hunger pangs drove him to distraction. "I learned that someone who is hungry and who hasn't eaten in days is, in some degree, mentally handicapped. I had to be extremely focused because it was very difficult to think of anything except food."
And while his hunger was a great discomfort, he found himself grateful that at least he had a roof over his head. "It was a cold and wet week in Vancouver, but I was warm and dry and I became quite conscious of that."
Mr. Gratl said he hopes more high-profile British Columbians will participate.
"What did I learn? Hunger is no small thing. No human has the capacity to be able to avoid this. It was a week well spent. This was a real head trip. It taught me a lot about myself. I wish others would do it."
Sister Elizabeth Kelliher, 85, who helps run a soup kitchen in the Downtown Eastside, fasted the same week as Mr. Gratl. Unlike her relay partner, Sister Elizabeth said the liquids-only diet didn't faze her much.
"I didn't really feel hungry," Sister Elizabeth said. "And it's not that I don't have a good appetite otherwise."
At first, Mr. Johal, the organizer, thought he should dissuade the elderly nun from joining the relay. But she insisted.
"I think a lot of people wanted to tell me 'No,' " Sister Elizabeth said, laughing.
Mr. Gratl, on the other hand, was counting the seconds until he could eat. On the day his fast was to end, he awoke at 6 a.m. His stint ended at noon.
"I spent six hours preparing an all-day breakfast. It was so good, I can't tell you. I finished the whole thing myself. I felt quite content."
For the original text, see: Citizens go hungry
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