The Paul Wells Show - The Paul Wells Show year-end variety special

Episode Date: December 13, 2023

Join us for a night of jazz, political wonkery and a novel-length poem about werewolf whalers for some reason. Featuring: - Shuvaloy Majumdar, the new MP for Calgary-Heritage - Jason Guriel, reading from his book The Full Moon Whaling Chronicles - Larisa Galadza, Canada’s former ambassador to Ukraine - Jazz singer Caity Gyorgy, accompanied by Mark Limacher on piano

It's a big world out there and sometimes it feels like it's broken. I'm talking to the people who are trying to fix it. Tonight live from the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, welcome to the Paul Wells Show, holiday show, show. Thank you. Mark Leemacker at the piano. Thank you, Mark, for playing the theme song. Mark will be back a little later with Katie George. Good evening and welcome to a live year-end recording of the Paul Wells Show. I am Paul Wells, the inaugural Journalist Fellow-in-Residence at the University of Toronto's Munk School. You know, when I quit my job 20 months ago, I had no plan. I just knew where I wanted to leave. All I knew was that I wanted to tell stories and build community. So I wrote a note on my LinkedIn and I said, I would like to tell stories and build community.

And slowly at first, and then with gathering momentum, I started to figure out a few ways to do that. Tonight is mostly a party, but it's also a little bit about telling stories and building community. My first guest is on clock tonight. So that's why he's my first guest. He is one of the newest members of the House of Commons. He was elected in Calgary Heritage, Stephen Harper's old writing, in July of this year, but Ottawa already knows Shubh Mujumdar well. He was an advisor to Conservative Ministers of Defence and Foreign Affairs during the last Conservative government. For several years he's run the Foreign Affairs Programme and the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. The National Post called him one of 12 to watch on Canada's rapidly

rising right. Please welcome the Rookie MP for Calgary Heritage, Shuvalloy Mujumdar. Shuvoloy Majumdar. Shuv. The people who were going to play the theme music were not able to for the ever-popular health reasons. And then I got a note from from Shiv saying I might have to be voting while we're talking and I thought I'll tell you what, let's just go straight to the canapes. But I think we've worked out a plan. What's your voting plan tonight, Shiv? I'm keeping an eye on the remote app here. We're all allowed to vote remotely as part of this process. I'm sure you've seen that we had a marathon vote recently. So I'm keeping an eye on this thing and it'll tell me if I have to vote or if I don't have to vote.

And I am an independent-minded person, so I know exactly how I'm going to vote when that shows up. It will not tell me that. I'll just need to know. And you have to take your photo to prove that it's you voting? Yeah, it's a really awkward experience. I don't know if your listening audience will capture this, but at first it takes a picture from afar to verify it's

your face, and then it brings you right here. So you can imagine 300 parliamentarians doing this exercise. If you're an alien watching our Canadian parliament, you're like, what are these people doing? But then it takes a picture, and it's the most unflattering picture ever because the technology is a fisheye technology. So whatever features you're insecure about are just only exaggerated in the worst possible way. And then you cast your ballot. But then it goes through a verification process where various whips can make sure that, you know, the actual member is voting.

And it's an accountability process. And you know, if it's two in the morning and you just gotta have a shower, it's probably not your best look. But it's a fun, it's probably not your best look. But it's a fun... Actually, that particular hypothetical strikes a little too close to home for some of our recent ex-MPs. We can talk about that. Can we talk about that? Maybe next time. You mentioned there was a bunch of marathon votes last week. What the hell was that about? Remind us.

bunch of marathon votes last week. What the hell was that about? Remind us. It's about the carbon tax. In fact, this carbon tax now quadrupled is having, as I'm sure many of you have heard, a devastating impact on the Canadian economic fabric. I just was recently elected, as you mentioned. I was elected July 24. And on the doors of Calgary Southwest, this impact of inflation, of carbon taxes on gas and grocery, just everywhere, is making people extremely anxious. And so this carbon tax now quadrupled was up for a partial relief for our farmers. You saw that the Prime Minister provided relief for heating oil in Atlantic Canada. And for some years now, there was an attempt from the House,

with its constitutional powers on tax, to relieve the carbon tax on farmers, lowering prices for groceries, lowering the burden for Canadians. And so it came into a vote in the Senate, and the Prime Minister called his independent senators, wrangled them, and the Conservatives lost the vote by one vote. And so the leader of His Majesty's official opposition, Pierre Paglia, said, heck no, we're not going to take this sitting down. We're going to make them vote until they

