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The Current Transcript for March 14, 2019

Host: Piya Chattopadhyay

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

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So I was a little bit nervous but the flight was fine. The landing was okay. But I would have preferred not having been on it to be honest.

PIYA CHATTOPADHYAY: That was a passenger on one of the final flights of the Boeing 737 MAX 8 in Canadian airspace before officials grounded the controversial aircraft yesterday. The planes are parked now until we all get some answers about why two have crashed in a matter of months, killing hundreds. But bigger questions still hanging in the air about the increasingly complex software and systems we all rely on to fly. We're starting today with voices of two pilots with two points of view. Then closer to the ground, on the good old Canadian farm where some new faces have been arriving.

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I never told you guys this, but when you guys bought our farm the first time in the coffee shop was 'oh, you sold to the Chinese, did you?'

PC: From Chinese investors to Chinese Canadian hardworking farmers a new documentary looks at some of the impact these new faces are having on agriculture and community as well right across our country. We'll hear from a couple of them in half an hour. Plus the latest on the Brexit drama in the U.K. and then to something completely different.

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Hello everybody, it's me, Mickey Mouse. Let's go.

PC: He may just be a mouse but don't underestimate Mickey or the power of being cute. That story in an hour. Hi I'm Piya Chattopadhyay sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti and this is The current.

Adding complex safety systems to planes could make flying more dangerous: pilot

Guests: John Cox, Chris Clearfield

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I'm issuing a safety notice. The safety notice restricts commercial passenger flights from any operator of the Boeing 737 MAX 8 or Max 9 variant aircraft, whether domestic or foreign from arriving, departing or overflying Canadian airspace.

PC: Or that is Canada's Transport Minister Marc Garneau announcing yesterday that Canada was closing its airspace to Boeing 737 MAX 8 and 9 jet. A short time later. US President Donald Trump made an announcement of his own.

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Any plane currently in the air will go to its destination and thereafter be grounded, until further notice. If they are 737 Max will be grounded upon landing at the destination. Pilots have been notified airlines have been all notified, airlines agreeing with this the safety of the American people, and all people, is our paramount concern.

PC: Well these decisions come after Sunday's Ethiopian Airlines crash that killed 157 people aboard, including 18 Canadians. The crash was the second Boeing 737 MAX 8 disaster in less than six months. Now there are questions about whether there were issues with the plane's automatic control features. An investigation by The Wall Street Journal and The Dallas Morning News have raised concerns about U.S. aviation regulators. For insight into what this means for the aviation industry and the flying public we're joined by John Cox. He's a former airline pilot and accident investigator. He is now the CEO of the consulting firm Safety Operating Systems. And we've reached him in Columbus, Ohio. Hello.

JOHN COX: Good morning, Piya.

PC: What's your reaction to Canada and the USA and every other country around the world that has now grounded the Boeing 737 MAX jets?

JOHN COX: Well I was struck by the word of Marc Ganeau that he had new information that indicated a similarity in the flight profiles. For that reason, Canada was [unintelligible] ahead and closed their airspace. That information has also been shared with the FAA, and they in conjunction with the White House concurred with that decision and that's what finally put your plane on the ground. I think that it shows a careful methodical approach based on data. The most thing we need right now is the readout from the flight data and cockpit voice recorder of the European jet. That will tell us the story of what happened there.

PC: Amidst all this Boeing has says it still has full confidence on the safety of its planes these planes but out of an abundance of caution and to reassure the flying public it's temporarily suspending its entire fleet - I think it's something 371 Max aircraft around the world. What do you think about Boeing's repeated assurances that, look, these planes are safe?

JOHN COX: I think the Boeing position is certainly understandable. The Max jet is the newest update. The 737 which [cutting] It's been around for a long time. The tragedy in Jakarta of Lion Air in October raised some questions about some of the systems that are unique to the Max whether those systems are also something of concern in the Ethiopian accident. We don't have the data yet. I flew the 737 for 15 years. I know it's a solid air frame and the issues surrounding that Max that are unique to it, that's what the FAA Transport Canada are looking at very carefully and will get those answers and I hope within a few days.

PC: You know it's interesting that you say that I flown these planes and I bring that up because there have been concerns - this was brought up in the Dallas Morning News - that Max 8 pilots voiced concerns about the aircraft to authorities in the months after the lion Air crash. One cock captain called the flight manual quote "inadequate and almost criminally insufficient". You know these things. How seriously do authorities take these kinds of complaints from pilots? Do you agree with the assessment that that captain made?

JOHN COX: Well have to look first at the source. The source of this, from what I've read, is the Nasa Aviation Safety Reporting System and those reports are not validated they're just pilot opinions. And so this particular captain believed that the manuals were adequate while other pilots believed that they were okay. You have to put those on balance. So in the end the regulator,the FAA, as well as the European Aviation Safety Agency, Transport Canada, they all looked at the manuals and found them to be adequate. There has been an emergency airworthiness directive after the Lion Air accident to make sure the pilots were aware of the functionality and what some of these new were systems did and how the pilots could respond to them, should they malfunction. So the information flow has been there. I would have liked to have seen Boeing put out more information about some of these computerized systems earlier, before the Line Air accident, but they addressed that today in today's world.

PC: You know another group of people who work on planes have raised concerns. Different ones. And So the flight attendants have been expressing their concerns about safety while on the job. So I', going to play Sara Nelson who is the international president of the Association of Flight Attendants reacting to the grounding of the Boeing 737 MAX planes.

SOUNDCLIP

There are already plans to make a software fix in January. We're learning that that was put on hold because of the government shutdown. This has really been a total breakdown in a failure of leadership and governance here, and were very concerned about it. We're concerned about the fact that in this case America's last when in fact America has always been first. America has been the leader in aviation for decades. We believed that Boeing should have taken action sooner, the FAA should have taken action sooner instead of continue this on and have people really be questioning this and have a lack of confidence in this fleer and potential in U.S. aviation. This is not fair to any of the workers on the frontline to make aviation safe every single day.

PC: John Cox, Sarah Nelson points to the U.S. Federal Government's recent partial shutdown. The Wall Street Journal reporting that it played a role in delaying the key software update for the 737 MAX aircraft, that Boeing was working on the software fix after the Lion Air crash and was expected to run out in January. It didn't because of the shutdown. How concerning is that for you?

