Welcome back to the Vancouver Group Chat, a roundup of some of the city’s most exciting updates for the week. If they haven’t hit your algorithm or group chats yet, now is your chance to be the first to hit “send.”
This week, we’ve got some fun last-minute Halloween parties to check out, a spooky flash mob, a speed friending event, and a new Canadian premiere exhibition at MOA. So let’s dive right in!
What’s new, Vancouver?
The Conservatives win in B.C. for the first time in nearly 100 years
By now you’ve likely heard the news. B.C. residents took to the polls this past weekend, and the right-leaning Conservatives won 64 out of 93 seats. A first-in-93-years win that marks the end of the left-of-center New Democrats’ time in B.C.
According to Reuters, cost-of-living, healthcare, and the ongoing trade war with U.S. President Donald Trump were top-of-mind in this year’s election.
For last-minute Halloween plans
Switching gears here. Halloweekend has nearly arrived, and we know your group chats must be blowing up with last-minute plan ideas, so we’ve gone ahead and picked out some events for you. All have tickets available at the time of writing this, but they’ll go fast, so it’s go time!
For a night out on the town
For a theatrical experience
For a cozy vibe
A Canadian premiere exhibition at MOA
It’s a great time of year to explore Vancouver’s many art galleries and museums, and the Museum of Anthropology at UBC is world-renowned for its extensive exhibits.
A new one to check out this fall is the Canadian premiere of From the Deep: In the Wake of Drexciya with Ayana V. Jackson, a landmark Afrofuturist exhibition that premiered at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art back in 2023.
Now on tour across North America, the exhibition draws inspiration from the mythic underwater world imagined by 1990s Detroit techno duo Drexciya, whose music portrayed a world populated by the descendants of enslaved African women thrown overboard during the Middle Passage. It’s a fascinating exhibit that immerses museum-goers in a Pan-African “aquatopia” inhabited by water spirits from African and Afro-Atlantic traditions, on display from Nov. 19 to March 19, 2027.
You’ve got plenty of time to check it out for yourself, but it never hurts to make some museum-hopping plans for November.
Canada’s weakening polar vortex
According to a new report by The Weather Network, a wrench may have just been thrown into Canada’s winter forecast.
“Every fall, the North loses sunlight, and temperatures plunge, initiating a massive circulation of powerful winds high in the stratosphere,” The Weather Network explains. “Just as the polar vortex should be ramping up for the season ahead, forecast models are now suggesting a significant derailment heading into early November.”
While the polar vortex should be ramping up, the opposite seems to be happening. An “unusual weakening” is now forecast for the first half of November, which may lead to an even milder winter across much of Canada.
However, this doesn’t mean that colder weather is off the table. On the contrary, the same atmospheric patterns that disrupt the polar vortex can also create colder weather patterns, despite a historically strong El Niño driving the milder start to winter.
So don’t write off the current winter forecast just yet. While nothing has officially changed, it’s definitely something to keep an eye on.
Your sign to do something random
- Meet some new people at a speed friending event at the Vancouver Public Library on Tuesday, Oct. 27.
- Make your own witchy stickers at this craft coven on Tuesday, Oct. 27.
- Watch a free screening of Heretic (2024) at the Vancouver Public Library on Wednesday, Oct. 28.
- Take part in a spooky flash mob at the 14th and Main Street Plaza on Friday, Oct. 30.
- Carve a pumpkin for free outside of Blossom & Vine on Friday, Oct. 30.
- Make an adorable keyhole vase at this free workshop on Sunday, Nov. 1.
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