decide to cancel the carbon tax on farmers. Now, I think that larger project failed temporarily. But the objective of having a carbon tax election and making the point that these people are going to keep voting for this carbon tax over the need for everyday Canadians to have a quality of life that they deserve, I think was made. Okay. So the threat of having nonstop votes until, in your leader's terms, we wrecked Christmas, that is no longer operative. We're going to have Christmas. Well, you know, Christmas is a great celebration decided on powers much above that any politician could pronounce. Well, that's a relief. Hey, why did you want to, you worked for John Baird and which ministers

did you work for back in the day? I've had some fun. I worked with John Baird. I worked with Bev Oda. I've worked with Jason Kenney, Rob Nicholson. For two weeks, Ed Fast was my foreign minister. When John had retired, there was a period of time before Rob Nicholson for two weeks. Ed Fast was my foreign minister when John had retired. There was a period of time before Rob Nicholson was made. So I had some fun in the conservative government. At least a couple names on that list might belong to people who would gently warn you against running for parliament. Did you have any trepidation about moving from obviously a deeply politically involved role to actually being in the firing line? I did.

It was absolutely kind of completely counter to my nature to do something like this because usually I'm a pretty private person. I'm a nerd with all the bona fides from sci-fi and on. And for me, it was a number of things. I'm 43 this year. I'll be 44 in a month. it was a number of things. I'm 43 this year. I'll be 44 in a month. I saw my friend, the leader of the opposition, Pierre Polyev, who I've known for a quarter century, rise into the position of leading a unified and emboldened conservative party that I think is pitched to the moment of leadership that we need right now. I've had the benefit of having worked

for Preston Manning in my early 20s, of having worked in Iraq and Afghanistan with Senator John McCain's organization, the International Republican Institute in my late 20s. I never thought I'd be serving government in the way that I ended up serving it as an advisor. Some of the things that you were able to see us do was just really special. And then I saw, as the work that I was doing in the Macdonald-Lorey Institute revealed, just how big the stakes are right now in this moment, with the world the way that it's going, with our economy dealing with the pressures that it is, domestic and foreign, with the rivals that we have to contend with, with the pain we see across the streets of Canada,

when the opportunity to put my name on a ballot in a community I grew up in afforded itself, I said, you know what, I don't want to live five years down the road wondering if I should have tried this out. It's one of those things where do it now or don't regret it later. So I started knocking doors. And as I started knocking doors. And as I started knocking those doors, my very first door didn't go very well at all. It was horrible. In fact, I was amazed that I was able to have a conversation.

But then the second door and the third door and the fourth door just affirmed to me that maybe I have something to contribute in this moment to my community, to my party, and to my country. And it's just been a slipstream ever since then, over a year ago, to now sitting with you. Do you think we're going to have an election in 2024? I could see why it'd be tempting for the Trudeau liberals to call it. I mean, in the fall of next year,

you'll see American disruption and its politics in full array. A lot of your former colleagues in the press like to make it a full-time vocation to import American news to Canada. That conflation is probably quite tempting for this government to leverage in a narrative that they're trying to build and define conservatives here with. So I could see it being very tempting for them doing it in the fall of next year. I think early next year may seem a bit opportunistic, and they've already tried that, and I'm not sure that Canadians would reward that.

Or maybe the Prime Minister says, you know what, I've got this for another couple of years, I'm going to go the whole distance. So it's a great question. It's a theoretical question. But I think for people like me, we just have to be prepared for the worst case scenario, which is if they want to go early next year, let's go, let's roll, we're ready. You mentioned importing American politics. Viktor Orban, the Hungarian president, is in Washington today trying to get Congress to pull funding for support for the war on Ukraine. The Ukrainian-Canadian Congress asked last week where the Conservative Party is on this

question, because the Conservative Party voted against a free trade deal with Ukraine because it contained a reference to a carbon tax. And then one of the hundreds of votes at the end of last week, one of them was for a supply, One of them was for a supply, a business of supply to fund, among other things, Operation Unifier, which is the Canadian training mission in Eastern Europe for Ukrainian soldiers. So, voted against free trade with Ukraine, voted against OpUnifier. Ukrainian Canadian Congress says what's up, and I know you would want to field that question. I'm grateful for the opportunity. I mean, I think what you're seeing in our two parties, of which really could form a government, is a question of ambition that we can bring to Ukraine. I mean, a little bit about myself. I worked the Ukraine file for the Harper government. A lot of the work that had gone through was stuff