JOHN COX: Well I think that the shutdown did certainly have some role in the timing of the release of the [unintelligible] software update. Whether that played a role in the ether will be an accident or a not is not yet known. So the Boeing was responding to the Lion Air accident and to make the software update. They have moved that forward but clearly the shutdown did have some effect. It was very unfortunate that it occurred when it did. Hopefully they can get the software update out in the near future and get it installed in the airplanes. But until we understand what happened to the Ethiopian aeroplane, we won't know if there's any correlation between these two actions and much less whether the curse was involved in Ethiopia or not.

PC: Do you think we acted too prematurely?

JOHN COX: I think initially, regulators like China acted prematurely because this was not data to link these two accidents together. As information involved in the data became more clear that the flight paths were similar between the two accidents, I think the Canadian authorities acted prudently and properly and I think the FAA who was working in the same direction also at that time there was enough information to go ahead [unintelligible] grounding the aeroplane. But I think a number of countries moved before there was down to support it because, even to this day right now as we speak, there is not any proven commonality between these two tragedies. The data from the flight data recorder, cockpit voice recorder that will provide evidence of linkage if it exists.

PC: So there have been some allegations some concerns raised that there is a political situation here, that President Trump's close connections to Boeing CEO and the potential reason why he was slower than other countries to ground the 737 MAX aircraft. Given what you just said, I'm guessing you know about that.

JOHN COX: No I don't think so because I think I know the FAA was looking very carefully. They were coordinating with the White House but they were looking for information. The FAA has a mandate. If they see an unsafe condition they are mandated to issue an emergency airworthiness directive and fix it. But the establishment of an unsafe condition has not yet occurred with the 737 Max because there is not leakage between these two accidents. The data off the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder may very well provide that linkage, but until the FAA identified that an unsafe condition existed like it did with the 787, there wasn't a legal framework for them to ground the airplane.

PC: There are so many people flying at this time of year. It's March Break in many parts of Canada, in your country spring break are about to kick off everywhere. There are a lot of people trying to get home and get to their destinations. Airlines having to find other planes to do that. And I guess this is kind of a basic question but if someone is getting on a plane today and is worried about overall safety, you say what?

JOHN COX: I would say and I would point to the fact that aviation has probably never been safer. In 2017 we flew four and a half billion passengers or nearly 45 million flights without a single passenger fatality on a commercial scheduled jet. So if you see where aviation safety has evolved over the years, it's unquestionably the safest form of public transportation ever designed by mankind. The most dangerous part of a commercial airline flight, clearly, unquestionably, is the drive to and from the airport.

PC: John Cox, we'll leave it there. Thank you very much.

JOHN COX: My pleasure.

PC: John Cox's a retired airline pilot. An accident investigator is now CEO of the consulting firm Safety Operating Systems. We reached him in Columbus, Ohio. Well our next guest knows a thing or two about the technology that helps run airplanes. And he has some concerns about their potential impact. Chris Clearfield is a licensed commercial pilot and is the co-author of a book called Meltdown: Why our Systems Fail and What we Can do about it. He's in Seattle, Washington. Hello to you.

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Hi. Good morning there.

PC: What did you think when you heard about the concerns surrounding the Boeing 737 MAX planes, in particular the software issues?

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Well you know it's really interesting because when you look at the decision that Boeing made which was to essentially add a feature, add a safety system as they redesigned this aircraft to support these bigger engines. In a local sense it seems clear that adding a safety system is a good decision, but I think what we see is this are unanticipated consequences of that. They come from the fact that it's such a complex system and so you can always expect that sort of local decision to play out in the way that you necessarily anticipate.

PC: Meaning that pilots can in some cases kind of take control over the computer stuff in a plane but there's so much run on a plane now by computers it's hard.

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Yes. There's that aspect to it. And then I would even push it back a level which is thinking about the engineers who designed this, who fundamentally showed up at work every day to make a safe airplane and to do a good job and made I think good decisions to do that. But what we see is this, the fact that complexity creates these opportunities for these unanticipated failures and then that can impact how well flight crews and pilot after approach these airplanes.

PC: President Trump tweeted 'airplanes are becoming far too complex to fly. Pilots are no longer needed but rather computer scientist from M.I.T'. He got marked by a lot of people for making them statement but is there some truth to what he's saying there?

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Yes I mean it's interesting. I think first of all it's a very nuanced tweet from President Trump which I think is interesting in and of itself. I mean computer scientist from M.I.T. are involved in these processes and I actually think that what we need and what we see in the Lion Air crash in particular is that the pilots were out of loop. They didn't understand enough of what was happening. They were startled and so they responded like humans do, which is to say, sort of imperfectly. But the flight before the tragic Lion Air crash you had a flight crew it had the same exact condition and they were able to troubleshoot it and fly the flight and land the airplane safely. And so I actually think what we need is humans more in the loop. And engineers should generally do a good job of thinking kind of pilot centric at places like Boeing, engineers being able to think kind of more pilot centrically.

PC: We just heard John Cox saying flying is as safe as it has ever been. Are we reaching a point of diminishing returns when it comes to putting computer software on planes?

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Well I mean yes and it's important to note that there is tons of computers software on planes already. So they're sort of different models of thinking about how software affects the way that pilots control the planes. But we're diminishing returns in aviation safety kind of by definition because it is already so safe. So really I mean any change we make can only reduce safety in some sense. And you know the software edition, the safety feature that Boeing added, was really driven by the design of the airplane and the intent-- the new engines to make it more fuel efficient. And so you know that's an area where there is engineering innovation but we've got to think about complexity as one of the things that kind of fall out of that and as a source of error.

PC: You know at this point in both the Lion Air crash and the Ethiopian one on the weekend, obviously but there is no formal findings. The investigations in one case were just really sturdy and the other still is incompleted. So to point to what the cause is at this point is premature. But give me examples of airplane crashes that have been caused by complicated flight systems.

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Yeah there's a bunch of them. The Air France 447 is is kind of a great example. That was an Airbus airplane. And similarly as the Boeing, the Lion Air flight, it had problems with some sensors which gave erroneous readings in the cockpit and confused the crew, and created this this startle effect. And they didn't respond in the right way - obviously despite their best intentions - and that was exacerbated by the fact that the way the Airbus is designed. It's actually pretty hard for one crew member to tell exactly what the other crewmember is doing because of the way the control sticks are designed. And so that's an example that springs to mind as a tragedy. But there's loads. I mean there's instances of pilots entering the wrong waypoint in two into their flight management system and unexpectedly being off course and crashing. That was a procedural problem but also a human technology interface problem.

