Ottawa Bear Hug III - 2010

Dear captive audience,
Bear Hug 3, Billy Madison Triscuit Cracker sceen, Guiness World Record, municipal food supply, Ottawa Bear Hug, Sens Foundation
Today was the 3rd Ottawa Bear Hug. I refer to this event a few posts ago when Billy Elliott donated some money to the charity. I participated because my dad is one of the organizers which deterministically implies that I am one of the volunteers :P. I took some photos and a video, the latter being much louder and more obnoxious than the former. I YouTubed it so you can all see what I mean. BTW I was at the "NOT cool person" post. That is to say; NOT the where the media, the sponsors, the Sens Foundation (including rising star Jesse Winchester) and other VIPs were. They were all up at the pedestrian bridge with all the food. I'm not saying that they ate the delicious Tim Horton's donuts. But I am saying that there were a lot less food in the afternoon than in the morning. What I am saying however is that those who I previously mentioned were the ones who ate them. I also don't want to hear how sorry they are because "sorry" doesn't put the delicious desserts into my stomach does it?

Also before I forget, hundreds of thousands of dollars were raised for charity and a new Guiness World Record may have been set.

I would like to thank everyone who helped make this event possible (present company included). And a special thanks to all our VIP who really made this event possible (despite allegedly demolishing the municipal food supply).

Update as of Jan 10th 2011:

Its official, the record was broken on that fateful day. So the Ottawa Bear Hug is now the biggest bear hug ever:

“I can see that your attempt was approved as a new Guinness World Record on 4 January and certificate has been sent to you already.”

Congratulations!

Aleksandr Vypirailenko,
Records Manager

Guinness World Records

Ottawa Senators: Brian Elliot

Here are two Ottawa Senators videos that I filmed a couple months ago. I was on the Ottawa Senators bench during the beginning of a game against Boston (i think). Brian Elliot had been named Molson Cup player of the month (December 2009) and awarded $1000 which he was to donate to a charity. He didn't have any charity in mind so Nick Foligno suggested that he donate it to the Sens Foundation Bear Hug.

Short aside: Nick is the captain of The Bear Hug. The Bear Hug is a fundraiser that the Sens Foundation has adopted a few years back. Generally money is raised by high school students. The students raise funds door to door, then they come together on the day of the "hug" and attempt to beat a Guinness world record for largest bear hug ever. It was an organization called "The Force" that originally came up with the idea. Later they approached a group of people (mainly at St. Matthews high school, my dad included. They raised over $100,000 that year and they beat the Guinness record 5 117. Some Romanians came and beat that record so the Ottawa group tried it again raising $318 000, but failing to beat the record.

Anyway, they wanted to show Brian donating the money to the Foundation in a pre-game ceremony in from of all the fans and so my dad was asked to ceremonially accept it. He was also given two tickets to the game so I went along too. These videos are of me behind the Sens bench during the pre-game warm up. The first video is the national anthem which I enjoyed along with the likes of Pascal Leclaire. The second video is of Brian Elliott receiving an over-sized check from Molson then handing to my dad who accepts it on behalf of the Bear Hug.