Run for Change

Here's an inspiring video about Run for Change. From their website runforchange.ca :

Run for Change was founded by a local runner named Benji Chu in 2009 and is aimed at introducing low-income, shelter, recovery and homeless people living in Vancouver’s Downtown East side to a healthier active lifestyle through running. Run for Change works in partnership with a number of community organizations to make this happen, including Mission Possible, the Carnegie Community Centre and First United Church.

Tracking ancient diseases using dental calculus

Mental Health

A timely message showed up in my inbox as part of an e-newsletter from the Canadian Dental Hygienists Association today encouraging paying attention to mental health.

After all the talk this weekend about mental health (thanks Cathryn and Crystal!) I thought I'd pass it along.

www.notmyselftoday.ca

Hello from Reykjavik!

Downtown Reykjavik 

My husband is busy at his conference today and I am sitting in a little cafe in downtown Reykjavik finishing my final project. As there is nothing like procrastination, I'm writing a blog post to say how amazing Iceland is. 

I've been on the look out for health promotion behaviours and programs since arriving at Keflavik airport on Monday but they aren't overly evident (I did see a billboard for a fluoride rinse - the only dental think I've seen since arriving!) Icelanders are said to be among the happiest people in the world and I believe it entirely. Icelanders are incredibly intelligent, well educated and socially connected. They have strong family units and seem to spend a lot of time socializing with friends and family. I've seen more men pushing prams alone than women.

I commented to a tour guide we had about the strange working hours here (Grocery stores are open from 12-6:30, most restaurants that serve dinner are closed by 7:30 or 8pm, nothing opens for breakfast before 8am) and wondered if Icelanders work more or less than the average Canadian. He stated that Icelanders work long hours - 8 or 9 hours a day. When work is over, they go to pubs and cafes to socialize and chat. Families seem to all go together (in fact, they leave their infants in prams outside cafes while they sip their coffee inside!) and there is a real mix of ages in all the places we've been. 

The tour guide also told us a bit about their health and education systems. They have a yearly cap of 15,000 kronur for prescription drugs (about $120 CAD) so when you've paid that much, the rest is free no matter what. All their medical costs for surgery and such are paid for except for a doctors visit fee of 300 kronur ($2.50 CAD). As for education, primary education is free. After primary school, they have a choice to enter a trade or continue with secondary school. Secondary school costs ~2,000 kronur per semester ($16 CAD). When they continue to university, it costs between 7,000-8,000 kronur per semester. (~$55-65 CAD). All Icelanders learn to speak English starting at age 8 and Danish starting at age 9. They have to choose between 3 more languages in secondary school (French, Italian and German I think?) and most choose all three. All the Icelanders I've met speak fluent English without any problems. 

I haven't seen one overweight local, yet I don't see any 'traditional' exercise either. There are no runners, very few gyms (I've only seen one - a crossfit gym!) and the public swimming pools are used as social gathering spots (and are hot springs so essentially big hot tubs!) The portions are smaller but the food is amazing. They eat a lot of lamb and fish. 

Overall, it has been a hugely different experience visiting Iceland but I would come back in a heartbeat. It's a stunningly beautiful place!

Lime Margarita Cupcakes

The recipe can be found HERE.

I had to add more icing sugar to the icing to make it pipe-able. I doubled the recipe and got 21 large cupcakes and 24 mini cupcakes.

Enjoy!

Fitocracy

After talking about what motivates us to make changes in our health, I thought I'd share a fun motivational tool for exercise I found a few months ago.

Fitocracy is a social game where you track your exercise to get points. You must get a certain number of points to move on to the next level. The higher you get, the more points you need to level up again.

There are quests to undertake such as "The Squat isn't so Scary" where you must complete one barbell squat and "Stiff as a Board, Light as a Feather" where you must perform 300 seconds of planks and a set of wide grip pull ups.

There are also Achievements which are for performing the same activity multiple times such as "I lift things up and put them down" (the creators have a sense of humour!) for deadlifting 1.4x your body weight or "I seem to be lost" for running 20 miles (32.2km) in your lifetime.

Overall, I've found it a fun place to track exercise and motivate myself to try new things (I like to see that completed quests number go up!)

I have 9 invites, so I'll put up the link here if anyone wants to try it out. Those 9 could then share their invites as well so that everyone can give it a go if they'd like.

Happy exercising!

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I have invites to Fitocracy, the social game you play to improve your fitness. Snag one here! http://ftcy.co/niFBSM (via @fitocracy)

The Chronic Disease Prevention Alliance of Canada Conference

A conference to discuss reducing chronic diseases in Canada from the standpoint of some of the social determinants of health.

For any that are interested....

Link is HERE