PC: when these kinds of examples have come up, there are actually incidents not examples, what has generally been the reaction of airlines and manufacturers when these system defects have been noted?

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Well you know I mean of course there is sort of a natural human tendency of organizations to, at the beginning, possibly resist what's happening and you know it's hard. I do think it you know the 737 MAX is ultimately still an incredibly safe airplane. I think what aviation has tended to do really well, when you zoom out a little bit, is learn. Learn from near misses. Learn from incidents. Learn from crashes and learn from failures and use that to not only update designs but also update procedures, update the way crews are trained and things like this. And I think that the discussion around, whether or not the software fix was delayed by the federal government shutdown, is sort of one way to frame it. But another way to frame it is that in this particular learning loop it would have been nice if this had been a little bit faster. On the other hand you've got to balance that against the fact that in this change Boeing is actually adding complexity and the way that this software works by incorporating input from multiple sensors. So it's something that one wants to be really considered about. But I think this learning loop is the thing that has made aviation so safe.

PC: You said how crews are trained. And pilots around the world have said 'our training hours have been cut, so the number of hours we spend on simulators to learn how to fly a particular aircraft have been cut for many many reasons'. Is that part of the challenge nowadays?

CHRIS CLEARFILED: You know I don't know if that's part of the challenge. I mean crew training is again unbelievably effective when you just look at the empirical outcome, and some of the training that makes it effective doesn't actually have that much to do with time. It's about how crews communicate with each other and it's about the culture of airlines and making sure that pilots,, and everyone involved in a flight are willing to speak up and say 'hey this doesn't seem right to me'. So I think the way of structured communication is a big part of it. And that that's not something that time alone necessarily helps. I do think what we see here is almost we're sort of at the threshold of the limits of human performance. I mean we, humans, we're imperfect creatures. We get startled and when we get startled our brains don't always work in this kind of rational logical way. And we need to be building that into our designs, which already happens, but we sort of need to keep those kind of fundamental limitations of expertise at the forefront as we think through this stuff.

PC: Chris Clearfield we'll leave it there. Thank you very much.

CHRIS CLEARFILED: Thank you.

PC: Chris Clearfield is the co-author of Meltdown. The book is being released in paperback next week. It has a new subtitle: What Plane Crashes, Oil Spills and Dumb Business Decisions Can Teach us about How to Succeed at Work and at Home. Chris Clearfield was in Seattle Washington. If you happen to be a pilot, a co-pilot. A flight attendant or just a regular passenger and you want to talk about the story with us to get in touch. @TheCurrentCBC is our Twitter handle. Facebook.com/cbcthecurrent is where to find us on Facebook. Or you can e-mail us cbc.ca/thecurrent our Web site. Once you get there click on the Contact Us link. The CBC News is next. And then a new documentary looks at some new faces in Canadian farming, Chinese Canadians and Chinese investors. We'll hear from them in just a bit. I'm Piya Chattopadhyay, sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti. You're listening to The Current.

Chinese-Canadian farmers are facing hostility as they settle in rural areas. A new CBC doc aims to change that

Guests: David Fu, Tony Fu, Diana Dai

PC: Hi I'm Piya Chattopadhyay in for Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current. Still to come: The Brexit mess house.

SOUNDCLIP

The house needs to face up to the consequences of the decisions it's taken.

PC: Prime Minister Theresa May after yet another defeat in the British House of Commons. we'll look at whether Britain can really avoid a no deal Brexit. And what do you expect from today's vote on delaying the divorce. Plus, the power of cute. Those stories in half an hour. But first, down on the farm.

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VOICE 1: Along the way there is definitely some people who felt that we didn't belong in this area. A lot of people have also never seen any Chinese farmers. Because it's always been Canadians who look similar to them, enjoy similar things. Initially when you're entering this community there's definitely going to be some hostility for why exactly you're here.

VOICE 2: There are a lot of people that were local that stopped coming to this winery because they have been sold to a foreign investor. Most people don't like change.

PC: There has been plenty of changes to the face of Canadian farming. As you can hear in those clips from a new CBC TV documentary called My Farmland. Director Diana Dai focuses in on the growing Chinese investment in Canadian agriculture both in the Saskatchewan breadbasket and Ontario's wine country. In Saskatchewan a long established farming families are grappling with higher land prices and many blame foreign investment. They also worry about how it's affecting local communities where there are just so many absent landholders who just rent out their farmland. But the film also features a Chinese Canadian family that is living on the land and farming it committed to making things work in the face of financial difficulties and drought. David and Tony Fu are the father and son featured in the film on their farm is in Coronach, Saskatchewan. They're with us now from Regina and Diana Dai directed the film which airs on CBC Docs POV tomorrow Friday night. She's with me in Toronto. Hi everyone.

DAVID FU: Hello.

TONY FU: Glad to be here.

PC: Diana Dai is the film's director. She's in our Toronto studio here with me. Hello.

DIANA DAI: Hello, Piya.

PC: Diana let me begin with you. What is it that prompted you to make a documentary about the role of Chinese Canadian or Chinese investors in Canadian agriculture?

DAVID FU: Well obviously I'm a Chinese Canadian documentary film makers so I pay close attention to the news about Chinese investment or Chinese immigrants story Canada. The Chinese investment. It's usury is quite a controversial topic for locals. So impaired Chinese investment in the city had been well publicists but benign agricultural sector. But the impact on agriculture sectors are quite big too big.

PC: How big a role are Chinese investors playing now in our agricultural sector?

DIANA DAI: Our say because in Canada's province they really have placed their restriction and the numbers of acres a non-resident residents can own, and their liking. Saskatchewan non-residents can only own up to 10 acres of land. But some provinces like Ontario, BC does no retraction. So it depends which province.

PC: Okay David let me bring you in. Tell us your story. Why did you decide to start farming in Saskatchewan? How did you even decide all of this?

DAVID FU: I brought my family into Canada 20 years ago. I lived in Vancouver in the beginning. I worked as a research scientist for 10 years, but unfortunately I got sick, I took a long term so. But during the time I got a chance to visit Saskatchewan to look at the farms over here. What shocked me is the open field is so huge which recalled my old old dream when I was a child in China. I was born there lived in poverty for my entire childhood. I struggled for food, for daily life for many years. So when I went outside this in Saskatchewan, the farm, the size is so huge and the land is fertile. So I just-- just my dream just come, just hovering around. If I can own these farm like this I can not only just feed myself and my family, I will have some plants to feed other people.