that I was a structural engineer for. I'm proud of every part of it. I'm proud of the record that we had on capitalizing the Ukrainian budget, on investing in Operation Unifier, creating it, making sure that command, control, and communications for the Ukrainian armed forces could get them to be NATO-grade over time. I'm proud of how we imposed hard sanctions and put punishing costs on Russia. I'm proud that Prime Minister Harper challenged Vladimir Putin at the G8, making it the G7, restoring the principles of an international group and economic partnership that is centered around market democracies and what they're willing to accommodate. I've been sanctioned since by Russia three times, individually, as an institute member

at the McDonnell-Lorey Institute, and as a board member of the Parliamentary Center. I am a member of Parliament for Calgary, which is the core of our energy life. And the things that these liberals put into their free trade agreement were unprecedented. We never had ESG language built in that is a moving target around how energy decisions can be made. We never had detailed discussions around how taxes would be aspirationally imposed in any jurisdiction, in any trade agreement. And the deal that we already had would be just fine renewing today. So what we are saying is, listen, you're playing garbage games at the expense of Ukrainians, while at the same time over these last eight years,

you've given Vladimir Putin a gas turbine so you can continue, Putin can continue his energy dominance of Russia, of Europe. You've denied our allies and partners the gas and oil that they need, or even the energy technologies that they need to offset their dependence on Putin. You're not bringing ambition to the kind of defense production that the Ukrainians have asked for. In fact, the Ukrainian ambassador, the day of the vote, was on one of the major networks here

describing how, yes, look, we know we have cross-party support for Ukraine. This is the Ukrainian government. We know we have cross-party support for Ukraine. Of course we want more energy cooperation. Of course we want defense production. And that's the argument we're making now, saying to the liberals who have a horrible record on actually succeeding at confronting Vladimir Putin,

to say this is how we wanna help Ukraine bring victory, not taxes. The final point, if I might, this government's instincts right from the very beginning, you'll remember Stephane Dion in his first days, dispatched senior officials from his foreign ministry, the ADMs, to Moscow to normalize relations after Russia began their invasion on Ukraine last decade. So I'm saying, you know, our instincts are exactly the same as they were. Our principles are about peace through strength. And we're trying to bring actual ambition to a partnership with Ukraine

that can deliver victory sooner rather than later because we know the longer this goes, the harder it gets. So conservatives still support Operation Unifier? So even the liberals had voted against supplementary estimates during the Harper government that included things like Operation Unifier, which is a, it's a cute game that they're playing, you know, with their talking points. And I'm sure that other politicians and parties in the past have done the same. I'm not saying any one party is above this gamesmanship. What I find troubling about it is that you have an actual consensus in Canada on Ukraine, and you have the governing party trying to wedge the opposition party against it because they're so desperate

to pretend that somehow an American stream of politics is finding its way into Canada, when in fact the Canadian conservatives are heirs of the British conservative tradition, not the American Republican one. the Canadian Conservatives are heirs of the British Conservative tradition, not the American Republican one. Okay, that's good to hear because every time Pierre Poiliev talks about support for Ukraine on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, dozens of people in the replies say, oh man, I thought you were different. It turns out you're another globalist just like all of them.

It would be better if we weren't involved in this wasteful war. How do you feel about having the support of people who hold that kind of line? I met many people in my own campaign, not just in the nomination race, but also in the by-election in Calgary, who surveyed the institutions that they were supposed to trust, whether it's our parliament, our media, our academic life, our bureaucratic life, our health institutions. And what we have seen happen over these last eight years is a wrecking ball run through the institutions that should be arbiters of public trust. And with broken trust comes economic

anxiety and the desire to find information that seems truthful. When I encountered folks, they'd tell me at the doors, like, we like what you say about woke. We like what you say about energy. We like what you say about Calgary and Alberta and our conservative cause. But you're not one of those stand with Ukraine people, are you? And I tell them, well, listen, I'm not going to lie to you. I'm going to tell Paul Wells what I told them at the doors, which is, yes, I do believe in Ukraine. And I believe that they had borders. You know, I think Tucker Carlson is an interesting guy. I've been watching him since the 90s. He's built a huge constituency since then. but he started out as a neoconservative in the 90s promoting wars that I ended up participating in in Iraq and Afghanistan, wars that were

mismanaged and resulted in huge costs, and in both countries, particularly in Afghanistan, devastating failure. So I feel, I understand why people are skeptical of foreign adventurism. I share that. But I would tell them, for some reason, though, the question of Ukraine does not start with the Orange Revolution, as some present. It actually starts with something called Budapest, where at the end of the Cold War, Ukraine had immense power.

