Those interested in making their way south from British Columbia to explore the cultural offerings of Washington State will definitely want to make time for Tacoma’s museum scene along the revitalized waterfront area. Supported by a free light link rail system and a variety of shops and eateries, this cultural district can be accessed by those choosing the hotel option as well as by travelers visiting by boat via the downtown marina. Be sure to check out the following highlights during your visit.

Museums: While the Tacoma Art Museum has been a fixture in the area for some time, their nearly-complete expansion will add significant display space in the form of a new gallery featuring prominent Western art and a free creative space stocked with materials for spur-of-the-moment project ideas. America’s Car Museum is a unique venue featuring multiple floors of vintage vehicles and rotating theme exhibits to keep automotive enthusiasts coming back for more.

The most dominating structure in the entire museum district is arguably the Museum of Glass. With a giant cone-shaped hot shop and the Bridge of Glass extension offering walking access across the highway, visitors will be prepared to be impressed when they reach the waterfront entrance with multiple outdoor displays, nearby eateries and of course the impressive exhibits inside. Also of note are the Washington State History Museum and the combination zoo and aquarium at Point Defiance Park.

Munchies: If grabbing a coffee and checking email with free Wi-Fi is your idea of a great break in between museum visits, be sure to check out Anthem. Located next to the history museum at the drop off point by Union Station, it has great atmosphere, a variety of baked goods and easy access to the glass museum as well. For something more substantial, head to the Harmon Brewery further down the street. Their beer tasting flights are served on the tip of a ski, and they make a mean homemade chickpea burger and roasted red pepper bisque.

If Mediterranean is your cuisine of choice, Ammar’s near the Tacoma Dome is worth a visit. The staff is friendly and the falafel platter makes a great meatless meal that will stick to your ribs and satisfy for the long term. Gyros and stuffed grape leaves are also available.

Activities: The paved waterfront jogging trail is several miles long, and takes you past a variety of scenic spots and is suitable for dog walking, rollerblading and bike riding as well. It goes all the way down to the public beach, with public restrooms, sculptures and snack options along the way. The downtown museum district is a fun place to do a little shopping as well, with local clothing and jewelry shops offer plenty of temptation. And of course, there’s the Tacoma Dome which hosts big-name acts on a regular basis across multiple musical genres. For those who enjoy Mother Nature, Mount Rainier National Park is also an easy day drive from the city.

Photo Credits: Myscha Theriault

Theriault is a best-selling author and avid traveler who is currently touring the United States in a Jeep with her husband and 80 pound Labrador retriever. You can keep up with her adventures on Twitter by following @MyschaTheriault.

Julie was a drug addict living on the streets of Toronto. Then a pottery wheel changed her life.

Seven years ago, Julie (her name has been changed),  joined Inspirations Studio. The pottery social enterprise is run by the Toronto non-profit, Sistering, which helps low-income women who have experienced poverty, homelessness and mental health issues. Julie learned to make kitchen crockery items, which she then sold. The boost of confidence was essential in helping her kick her drug habit. And with a small income, she no longer lives on the street.

The melding of art and enterprise is an incredibly powerful tool in helping marginalized women rebuild their lives. Women gain purpose, independence, and the ability to manage challenges like mental illness.

It’s an approach we’re intimately familiar with. For over a decade, we’ve used artistic enterprises, like making jewellery, in communities where we carry out our international development work to socially and economically empower vulnerable women. And we’ve heard so many stories of success, like that of Yolanda Chimbo, a struggling single mother in rural Ecuador.

After separating from her husband, who was the family breadwinner, Chimbo and her children had to live off the charity of her sister. Then she joined one of our income projects, learning to hand-weave jungle plant fibres into gorgeous items like bracelets, which are sold in local markets. With the income, Chimbo pays her kids’ school and boarding fees in the nearby town of Tena, and contributes to her sister’s household.

Solutions for women who live overseas are just as effective for Canadians like Julie.

In addition to the pottery enterprise, Sistering also runs Spun Studio where women produce sewn and knitted goods like runners, rugs and children’s sweaters that they sell at sidewalk display tables in Toronto and at farmers markets. Neighbourhood stores have also started to order the women’s handmade items. The profits give women much-needed money, and help the organization purchase equipment for its programs so it can help more women.

“For someone with a mental illness, the fact that you can create something, and look at it, has a lot of power.” –  art therapist Merav Gilboa. 

Many of the women who have taken part in Sistering’s programs become independent entrepreneurs. The organization supports them with training in skills like networking and making business plans. Julie now has her own home-based enterprise making one-of-a-kind mugs and teapots.