PC: You grew up in a farm in China, yes?

DAVID FU: Yes.

PC: So farming is in your blood so to speak.

DAVID FU: Right.

PC: And so you get to live out your dream, and you pick up and you move stakes from big city Vancouver to a very small town Saskatchewan.

DAVID FU: Because at a time my son Tony came with me you. Actually the initial reason is he is just going to come from me. We just settled down which surprised me is Tony has more interested in farming as well and just he just has got a big push behind me. Just that. Buy a farm as big as possible. I'll farm it for you. At the time we just trying my best to get more capital over here and we bought farm. Step by step we just are farming.

PC: Tony, you grew up basically in Vancouver so you are a city kid, and you weren't so old when you said I'll go to the farm. Like what made you want to do it? Your dad says, he came kind of on his own volition.

TONY FU: Yeah actually I like that phrase he used he said the farming is in our blood. I mean this is something I've never done before. When I first came here I was slightly over 18 and full freshed greenhorn, greenhorn on pretty much everything in life. So I don't know what I was doing. I don't know what was good or bad. I don't know. As soon as I heard about this opportunity and saw with my own eyes I guess it just really connected to me and I just felt this was something I really needed to do and that's exactly what we end up doing.

PC: You really have no skills right.

TONY FU: Yes exactly. No skills. I didn't have experience in anything else. So I was really- consider me as a baby lamb that didn't know anything.

PC: Diana Dai how typical is David and Tony's story; Chinese Canadians who are living and working the farm themselves?

DIANA DAI: You know I'm lucky to fundus family. You see most Asian immigrants in Canada and they rarely do you see them settle on farm, especially this family, really physically working on the farm that's rare.

PC: Why is it so rare?

DIANA DAI: Because I think Chinese people who come here they are more into a city life. I mean I've been to David's farm you know is like in the middle of nowhere, it can be considered a boring life, can be sometime probably be scared.

PC: Is it also because in China farming isn't regarded as nobly as it should be?

DIANA DAI: That's true. In China as far as social status are pretty low compared with those professionals and usually in China a farmer is pretty poor. So really like it is not the respectful career in China.

PC: And even now in 2019 the farmers who come out from other parts of the world places like China who end up in small towns Saskatchewan still very monolithic societies mostly white. Integrating is challenging sometimes to you.

DIANA DAI: Yes because I mean the community is close knit community in farming. You know more some of them are related to each other and they lived there for many generations. So they can be used to the kind of lifestyle. All of a sudden they see people especially ethnic background they're coming 'hey do those guys know how to do farming?'

PC: You present one of these people in your film. He is at the heart of your film another Saskachwan farmer called Stuart Leonard.

DIANA DAI: Yes.

PC: Tell us about Stuart Lerner and his situation.

DIANA DAI: Stuart is a typical young farmer in Saskatchewan small town. He has seen much in his area had bought by Chinese Canadian investors. So the young generation farmers like Stuart they cannot afford to compete with investors. So they start to rent to lend you know instead of owning land. For me as a farmer your land is your livelihood. You've many generations family farming the land and you kind of own the farm. You know what means to you. But also they also afraid of the losing community.

PC: So let's listen to Stuart Leonard and his wife Tanya talk a bit about that, about how investors are changing the area in which they live.

SOUNDCLIP

STUART LEONARD: There's about 30 percent of land around Ogema that's owned by investors. Before it used to be a neighbour over two miles, a mile. Now not that way anymore because they're buying big blocks of land. I definitely worry about the investors not being involved in Ogema. I think you'll see that depletion on the community.

TANYA LEONARD: There are small communities around us that have disappeared, cables disappeared, it's nothing. And also the land around there is investors now.

PC: So Diana Dai, in that clip from your film, there at a baseball, a local baseball game.

DIANA DAI: Typical Canadian.

PC: Small rural area kind of gathering. And so you heard Stuart Leonard say it's not only about people not being here to physically farm the land. He's concerned about the culture of Saskatchewan - rural Saskatchewan - changing. How justified are his worries about how the culture of rural Saskatchwan is changing as a result of foreign investment?

DIANA DAI: Well I think first of all when this small community-- so basically people in a small town they always participate all events. They do volunteer work. So that's how they keep coming and going. But right now Stuart said that basically investors, they never involved those kind of work. And you see less and less people there. You know one thing I filmed Stuart was to come by was on fire and he mentioned it.

PC: In the film as one of his combine, Stuart's, catches on fire. The local people who have farmland come and help him put out the fire and he makes this point that 'I see any of these Chinese investors here helping me put out this fire'.

DIANA DAI: And because the less neighbor. You know usually the farmers they walk in the middle of nowhere. So if machinery break down and an accident happen they need a people to come to help them.

PC: David Fu, when you hear the kinds of concerns that Stuart Leonard brings up about the idea of community the traditions that he's always known through generations of his family in his small rural community, talk about this, what do you hear?

DAVID FU: When I first came to here, Saskatchewan, I wasn't realize this. A lot my friend they come here to apply farm farmland but eventually some of them just bought the land and leave it there unattended and rent it for the neighbors and they just take advantage of their land value appreciation. So if the previous farmer is deciding to a retirement they get more cash in their pocket for their retirement that is good for them. However, as a farmer now, living here for many years after that I know this kind of things is not good for farm industry, for the farm itself.

PC: There’s a scene with Robert Brenner who owned your farm before you did. And in the scene he is driving and he tells you how the locals see you. So let's have a listen.

SOUNDCLIP

Some people don't want to talk to you because they don't want to see you in here. I've never told you guys this, but when you guys bought our farm, the first time in the coffee shop was, 'oh you sold to the Chinese, did ya'. And I said, were you guys prepared to pay that kind of money?

PC: That was to you Tony when you're out there driving. How did you feel when he told you that?

