VANCOUVER : SECRETS OF THE CITY
By Shawn Blore and the editors of Vancouver Magazine
VANCOUVER XENAFESTS, page 140.
EXCERPT
COMMENTARY
An section in a Vancouver guide book! Tourists obviously need their Xena fixes when traveling.PRIMARY SOURCE
"Xenafests TV shows spawn the strangest of fan clubs. Back in the 1970s, the original Bob Newhart Show spawned the drinking game know as "Hi Bob!" (Every time someone on the show said "Hi, Bob," you had to drink.) But while "Hi, Bob!" was popular with the jock-and-fraternity crowd, fans of Xena: Warrior Princess come from an altogether different demographic. The sword-wielding Amazon, clad in short skirt and leather breastplates, who with her softer, shorter, slightly more feminine but still self-actualized sidekick Gabrielle does weekly battle with bulging beefcake bad guys, has become a cult favourite among devotees of Sappho, among others. Xena's more ardent followers have banded together into fan clubs, with national and international conventions. At one such gathering staged by the Pacific Northwest Xenites of North America, fans of the warrior princess staged a mock Xena episode in West Vancouver's Ambleside Park. Ululating Xenites took up their broadswords and, after a decent interval for some good-faith attempts at accommodation, chopped he nefarious (male) evil-doers to bits. Then they repaired to a local restaurant to ogle the belly-dancer and ululate some more. If that weren't enough, there are Xena chatlines, and local Xena parties, where Xenites dress as their favourite characters and watch as Xena and Gabrielle battle evil and share the occasional bath (Gabrielle does the scrubbing). One such fest is held weekly in an undisclosed Surrey location, by a woman known to the world only as Cindy. Details on her Xena fest, or on the activities of the local Xena chapter, can be found at www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/1291 , or by emailing PNWXenaFanMail@bigfoot.com."
Click here to return to the THIS WEEK IN XENA NEWS page.