Are you ready to welcome the FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015 Vancouver? Celebrate the beautiful game and the amazing skills of the best soccer players in the world, right in the heart of our city. Here’s a great reason to visit the City of Vancouver’s free FIFA Fan Zone on Cambie at Georgia Street during the tournament: You can win tickets to each match hosted at BC Place courtesy of FIFA – including the SOLD OUT final match on July 5th!

How to Enter to Win

• Attend the Vancouver FIFA Fan Zone on any of the 12 days it’s open
• Take a Fan Zone Selfie and post it on Twitter using the tag #VanFanZone (you must tag it with this hashtag to be eligible) + @Miss604
• Have fun at the Vancouver FIFA Fan Zone!
• Enter often with new selfies each time

Visit the Fan Zone, stay, have fun, and catch matches with friends and family including the opening Canada vs China match on June 6th. Enjoy local live music, interactive games, great food and a lot more. Let’s show the rest of the country how we celebrate the Women’s World Cup in Vancouver!

You will automatically be entered to win when you post your Fan Zone Selfie on Twitter using the tag and tweeting @Miss604.

Winners for each match will be drawn at 8:00pm the night before each Match Day at BC Place. Winners for matches on June 8 and 12 will each receive 2 tickets. For each subsequent match, winners get a 4-pack. See more contest details below. You will have 2 hours to respond to a Twitter Direct Message to claim your tickets. The DM will contain instructions on where to pick them up.

Vancouver FIFA Fan Zone Information

The Fan Zone will be open 12 days from June 6th to July 5th, 2015 during the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2015TM. This free, family-friendly soccer-celebration destination has been created to welcome the world and provide a fun space to enjoy live entertainment and watch live match broadcasts, including Team Canada.

Fan Zone has an exciting 12-day schedule:
June 6, June 8, June 11, June 12, June 15, June 16, June 21, June 23, June 27, July 1 (Canada Day), July 4, and July 5. Get the detailed schedule here.

You’ll enjoy popular local live music performances, exhibition soccer tournaments, themed food trucks, beverages, interactive games, soccer demos, win prizes, and more.

Be Travel Smart. Use transit or ride your bike and use The Bicycle Valet at the Fan Zone. Just like a coat-check, your bike will get a tag and you get a claim stub. You can leave your helmet or panniers securely attached on your bike. Enjoy the Fan Zone for as long as you like. When you’re ready, present the claim stub to the valet and your bike is back.

[expand title=”FIFA Ticket Contest Details” tag=”h3″]
Win Tickets to FIFA World Cup Canada 2015 Matches
There will be tickets for nine matches (2 double-headers) that will take place on seven different days. To make sure you don’t miss a single opportunity to win tickets, plan your visits to the Vancouver Fan Zone ahead of time. Here are some dates you won’t want to miss:

Saturday June 6: Fan Zone Opens
FIFA Women’s World Cup Opening Ceremony + Canada v China Match
Take your picture at the Fan Zone and share it with #VanFanZone to win a pair of tickets
Prize: Monday June 8 – Cameroon vs Ecuador at 14:00 or Japan vs Switzerland at 19:00

Monday June 8 and Thursday June 11
Take your picture at the Fan Zone and share it with #VanFanZone to win a pair of tickets:
Prize: Friday June 12 – Switzerland vs Ecuador 16:00 or Japan vs Cameroon 19:00

Friday June 12, Saturday June 13 and Monday June 15
Take your picture at the Fan Zone and share it with #VanFanZone to win a pair of tickets:
Prize: Tuesday June 16 – Nigeria vs USA at 17:00

Tuesday June 16
Take your picture at the Fan Zone and share it with #VanFanZone to win a pair of tickets:
Prize: Sunday June 21 – Match 3 – Round of 16 at 16:30

Sunday June 21
Take your picture at the Fan Zone and share it with #VanFanZone to win a pair of tickets:
Prize: Tuesday June 23: Match 1 – Round of 16 at 16:30

Tuesday June 23
Take your picture at the Fan Zone and share it with #VanFanZone to win a pair of tickets:
Prize: Saturday June 27 – Quarter Final – Vancouver at 16:30

Wednesday July 1 (Canada Day)
Show your Canadian pride wearing red, take your picture at the Fan Zone and share it with #VanFanZone to win a pair of tickets:
Grand Prize: Sunday July 5 – Women’s World Cup FINAL at 16:00

Claiming Your Prize
Winners will be notified the match their tickets are for, date, and time. Winners will pick up their tickets the day of the match at City of Vancouver’s Fan Zone. Winners will be invited to join the Soccer Samba Parade to BC Place taking place before each match.