TONY FU: I was honestly pretty shocked. Originally I wasn't aware of these facts because obviously you know like they don't mention these things to us directly. So generally in these situations I would say maybe 19 out of 20 local residents, they're all really great. Like all our neighbours are all really great. If we asked for help, you know, they're always there. And if we ever had any problems, they would be there for us, right. But it's that one out of 20 person ... the last of the 20 people that could have a problem with you, and the problem here is that they're always the loudest and they're always the most vocal about these things. So if we're not around, they might be the one speaking the loudest to the other neighbours about, 'Oh maybe we shouldn't have these guy here, or why are they here?' And questions like that.

PC: Diana Dai you take us to another farm in Canada this as an example of Chinese investment, foreign investment. This is at a winery in Niagara on the lake. What brought Chinese investors into that farm and who are they?

DIANA DAI: Well they're Chinese investors from China. You know he's a business man in China. Well the winery, owning a winery is a standard symbol in China. Plus, on the Niagara on the Lake, near the Niagara Falls, you know that's a great area for us to put you know to do a business here. And so they had pretty high expectation. It's good to purchase a winery in such a famous area. But I think the purchase of this [unintelligible] winery by Chinese investor is a perfect example of a challenge faced when those kind of transitions happen and when people from East start work with people from west.

PC: This was a successful winery owned it operated by Canadian citizens that was bought up by Chinese investors who don't live in Canada for the most part. And then what happened? They were exporting wine to China that was the market right?

DIANA DAI: Yes. But the beginning was not the kind of story. In the beginning when they purchased the land, they had a language barrier, they have a different culture backgrounds and they had a no support system there. They had nobody, no network and they had no knowledge about the industry, did not understand the risk.

PC: No experience in even growing grapes.

DIANA DAI: They don't know the name of grapes. So did almost understand the [unintelligible]. They also did not expect you need to invest so much money in a winery. So the staff work there they have mixed feelings because they have a different way to operate a business. So for local stuff, there was hesitation to work with them because they never walk with someone having no knowledge of the industry and who lives in another country.

PC: Let me ask you a very frank question. How much of these reactions that you the weather it was in Ontario or Saskatchewan do you attribute to racism?

DIANA DAI: I won't say racism, that's strong but I think it is something dislike. If a winery owner is by Americans or European or other nationalities probably will be little slightly different. But also because of the culture backgrounds there. The eastern culture is so different from different culture. Also another perception they always think well Chinese they have lots of money. So has the money doesn't guarantee success. I think they still have some attitude towards Chinese investors that's for sure.

PC: There is this lovely moment in the film. I enjoyed so much David and Tony and your wife, David, sitting around the dining room table. You're having dinner. I think you’re reading shepherd's pie or something like that. I remember looking at it thinking this makes me very hungry. And the film in that scene gives us a window into the fundamental discussion that goes on inside farming families, no matter where your’e from or how many generations have been doing this, about whether farming is worth all the hard work and all the uncertainty. And Tony, at your dinner table, when we get a glimpse into it, there is this very frank conversation where your mom asks you whether you really want to carry on with the farm rather than go off into some other industry. So let's listen to that.

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MRS. FU: Even the local family think this industry is unpredictable, risky. Some have very good profit. However, most of them are farming background for ancestor, but is not apply for you. You don’t' have the procedure to follow.

TONY FU: I thought about it for a long time. I still think this is the thing that I really enjoy doing.

MRS. FU: How much capital we have to support him, how likely last? Did you think about that?

DAVID FU: If Tony after six or seven years of experience on farming is still didn't lost his face on it, we can still give him another try.

MRS. FU: From my background and my knowledge, if this thing is too risky, I rather to quit.

TONY FU: I don't want to talk about that. I don't want to talk about this stuff.

PC: Tony why was that such a hard conversation for you?

TONY FU: Well you know this is this is the biggest venture that I've gone on and the hardest thing that we've had to do so far. And you know we faced truthfully a lot of ups and downs and quite a bit more downs actually than we were expecting so. You know life my parents have always been a great support from me throughout life and if they obviously had more experience in regards to many things. So if they think that it's something that they don't see is maybe a good future, then they obviously want to raise those points to me and to ask me, to confirm with me whether or not this is in fact something that I want to do for the, at least the foreseeable future. So no matter how hard the casket conversation is, we still have to make sure that we discuss the negatives and how hard this whole thing would be just to get it out there and to make sure that we're doing something we can all agree on as a family.

PC: There is not a farming family in Canada that doesn't have ups and downs. That's the nature of farming depending on so many other factors that you're not in control of. David what does the farm look like now? What is your future and farming look right now?

DAVID FU: Actually we haven't just fully recovered from a big loss in 2017. But last year was slightly better. Hoping this is a better year, this coming year of 2019. But however we still have some [unintelligible] uncertainties. I cannot make for sure whether I'm going just to expand our farm in the near future, but even that is my dream. But I will try my best to bring it back on track. I will just work with Tony and my family and see what's going on.

PC: You got how many acres right now and what are you farming? What are you going to seed in next month or two?

DAVID FU: Still this year we have 3000acres to farm, but mostly I work with my neighbours, do some crops here and leave some land to him. So I have to be more conservative.

PC: What do you grow?

DAVID FU: Most likely germ or lentils this year.

PC: What do you want us to understand about how the face of farming is changing in Canada?

TONY FU: Well I think the biggest thing is- I guess Diana brought up a good point. You have to really get to know a person first before you can make a predetermined judgment or like decision on what you perceived them to be as. So for us you know obviously we look like the other Canadian investors come in to just buy the land and rent it out, but in reality we don't do that. We are here to stay and were here to make sure we farm and do everything according to the culture and the societal guidelines. They have already been established for 100 years or so. I feel like if people got to know us and understand that we're part of society and we do what the other local farmers do as well, then I foresee that there will be a lot less issues going into the future.

PC: David do you know anything to that?

DAVID FU: I want to let the local Canadian farmers know, I appreciate for all kind of help they provide for our family as a newcomer. And if we have something which is just different from the original way they farm here, they just give us more understanding, just give us more support.

DIANA DAI: Piya, I really want to say something. I hope my film can make people from different cultural-- just be a bridge, can people from different backgrounds to see each other's strengths to understand other's prospective. And you never know. You [unintelligible] one day you know and you never know, other party will open a completely new world for you. People from different backgrounds can walk side by side. I think it is what Canada about.

PC: Thank you very much to all three of you. David and Tony Have a good seeding season and I'll drive down the road to come see you when I'm back home in Saskatchewan.

TONY FU: Yes for sure. Thanks.

DAVID FU: Thank you.