It had the third largest nuclear stockpile in the world. It could have held on to that and leveraged it for massive influence. But instead it traded it for sovereign borders, borders guaranteed by the United States, by the United Kingdom, and by Russia. Why did they do that? They did that because they wanted to live in peace as their own sovereign country with the borders that were guaranteed by major powers. That's the best deal they could have made at the time. So one, our deals matter. And Google Budapest, if you don't want to take my word for it, there's lots of literature out there from all kinds that will verify that what I'm telling you is not untrue. Two, when you see President Xi Jinping and President Putin sitting in Beijing

at the beginning of the Olympics, plotting out their unlimited ambition, they put a declaration out. Line item number five or six or seven, I can't remember, my brain's a bit foggy, is our Canadian Arctic, our sovereign borders, our backyard, our front. And we know that they're going to make good on their promises because they've got a whole operational plan they're deploying around the world right now. And third, say what you will about the war. Our country has $3 trillion of natural resource wealth,

of food and fuel that would secure the world and secure Canadians and so from a very narrow interest of our country to protect our Arctic border to empower our energy production to be a better ally to help our allies secure their borders for all these reasons I stand with Ukraine that's probably a pretty good note to end on, especially because you've still got another vote coming up. You've got a meeting, you've got MP stuff. If you want to get rid of me, we're good.

What's the biggest surprise about being inside rather than watching from outside? What's the biggest surprise since you became a member of parliament? I live in a straitjacket now. I haven't worn a suit and tie for, on a regular basis in eight years, and I miss it. I mean, I don't. It's a mix of amazing feelings, Paul.

I mean, closer inside your own family is somebody who I used to work for in my first job. His first boss was my wife. So how's that for a weird world oh and I hasten to add they were the same age yeah well yes but like I on one part

I have met people who I represent now I'm not an advisor I'm not a writer a commentator if you will I'm a representative and. I'm not a writer, a commentator, if you will. I'm a representative. And I looked into the eyes of literally 24,000 doors, homes that I knocked that opened and 24,000 conversations out of 55,000 that my campaign knocked. I have a commitment to people. And I feel that. And I don't want to be cheesy about it. But I feel that in

every moment. Every decision I make, I'm thinking about that woman who has three kids and is not sure she's going to be in her home on like this month. Or the senior whose savings are going up in smoke because of inflationary pressure. Or the newcomer or young couple that just want to buy a home. And that anxiety is very real. And I know how serious the task is. So the surprise of feeling that responsibility, I thought I would understand it watching people having done it. But now doing it, I understand it a lot better than I would have without having done it. You talk about being in a straitjacket, and I immediately thought not of the jacket and tie, although you'll notice that the deal I made

was that I wore a tux in exchange for not having to wear a tie. You've always been a classy guy. We need more people who think so. I immediately thought you were talking about the rhetorical straitjacket, that you probably don't get a lot of chances on the Hill to go back to Ukraine giving up its nuclear arsenal in return for assurances of territorial integrity. That's a level of detail that the House of Commons doesn't often support.

Am I right? I wouldn't agree with that. So I've given speeches. I try and say a few things not often, right? That's just my personality. My inaugural speech, my Ukraine speech, I gave a talk on Israel, and not too much else. I mean, there's some situational things here or there.

And I think it's a discipline of knowing what you want to say in the time that you have. You don't need to spend 30 minutes making one point. And Pierre says this all the time, you know, simple is not easy. Simple really takes a lot of work to simplify complicated things into things that anybody can understand. And it's a practice that I think I built some mastery at at the McDonnell-Lorey Institute. I tell my senior fellows, my colleagues there, don't publish something unless it speaks

to three audiences at the same time. The politician for why they need to act, my mother, who's a very sophisticated, intelligent human being, and the technical expert in the academy or the bureaucracy. If those three audiences can read the same thing, then you've done your job.