Winners must present a photo ID at the Fan Zone Information Booth where tickets can be picked up. The Fan Zone is open on every match day. Visit the Fan Zone page for a full schedule. [/expand]

Follow the City of Vancouver for updates, full schedule, and news regarding the Vancouver Fan Zone on Twitter, join the conversation by using #VanFanZone, Facebook and Instagram.

Winners So Far: @msongelaine, @yvrdesigns, @mcbizco, ‏@mrkarmajunkie

Worthy of a road trip for the Big Bang Theory characters, Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics research, is located right here at UBC. TRIUMF is one of the world’s leading subatomic physics laboratories and it collaborates with other facilities around the world, including CERN in Switzerland. They are also home to the world’s largest cyclotron. Each year, TRIUMF receives hundreds of visitors locally and internationally, and they offer tours throughout the year with an expanded summer schedule for free public tours in the summer.

Image courtesy of TRIUMF

Free Public Tours of TRIUMF

In the summer, TRIUMF (at 4004 Wesbrook Mall) opens its doors to the public every single weekday, excluding holidays, for a free drop-in tour at 1:00pm – and children are welcome with accompanying adults.

Discover the advanced work that researchers are doing right in our back yard with particle physics, nuclear physics, materials science, nuclear medicine, astrophysics, and accelerator physics.

The laboratory is a working facility and so members of the public can come see and learn about the physics experiments they run and gain an idea of what it is like to be a scientist. It is a unique opportunity for the public to learn more about the applications of physics research, see what a physics experiment looks like, and see physicists at work.

Follow TRIUMF on Twitter and Facebook for more information.

TRIUMF was founded over 40 years ago by Simon Fraser University, UBC, and the University of Victoria to meet research needs that no single university could provide. The University of Alberta joined the TRIUMF consortium almost immediately. There are currently twelve full members and seven associate members from across Canada in the consortium that governs TRIUMF.

BC Place still had that new turf smell when I arrived this morning along with media from around the globe to preview some of the technology that will be used during the FIFA Women’s World Cup. The scene around the stadium was filled with hard hats, scaffolding, tents, fences, and new branding was all put in place to strip the stadium of its local team branding for the duration of the FIFA Women’s World Cup, and replaced that of the tournament sponsors and rights holders.

The new turf’s premiere was at last Saturday’s Whitecaps FC match vs Real Salt Lake and it still looked perky and new today. I slipped off my shoes — as recommended by a FIFA official — and felt the bright green blades and dusty fibre infill between my toes. It didn’t smell like grass but it sure did feel like it.

FIFA Women’s World Cup Brings New Technology to BC Place

First up was a briefing about the turf, which is Polytan’s top of the line LigaTurf RS+CoolPlus surface. It will be used throughout the FIFA Women’s World Cup, next year’s 2016 World Rugby Seven Series, as well as for home teams Whitecaps FC and the BC Lions. This morning was all about the rigorous testing under which the turf went to be deemed suitable for FIFA play.

“The team is here to make sure meets highest possible standards,” Johannes Holzmüller, Group Leader FIFA Quality Programme told media this morning. The surface is certified to meet FIFA’s 2-Star rating and FIFA commissioned the independent UK-based company ProZone to put the turf to the test and ensure it was match-ready.

Niall McPhee of Sports Labs Ltd gave a few demos with the equipment used to test the surface, both in the lab and in the stadium. Niall rolled the ball down a slope to see how far it moved across the playing surface, tested how hard the surface was when the ball bounces, and held up a torque meter that tests traction. He emphasized that all tests are conducted with turf samples in the laboratory, including UV stabilization and accelerated aging, then also on the installed surface to ensure consistency.

They will continue to test the surface throughout this week, leading up to kick-off at BC Place for the first match here on June 8th.

Once the turf demos were complete, we walked around to the south side of the stadium for the Hawk-Eye goal line technology demonstration where six watches were handed out.

These watches will be worn by officials on the field during matches, and when the ball crossed the goal line they will vibrate and display a message “goal” using a wireless notification system. This will mark the first time that goal line technology has been featured in a pinnacle women’s football event, and the second time Hawk-Eye has been used by FIFA, it was previously used at the FIFA World Cup in Japan 2012.

There is no tech in the ball itself, it’s all about cameras. Hawk-Eye involves 14 cameras installed as high as possible within the stadium structure. In BC Place, they’re placed way up along the catwalk near the roof. According to the official FIFA press release: “Hawk-Eye is able to locate the ball at all times even if it is only found by two of the seven cameras. The system is millimetre-accurate and indicates whether or not a goal has been scored within one second by a vibration and visual signal on each match official’s watch.” This system will be tested many more times leading up to kick off and the goal line technology is also tested on game day by the match officials.