PC: Diana Dai thank you as well.

DIANA DAI: Thank you for having me. Thank you.

PC: David and Tony Fu for farmers from Coronach, Saskatchewan but they were on our Regina studio, and Diana Dai is the director of the documentary My Farmland. It is airing on CBC Docs POV tomorrow. That's Friday at 9:00 p.m. 9:30 in Newfoundland and Labrador. It's also going to be available to stream on CBC Gem as on noon tomorrow. Well whether you're a farmer in the Coronach Saskatchewan region or anywhere else in this country, we'd love to hear from you about how the face of farming is changing in the neighborhood in which you work and the effect that's having on all kinds of things in your area. You can get in touch with us on Facebook, Facebook.com/cbc/thecurrent. You can email us cbc.ca/thecurrent. Once you're there click on the Contact Us link. Or you can tweet us @TheCurrentCBC. Well coming up in our next half hour British thinker Simon May joins me to share his ruminations on all things cute. The power cute wields in our culture today. Plus an update on Britain's very un-cute Brexit saga. It's all coming up. I'm Piya Chattopadhyay sitting in for Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current. We're back in just a bit.

What the cuteness of characters like Mickey Mouse can tell us about our world

Guests: Simon May, Eric Reguly

PC: Hi again I'm Piya Chattopadhyay in for Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current.

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The legal default the legal default UK and EU law remains that the UK will leave the EU without a deal, unless something else is agreed. The onus is now on and one of us in this house to find out what that is. The options before us are the same as they always have been.

PC: That's British Prime Minister Theresa May speaking in the House of Commons yesterday. She has lost a vote after a vote after a vote trying to get a Brexit deal through the Mother of Parliaments. Now it seems she's close to losing her voice as well. With the big day for Britain's divorce from the EU, two weeks away, March 29, the story in Brexit just seems to be getting more and more bonkers. Eric Reguly is the Globe and Mail's European bureau chief. He has been watching at the Brexit maneuvers very closely. He's with us from Rome, Italy. Hi.

ERIC REGULY: Good morning, Piya.

PC: Eric, MPs have voted against a no deal Brexit. Said described the circumstances of that vote.

ERIC REGULY: Well it was part of a Prime Minister Theresa May's efforts to get the job done and it keeps failing. She's actually lost 18 votes in recent months, 18, as she's lost two big boats on her deal which I best described as a soft Brexit that minimized the economic damage on both sides of the English Channel. And last night she lost a whole other series of votes. These were amendments but it is farcical because you saw that you have the governments voting against its own amendments at one point. You had cabinet ministers abstaining from votes even though was a three line whip which you can get fired for. But she has no power left and couldn't get fired. So it's a shambles but she just keeps coming back and coming back. You've got to admire her tenacity.

PC: Well I mean the outcomes of lot of these votes have been no surprise to anyone. Was yesterday's any surprise to anyone?

ERIC REGULY: No. There was a consensus that Britain not leave that Britain should not leave without a deal with the EU. But you know you didn't really mean much last night in the sense that this is a non-legally binding vote. No one is to leave without a deal, but that's still the default position. If there is no deal within two weeks, Britain crashes out. How can Britain stop that crash out which will be economically destructive for Britain it would be like a nuclear bomb going off. The only way you can do that is, A, agree a deal which Theresa May is trying yet again for the third time next week. Or you agree an extension to article 50. Article 50 years is the exit from the EU clause and it looks like they're going to delay Brexit. Now the question is how long is it? Weeks? Months? Years? Forever? Who knows.

PC: Well given those variance in time line, if MPs vote to extend the actual act of existing. In other words delay delay delay, well then? What does that potentially look like?

ERIC REGULY: Well there's two scenarios here. If Theresa May gets a deal next week - I actually think she could because she is threatening. What her threat is very simple she said saying, look, pick your poison. You can choose my deal which is a soft Brexit or you going to have an extension which could go on together and effectively kill Brexit. That's true gamble and I think it may actually work, because if they delay Brexit for more than a couple months it could be delayed forever. Don't forget the European Union elections are in May. Is there's no deal on Brexit, a delay by several months or a year or two years, I mean this scenarios are possible, Britain has to run in the European Union elections in May, which means it's back in the European Union which would really annoy the Brexiteers.

PC: If Britain decides to extend, does it need-- you'd say 'yeah let's call you can delay delay delay'?

ERIC REGULY: That's a really good question. You're right it requires-- Britain can't just say look we want to delay. We want to extend our Article 15 by however long. It requires unanimity among the EU member states and there's twenty seven of them. They'll get it, but Europe is saying 'look, we need a good reason why you want an extension'. Is it simply to get legislation passed for Theresa May's deal. Or is it and entire rethink which could include a referendum, a British election which would not see Theresa May running as prime minister for sure. Or something else, there's all sorts of scenarios if Britain goes to the EU and said we want and extension but we don't know really know why we want an extension. They're going to say, no, go away, we're sick of this.

PC: I'm wondering when you say sick of this, what the mood of the public is. It has been a long endless drama, if I can put it that way. What is the mood?

ERIC REGULY: Oh everyone's sick of it. I mean everyone. Don't forget this started almost three years ago. So almost three years later after the referendum there still no deal. You can't blame the European Union for this. The European Union has been completely consistent. They said, look, we're sorry you'll leave, we don't want you to leave, but you can't cherry pick. You can't leave and keep all the best bits of membership. You've got to leave on our terms. So why does the EU do that? Because if it makes it easy for Britain to leave then it's an incentive for Poland, Italy, Greece everyone else to leave. Then the European Union completely disintegrate. So you can blame Brussels on this. In my opinion. It's just a complete shambles now in Britain. [Unintelligible] And Theresa May has lost her power. She's lost control of her cabinet, of her party. It's just complete mess.

PC: Is the average Briton - would you say 'oh my goodness. I'm tired, I'm fatigued of this. We got to figure this out one way or another'?

ERIC REGULY: Oh very much so yeah. And the really important thing in this fatigue factor is the business and economy and economic side. There is still no clarity what's going to happen next week let alone a month or a year from now. Absolutely none. The British economy is heading into trouble now. [Unintelligible] are stalling out, house prices are falling, even worse for Britain, car companies are leaving. I mean the car companies like Honda and Nissan which have huge factories in theU.K. are there because they export to the European Union. If Britain gone and car parts and cars themselves face tariffs, they're not going to want to be there. So everything has been on hold now for almost three years. They're getting really really annoyed and who blames them.