So I feel well-equipped, and I think that some of the detail that I get to bring on Ukraine or others, I do have opportunity to get into on the floor of the House of Commons in the chamber. I know I have that opportunity in committee, although I've been here for three minutes, so I haven't had a chance to experience all the committees that Parliament has to offer yet. And of course, I can write what I want to write whenever I want to write it. What's wonderful about how I feel about my job now is that my instincts are perfectly aligned with the leader of my party. I have something to contribute in terms of a strong voice.

And I do not feel inhibited in any way, intellectually or politically, to say exactly what I think. That makes two of us. Shuvale Mujinder, it is really good to catch up with you in your new role as a Member of Parliament. How am I doing? Tonight was pretty good. I'll take it. Thanks so much for joining us. And now for something completely different. The New York Times called Jason Greel's last novel

unlikely, audacious, and ingenious, and well they should. That novel, Forgotten Work, was a sprawling epic novel across centuries of future history about the centuries-long search for the lost record of a forgotten rock band. And it was written in verse. How do you follow up an exploit like that with a second novel in verse set in the same universe as Forgotten Work, even bigger and stranger.

This one has werewolves for starters. The new book is called The Full Moon Wailing Chronicles. This time it's the Washington Post that are calling Jason Gurriel a Canadian poet of gobsmacking originality. The Toronto Star says there is something utterly new and exciting here. I am really happy that he's here to read for you from the Full Moon Wailing Chronicles. Please welcome Jason Gurriel. It's always tricky reading from a novel because there's a whole story that's been going on, but I'll say a few things about this passage to set it up.

There's two characters in this passage, two teenagers, one named Paige, one named Dot. They are teenagers in a whaling village. It is just before school. They are kind of wasting time dawdling by the shore. And out to sea, there is a whaling vessel that has just left the dock. And they are werewolves. And all the... I forgot to say that at a reading, and people were like, what the fuck is this? I totally messed that up last time. And all the whalers are werewolves. There are humans in the book as well. They'd reach the beach beside the whaler's wharf when Paige first saw the mound at sea.

It dwarfed the ship. Its moon-white surface bright and wet. The mound had made the ship a silhouette. The moon is that, said Paige. She looked at Dot. Dot took her spyglass out. She stretched the squat tube, telescoping with a brassy click,

and raised the spyglass, squinting through its thick glass lens. It took a steady paw to frame the frantic whalers. Cubs would play a game in school to master scopes. They'd try to track a moving gull. They passed Dot's spyglass back and forth. The distant wolves were running round the deck. Their open muzzles had no sound.

Beyond the ship, the mound or island loomed. Up near its peak, a jet of something plumed. Volcano, Paige said, passing Dot the scope. Dot squinted. No, that's water. Plus the slope, it's way too smooth. Waves broke against their feet. It's flesh. They saw old Dickie Lush, the polymorph, come scuttling down the pier that jutted from the wharf. His head a wolf's, his waist a drum with half a dozen haunches.

Dickie's speed was that of something like a millipede. He almost never changed his shape these days. He didn't like to draw the wolfish gaze. They turned back to the sea. A horizontal line now spanned the mound, the ship, a model made of matchsticks from this distance, slowly turning as the line grew thicker. Holy moon, whispered Page. The line was soon the top half of an oval, half a moon of black, a maw. The mound, now following the ship towards the shore, was swallowing moon knows how many tons of sea,

its maw an arch above the ship, its lower jaw presumably a molared reef beneath the ship and studded with a row of teeth. The ship in silhouette dissolved against the backdrop of the maw. The maw commenced to close, became a line, and then was gone. The mound descending as if being drawn back into depths, its edges foaming with the water it displaced, the mound a myth already, drawing names from shore

wolves in a state of shock, the thing Leviathan, and where the mound had been the ocean bubbled briefly, rudely, then went still, untroubled as a mirror, not a single sail in sight. And that's when Page said one word, wail. Thank you. Jason Gurriel reading from the Full Moon Wailing Chronicles. Jason, what the hell are you doing with these book-length poems? I'm a glutton for punishment, I think. Well, I've always loved poetry. I've always read and written poetry.