These are just a few of the state-of-the-art features that the FIFA Women’s World Cup is bringing to our stadium this summer, along with the other five host cities across Canada.

Be sure to get your tickets for the Vancouver matches and follow the global tags #FIFAWWC and #LiveYourGoals online. Fans can also share how they are watching and enjoying the tournament, using the dedicated hashtag #myFIFAWWC. For the first time ever at a FIFA competition, fans will see this hashtag on match days, on each stadium’s LED advertising boards.

Jennie was referred to Covenant House at the age of 19. “[It] was the first place I’ve ever lived that I was safe and nobody could hurt me here. It’s the first place that I’ve ever felt that kind of sense of belonging, it’s the first place I’ve ever had a home.” Covenant House Vancouver is sharing Jennie’s story this month as it announces its annual donating matching campaign.

“She had been living on and off the streets since she was 10, and had attended over 20 elementary schools by grade eight. When Jennie turned 19, she left the foster care system and had no place to go.”

Jennie stabilized in the Crisis Program and worked incredibly hard. Having such an interrupted education, she had difficulty reading, so one of Covenant House’s volunteers helped her learn. Jennie then moved to the transitional living program, Rights of Passage (“ROP”) where she found her voice.

Learning to self-advocate and assert herself were life-skills Jennie desperately needed and ROP was the perfect place for her to learn.

“I was scared; everybody had kinda turned away and I just figured they’d turn away too. I didn’t really expect help because I didn’t think anybody would be there or care, and I found the exact opposite, I found that they didn’t just open up their doors to me, but they opened up their hearts.”

It’s painful to even imagine the kind of childhood that Jennie had, let alone experience it – she was sexually abused, neglected and she never heard the words “I love you”. Coming to Covenant House marked the beginning of a whole new life for Jennie and she is grateful to donors, for your support of young people like herself.

Read all of Jennie’s story, and many others from Covenant House youth, to learn about the impact and services of Covenant House.

Covenant House June Matching Campaign

I have come to know, appreciate, and support the work of Covenant House, through fundraising events and participating in their annual Sleep Out in November. A quote that I jotted down at one of these events has stayed with me: “Many of the kids have lived with violence or the threat of violence for much of their young lives. Feeling safe is a right we all have but one these kids have not enjoyed.”

No child should be homeless. You can help by making a donation online today, before June 30th, and it will automatically be doubled at no extra charge to you. Follow Covenant House on Twitter and Facebook for more information.

Be a tourist in your own town and discover what Surrey has to offer during Surrey Doors Open! From City Centre to Bear Creek, Newton to Cloverdale, sites and attractions will be open to the public with free admission for the day on Saturday, June 27th.

In one day you can visit the Bear Creek Park Train, do a Historic Cloverdale Walking Tour, attend the Whalley’s Corner Festival, visit the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara, and explore the BC Vintage Truck Museum. Guided tours, presentations, children’s activities, and entertainment will be offered a a variety of venues. Take the free hop-on hop-off trolley to experience as much as you can.

Surrey Doors Open

The 4th Annual Surrey Doors Open event will provide a unique opportunity for participants to experience Surrey’s rich culture, history, art and architecture for free. Over 40 locations will feature an exciting mix of historic sites, modern architecture, places of worship, public art, green spaces and unique food sites. Activities will include behind-the-scenes guided tours (many of which are not normally open to the public), presentations, children’s’ activities, entertainment, food and much more. Free trolley and shuttle services will make exploring a variety of Doors Open sites easy and fun.

Doors Open offers an opportunity for participants to develop a sense of inclusion and encourages community involvement. This sense of community is particularly important in a rapidly growing and diverse city such as Surrey. Last year saw attendance doubling to over 14,000 participants and with your generous support, we are looking forward to expanding participation.

The inspiration for Surrey’s Doors Open stems from origins in France where the first Doors Open event (La Journee Portes Ouvertes) took place in 1984. The idea soon spread to neighbouring countries and has since expanded around the globe.

Toronto was the first North American city to follow the European lead and launched a high profile event showcasing constructed heritage, architecture and design as a millennium project in 2000. The City of Richmond has hosted the event over the last 4 years, and has grown their community involvement to over 50 open sites throughout Richmond. [History of Doors Open]

Check out the full list of Doors Open Sites, the Doors Open Site Map, and find out how you can get to Doors Open locations on Saturday, June 27th from 11:00am to 4:00pm.

For more information, see the Doors Open 2015 Event Guide and follow the City of Surrey on Twitter and Facebook using the tag #SurreyDoorsOpen.