PC: What are you looking for a kind of broad strokes next? What's next week happens say they get an extension, the EU says 'Yes, Okay' then what Eric?

ERIC REGULY: I'm going out on a limb here. I think Theresa May is going to sail her way to success. If I can put it that way. I mean she's been utterly defeated for months and months and months now, as I said 18 votes have gone against her. But I think now the Brexiteers are realising that her deal is better than no deal it all. If they don't accept her deal next week they go into the unknown and Britain could stay in the European Union forever. That's her threat. It just may work.

PC: Eric Reguly, thank you very much.

ERIC REGULY: Thank you.

PC: Take good care. Bye bye. Eric Reguly is the European bureau chief for The Globe and Mail. And we reached him in Rome, Italy.

PC: I'm Piya Chattopadhyay and this is The Current. When you think of the endless stream of content we all swim in online these days, there are certain qualities that make certain things stand out. They may be provocative or sexy, controversial or just plain cute. Which brings me to Chris Newsome and Mr. Toad.

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The hat with the monocle started as a simple top hat. That was not the proper look I thought for Mr. Toad so I added a feather and then decided he needed to have a monocle. So I made a cowboy hat, and a [unintelligible]a baseball cap.

PC: Chris Newsome story is about as cute as Mr. Toad himself. It seems a small brown amphibian started making visits to Newsome's porch in Jacksonville, Alabama. The reason Chris Newsome started making the costumes was to cheer up a friend's child whose pet toad had recently died. Combine that cute backstory with the cute photos and well Mr. Toad became an internet sensation. And soon Chris Newsome was during the media rounds. We asked him about it.

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I would always say that toads and frogs themselves are typically not what most people find cute. Hats on dogs, hats on cats, never has the response that hats on toads do. I think it's because it's out of the ordinary. I've had several people that I've known for many years. They would say of all the creative things you've done over the years, this is the thing that gets you noticed: a hat on a toad.

PC: Look you might dismiss Mr. Toad as silly entertainment you might think cute things are frivolous and saccharine not worth paying attention to. But according to our next guest the popularity of cuteness actually tells us a lot about our current cultural moment. Simon May is a professor of philosophy at King's College London and he is the author of The Power of Vote. He joins us from London, England. Hello.

SIMON MAY: Hello.

PC: Okay. For most people, pretty hard to deny that are toad in a pink top hat is cute, but as a philosopher what are we talking about? How do you define cuteness?

SIMON MAY: So I think that cute is actually a very broad phenomenon. It's frequently thought to be just about sweet little teddy bears or kittens, or pandas looking helpless. And that is undoubtedly one of what I call the cute spectrum, so there's this whole spectrum of cuteness. But if that was all cute was about it wouldn't be the multibillion dollar international continuous sensation that it is, and that things like Hello Kitty or Jeff Koons's balloon dog which has run for years and years, or ET back in the 80s were. So I think it's a really broad phenomenon that taps into some very fundamental things about our world.

PC: Okay let's talk about what it's tapping into. What do you think of the fact that we live in a time, this cultural moment, where someone can become an online sensation of cuteness by making hats for a toad.

SIMON MAY: Well in a way that example - which I have to say I was ignorant of but sounded great - is a good example of what I call the uncanny end of cute. And that's the kind of end that really grabs people where you see something that actually is a little bit scary. So a toad is you know it's slimy. It jumps in weird ways. It's not close to the human infant say in the way that you know a little puppy with big round eyes is or, you know, it elicits that protective instinct in us. And I think it's precisely that juxtaposition of the familiar. We all know what a toad is, but with the slightly spooky uncanny that sliminess are referred to and then on top of it it gets a cowboy hat on. So there's this juxtaposition I would say of the familiar and the unfamiliar and you have as a result something that's indeterminate. And there's something about our age that's fascinated by indeterminacy and breaking down all those old clear characters and divisions that we thought we understood.

PC: So on the spectrum of cute here does Mr. Toad sits?

SIMON MAY: I think Mr. Toads sit sort of I would say - I haven't actually seen Mr. Toad yet but I'm going to run out and have a look at him afterwards, I mean I'm going to have a look at an image of him afterwards - but I would say he sits about one third of the way along my cute spectrum from what I call the Sweet end, which is the harmless teddy bear end.

PC: I want to play another piece of tape perhaps this is something that's agreed to be more conventionally cute.

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Hey everybody. It's me, Mickey Mouse. Say you come inside my club house? Well, alright, let's go.

PC: Simon May, you k now, I was at Disney were at Disney World last week I saw a lot of Mickey Mouse and what sort of struck me is and the staying power of Mickey Mouse. I remember seeing him and many as a kid and loving it and saw as an adult and gone 'still cute'. But has Mickey Mouse stayed true in it not evolving or has Mickey Mouse evolved?

SIMON MAY: Well actually Mickey Mouse has evolved and before the Second World War he was a he was a different little creature. He was a lot more aggressive, overtly aggressive and you know he sort of tweaked pigs, others and attack people. And then he became this much more gentler put upon, but nonetheless very feisty creature, after the Second World War. And reputedly the canny Walt Disney stuck post it’s on his designer's door saying 'Keep it cute' because he realized that something about the world had changed. Now these things are really difficult to articulate, you don't know what but you just sense that something has changed. And I think one thing that did change after the disaster of the Second World War was that the Western world and Japan - I mean the participants in that war especially the western world and Japan - just felt that we need an alternative to might is right, to running the world entirely on the basis of power and somehow figures that embodied the power to persist but nonetheless who were gentle, there was somehow a you know an attraction to that kind of figure and Mickey Mouse changed in accord with that new change in atmosphere. Anyway that's my guess but it's been borne out by you know others who studied this extraordinary transition.

PC: I'm glad you brought up Japan because Japan in many people's eyes is sort of the epicenter of cute. It's pretty as tell a whole command the Japanese government appointed three costumed women as official ambassadors of cute about a decade ago. There is a Japanese word procured I understand?

SIMON MAY: There is kawaii.

PC: Kawaii. Okay. What particularly particular significance does cuteness have in Japanese society?