But I've always found that the poetry world can be a very insular place. Poets are often, the people who read poetry, how do I say this kindly, they are often aspiring to become poets. Like it's like a world that talks to itself. And I wanted to write something

that was composed in verse. And this is couplets, rhyming couplets all the way through. I wanted to write something that was composed in verse but that could reach beyond the walls of the poetry world and actually appeal to sort of the intelligent general reader

or a member of parliament's grandmother. Like, I wanted to write that book that would actually, a book of poetry that would be entertaining. So that was sort of the brief I set for myself. I first heard of forgottengotten Work from Andrew Potter, the McGill University political scientist and former Maclean's columnist. And Andrew is becoming sort of like the bard of Gen X. And he loved Forgotten Work because it's about alternative rock culture and it's very Montreal kind of novel. So what happens is you notice

your work at two levels or and not quite at the same time. First you notice the immense cleverness of the language then you love the story and I found that happening too as I started to crack this book is that it's like a hell of a thing that he's done and then it's also a good book. Are you always trying to modulate those two ends as you go along? I'll take it. I mean, yeah, I think it's a weird challenge because on top of trying to advance a story,

which is enough work as it is, you're trying to construct believable characters and move action forward, kind of captivate the reader. You're also trying to maintain iambic pentameter and a rhyming couplet. And it's like every line, you're like, I can't believe I got to do another one of these. Why did I do this? But I hope people can appreciate it on two levels. But I think you can just let the music fade and just follow the story, hopefully. Do you have influences in this line of work? There aren't a ton of, strangely, there aren't a ton of people writing 400-page books in

rhyme. And they are oddities, And they're, they're audible things. To be honest, there's an old Nabokov novel called Pale Fire that was a bit of an inspiration to me. So it's a funny book. It's the first chunk of the book is it's like a 999 line poem that's written by a fictional character in the novel. And then the rest of the book, the rest of the book are end notes that attach to this poem. And in the end notes, a novel emerges. But the poem itself, which is really just a means to kick off the rest of the book,

I always loved the poem better than the rest of the book. And it was written in rhyming couplets and it told a story. And I remember thinking, wow, that's like a road less traveled. Like poets, you know, tend to write in free verse. They tend to write in a more confessional mode. But here was Nabokov kind of fabricating a poem within a novel that was really good. But it also told a story, and it held your attention,

and it was in rhyme. And I thought that was a cool, I always thought that was a cool thing, and why don't more people do that? So I had him sort of in the back of my mind when I was starting this. And you have mentioned Vikram Seth both in the last book and this one. So I assume that Golden Gate, which is his love story in sonnet form, damn thing is just like hundreds of sonnets. Yeah. Yeah.

I read that when I was young and crazy too. That's right. Yeah. And that was read that when I was young and crazy too. That's right. Yeah. And that was like, that was definitely a predecessor for sure. So people keep telling me I should try and do a third one and make it a trilogy,

but I might need to go to Disneyland or something and take a break for a little while. But it is a lot of fun. And I will say what's nice about writing in a traditional form like rhyme and meter is it's very generative. You know, like in the interest of satisfying a rhyme, you'll come up with a word that tilts your plot in a slightly different direction. And I had that happen to me a few times. So the rhyme scheme almost becomes like your collaborator. times so the rhyme scheme almost becomes like your your your collaborator there must also be a a kind of a delicious redemption in uh doing something that just almost nobody is doing

and that a lot of people would question why you would want to do it and then reasonable people and then the wall street journal and the new york times Times and the Washington Post are lining up to say, you've got to check this guy out. That must at least be a relief. Yeah, I think so. I think it's a labor of – I wrote it as a labor of love. I will say that. Like, I don't think you can write – I actually don't – I don't think you can write a book and chase success. I think you have to do it

because you love it and let the chips fall where they may. My wife is always saying, you're so good at rhyme, like you should write a kid's book. But I don't quite have that in my heart. Like it has to be, I think it has to come from that place

of love and then you hope the rest of the world picks up on it. And it's been nice to see it get some notices so when you're writing about werewolves do you worry that about whether you're treating them canonically like do you worry that you're consistent with werewolves lore um i i have to say i do so the werewolves are part of a novel within the book. There's a YA novel that intercuts through a different narrative.