It may seem like gender stereotyping to teach women artistic trades. But the skills are easy and fast to learn, result in a sellable product, and also bring psychological benefits. Decades of studies on art therapy show that creative endeavours can boost mental health.   

“For someone with a mental illness like depression, the fact that you can create something, and look at it, has a lot of power,” says Merav Gilboa, an art therapist with Toronto’s Baycrest Health Sciences Centre.

Many of the women Sistering works with have mental illnesses, and being creative is a powerful tool in helping them cope. “Our participants get into what they’re doing. All the other problems in their lives disappear for those few minutes,” says Patricia O’Connell, executive director of the organization.

There are programs like Sistering across Canada, including Vancouver’s 3H Craftworks Society, an organization supporting individuals who are homebound with  physical disabilities or mental illness. They learn to make items such as stuffed toys and Christmas ornaments, which 3H sells through its online store to generate a small income for participants.

It’s hard to imagine that a beaded bracelet or simple piece of pottery could make such a difference. But in both Canada and developing countries these trinkets allow women to create a better future for themselves.

Brothers Craig and Marc Kielburger founded a platform for social change that includes the international charity Free The Children, the social enterprise Me to We and the youth empowerment movement We Day. Visit the organization online at we.org

The revolution won’t just be televised — it will be painted, sculpted, danced and written. And when it is, the reverberations will be global.

Those aren’t the musings of some pie-in-the-sky dreamer of the “why can’t we all just get along” type. It’s documentable fact, says the CBC series Interrupt This Program, which examines underground arts scenes around the world itching to be catalysts for political change.

Adding import to agency, creators Frank Fiorito and Nabil Mehchi say what happens in Warsaw, for example, likely won’t stay in Warsaw.

“We went to Warsaw, where there’s a rise in right-wing extremism,” Mehchi says. “In Warsaw, they’re saying that if you want to see what America is going to look like in a few years, just look at what’s going on in Poland right now.”

For example, the annual Independence Day demonstration in Warsaw, run by far-right nationalist groups, drew an estimated crowds of 75,000 people last year, up 5,000 from the year before.

The Warsaw episode of Interrupt This Program in turn features a popular singer who has been blacklisted by the government. Her songs are banned from the radio, and her presence is roundly unwelcome at any concert or festival sponsored by authorities.

Interrupt This Program in Jakarta. []

The series adds to the dialogue by featuring a Canadian artist living in the city in each episode, and the means of protest prove varied and resourceful.

“Everywhere we go, we discover new forms of art that we didn’t see before. In the Beirut episode in the first season we had a man doing belly dancing, which is unheard of because it’s usually women who do it. Being gay, he thought it was one way of confronting a society that’s very homophobic, very conservative and religious,” says Mehchi.

“We discovered mural artists, dancers, poetry done in different ways. In past seasons we travelled in Eastern European countries, like Ukraine and Russia, where there was a lot of performance art in the street, people using their bodies to protest or put the word out, because they didn’t have a lot of resources.”

Also this season the series travels to Mexico City, where femicide — the slaying of women and girls — is part of a national crisis. Last month, about 100 kilometres away in the state of Puebla, a university student was murdered after she used a ride-hailing service, prompting another round of street protests.

“Seven women get killed every day in Mexico, the country, just for being a woman.”

“Seven women get killed every day in Mexico, the country, just for being a woman. And in Mexico City we filmed with some artists that are attacking that issue,” Fiorito says.

Closer to home — in geography if not subject — is Chicago. In step with Fiorito and Mehchi’s mandate this season to focus on struggles that aren’t just defined by outright war or natural disasters, the Chicago episode highlights a different kind of conflict zone.

“After the election of Donald Trump, we knew we wanted to go to the States. We wanted to resonate beyond the new Trump administration, and we found a city that’s almost like the heart of what’s going on in the resistance movement and activism in the States right now, speaking against racial injustice, the lack of resources, the high amount of guns and gun violence,” Mehchi says. (Gun homicides in the city rose by 61 per cent between 2015 and 2016, and so far this year there’ve been 503 gun homicides in a population of just over 2.7 million.)

“You feel that there are artists who are trying to make art as accessible as possible. Artists are going out into the streets, they’re putting it out there. They don’t want to be exhibiting in galleries or trying to work in an isolated bubble,” he says, noting that social media brings an unprecedented immediacy and reach.

“They’re bringing the art to the people. It’s the democratization of art, basically.”

Interrupt This Program debuts Season 3 on Friday, Oct. 13, CBC