SIMON MAY: Immense. In fact probably greater than in any other society that I know of. It is central not only to the kind of thing that people just love. People say the whole time when they see cute things 'oh kawaii' you know they're very focused on the cute aesthetic. But also as you just mentioned it's a way in which the entire nation presents itself to the rest of the world. And I think that's pretty much unique. I don't think any other major country presents itself as a cute nation.

PC: That's a cultural thing right? Because culturally cute can be seen as you know a nice thing which Japan has kind of embraced, or Japanese culture has embraced. There's no shame in being an adult and liking Hello Kitty and Pokémon and all this stuff. But arguably western culture see cute as something you do as a little kid. You get you get over your cuteness. You which you're out of your cuteness. It's trivial at best or at worst as an adult, the creepy fetish. What other criticisms have been leveled culturally against cuteness?

SIMON MAY: It's been labelled as infantile so that it it sort of reflects a desire to return to this childish womb like state. Having said that that hasn't stopped it be wildly popular in the West too among adults. An anthropologist called Christine Yannah who has studied the fandom of Hello Kitty and found that it's actually predominantly - I can't remember the exact age range - but I think it's about 16 to 40 years of age is where the majority of devotees of Hello Kitty lie. So they've obviously got them secretly secreted away in their offices and bedrooms. She's also looked at the professions and we're talking about investment bankers, academics - not that they're necessarily that mature - but Wall Street bankers, punk rockers, performance artists and fashion designers. You know fashion designers have been huge on cute. So it's by no means just in Japan that it's so fashionable.

PC: Where do you see the value in all of this? Dig deep what's at the core of this?

SIMON MAY: I think cute is quite right. Okay. But what interests me is that it's a way of expressing some of the most powerful needs and sensibilities of our contemporary world. We live in a world which is breaking down traditional hard and fast distinctions say of gender. You know it used to be said this just this one-- You know [unintelligible] which was masculine it has certain characters. One think of feminine certain characters. Now we have much more fluidity around that around the distinction between the child and the adult. So we now clearly see the child's life present at every stage in the adult's life, all its major decisions its relationships and so on. A breakdown in morality in the sense of knowing what's good and what's bad. You know I have my values you have your values and so on. And even actually a breakdown in species. I mean the old distinction between the human and the animal is breaking down. And those are just four examples. And so I think it speaks but crucially in a playful register. We're an age that likes things to come in playful forms. You know we've actually had a lot of seriousness. We've had a lot of catastrophe and we like the playful form. We self-represent ourselves with things like emerges and I've seen people from the age of nine to 90 do that. That's not age specific. So I think presenting this indeterminacy that somehow reigns in the world the collapse of traditional hard and fast categories but crucially in a playful way. And I think I've already mentioned this - in the context of Japan and the morphing of Mickey Mouse from this really unpleasant aggressive character to a much more gentle character - there's a certain anti power feeling in our world. I mean I know our world is still run a lot by just brute power but there's a sense of 'can we somehow escape from that'. And a lot of the post-war period of creating all these international institutions like the World Bank and the U.N. I know they’re hardly cute, but they reflect this will to escape from a world where might is right and move to a gentler world in some sense. And of course were somehow in a transitional situation at the moment but I think it speaks to all these and more.

PC: And to what extent does the fixation on cute at this current moment give people relief from what seems like a very, or what is a very divisive time not only politically but societally. People worrying about the future of our planet and climate change having anxiety over that. How much does focusing on, maybe look at the cute little puppy and like it just feel the world's okay or at least there's help.

SIMON MAY: I think undoubtedly that is the case but I would just say, though I agree with you, I think the interesting thing is that the cute that has the tremendous success where we are talking about global phenomena and not teddy bears and kittens. What has this tremendous success, things like Hello Kitty are always slightly creepy like your toad with which you opened the program. Hello Kitty is mouthless and voiceless Kitty has no mouth. She has no voice to speak with. She's a voiceless creature. What is a voice this creature? It’s a helpless creature in a way, but not help us in a sweet way like a teddy bear. Its slightly agonizingly helpless and I think you know in that sense it's not just that we're seeking distraction and consolation through cute things. I think cute things are speaking of something of how we almost see the world. But these things operate at a very unconscious level.

PC: What would you like the rest of us to think about when we see the next cuteness trend, in a philosophical way?

SIMON MAY: In the philosophical way I'd like people to think about what this tremendous attraction to cute things that are very slightly distorted actually is all about.

PC: And your answer to that.

SIMON MAY: My answer to that is that we all want to be attuned to feel one with the world in which we live. And the world in which we live is not one of [unintelligible]. It's one of distortion of healthy nature. It's one of indeterminacy where as I said before these traditional hard and fast categories of gender and age and morality and so on are dissolving. It's one in which we see the world as essentially transient in which there is little that's fixed. It's one in which we're trying to get away from the brutality of past centuries where things were just right, where millions of people were sent into battle to die and to get into a sort of gentler calmer perhaps cuter world. And I think it's speaks to all these things but crucially in a lighthearted way. In a lighthearted, perhaps I could say, even frivolous way. And for better or for worse, that's the world in which we live.

PC: Simon May thank you very much for your time I appreciate it.

SIMON MAY: Thank you.

PC: Bye bye. Simon May is a professor of philosophy at King's College London and the author of The Power of Cute. He was in London, England. You'll be able to find photos of Mr. Toad by the way on our Web site later on today. And we would love to hear your thoughts on the power of cute or not. You can send us your ultimate cute photo @TheCurrentCBC on Twitter or paste it to our Facebook page, if your Facebook is working right now. Or of course you can also tell us why you had just about enough of cute. Send us an e-mail through our Web site cbc.ca/thecurrent. That is the current for today. Stay tuned to Radio 1 for Q were Juno week continues. Michael Bublé is on the show for a special extended interview about hosting the Juno's, his son's cancer diagnosis and his new album It's Called Love. Remember you can take The Current with you on the go on the CBC Radio mobile app. It's free from the App Store or Google Play by play. Finally for us today after that conversation about the power and politics of cuteness, we thought we'd look back at a paragon of cuteness from an earlier era. She wasn't the first child star but she was arguably the ultimate one, and her spirit help distract audiences from the pain of another dark era in history; the great depression, with sugary visions of a candy utopia. Here is Shirley Temple. I', Piya Chattopadhyay in for Anna Maria Tremonti. Laura Lynch will be with you here tomorrow. Thank you for lending us your ear here on The Current.

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[Song: The Good Ship Lollippop]

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