But I am not, I think the Wall Street Journal said it was YA adjacent. And I kind of like that because I don't have necessarily a deep passion for werewolves. What I will say is the previous verse novel, there is a character who is reading a young adult novel called The Full Moon Wailing Chronicles. And it's just a throwaway reference. I don't even remember writing it. And then when I finished that book, I thought,

wouldn't it be cool to like, to take a really unpromising premise and turn it into its own book. And so that was part of that was a perverse challenge as well. But I think it maybe works. We'll see. But we'll see. I wrote two books about Stephen Harper. I know all about unpromising premises.

No, trust me, it'll be fun. Just because the good folks from Perfect Books are over there with two of your recent books, maybe you can give us the Reader's Digest version of On Browsing, which was your essay for Field Notes. And it's an interesting, it essentially is about two meanings at two different times of the term browsing.

Yeah, I wrote an essay for The Walrus a couple years back. During lockdown, I was just missing being in stores. I love physical media, love browsing, love going through books and record stores. And it sort of caught on. It went viral. And then I wound up expanding it into a small book for my publisher. He wrote to me.

He said, do you want to do this? It wasn't even my idea. And so it's a little meditation on browsing. And I mean, it aligns with all these books. All these books are about the search for lost records and lost writers. And I am, you know, there's a lot of science fiction elements to these books, but at heart I'm kind of an analog guy. And that's what On Browsing is about,

and it's about that love of physical media of the real. Jason will be sticking around afterwards to meet you all, and he'll be available to sign copies of his book. Do check out the Full Moon Whaling Chronicles. Read two pages and you'll just be amazed at how easily it scans and how much it's like a book. Jason Gurriel, thanks so much. It says here in my notes that my next guest's job took her to the centre of a major global crisis, but as it turns out, we were talking backstage and I underestimated the number of major global crises

she had to deal with by at least two. So my next guest's job took her to the centre of three major global crises. And I'm sure she was happy just to get home and hang out. Larissa Galadza was Canada's ambassador to Ukraine from 2019 to 2023. She is the first Canadian ambassador to serve in an active war zone since the Second World War.

As I know, she will be the first to remind us, Ukraine was already at war when she arrived. But then on February 24, 2022, the level of danger and crisis reached a whole new level with Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. At first, the embassy team had to move to Lviv in western Ukraine because of the risk, but in May of 2022, Larissa Galadza and her colleagues moved back to Kyiv, and she stayed at her post until the end of her assignment this August. She is an example of the finest traditions of Canada's Foreign Service, and I am so grateful she is here this evening. Please welcome Canada's former ambassador to Ukraine, Larissa Galadza. Thank you.

I mean, I'm assuming you're an example of the finest traditions of Canada's foreign service. I stand to be corrected. Let's just go with that. Okay. I said three crises because, obviously, before the full-scale invasion, there was COVID, which you had to deal with there the way everyone had to deal with it everywhere. And right as soon as you arrived in 2019,

there was even a third big mess, which was? The Iranians shot down PS-752, Ukrainian International Airlines. Its routing was Tehran, Kyiv, Toronto. And so the vast majority of the people on that flight were actually destined for Canada. I'm sure people remember that news. And, yeah, so that was the first one.

January 2020. And so they're followed, first of all, just the horrible business of notifying and comforting families and so on, and then trying to figure out what had happened in that. And really satisfactory answers have never been forthcoming. In the first few hours and days, the Ukrainians were our line of sight on what was going on, because we, of course, didn't have a diplomatic representation there, a relationship with Tehran. So everything

we could find out about these Canadians, permanent residents, relatives coming, was through the Ukrainians. And that's where I learned my first lesson of diplomacy, which is you have to have the relationships in place before you need them, because suddenly Ottawa needs you to find stuff out and you need to find the people who are going to give you that information. And what was incredibly touching for me was how much the Ukrainians were doing what they did for Canadians,

because it was only the air crew and the airplane that was Ukrainian. So all of their demarches, all of their work with the Iranians was actually for us. Canada has a special place in Ukraine for obvious reasons of the diaspora relationship. Did you know, did you have a sense that would be the case going in? or did it take time for you to sort of realize the depth of that relationship I knew it was a good relationship um but I didn't realize how close it was um and I mean close in a kin kind of a way um where you it's like going to um you know going on a on a vacation or going to see your cousins who you haven't seen in a decade or longer, and you just slip into something that's very comfortable.

And I expected that it would be more comfortable for me because of my background, but when I quizzed Canadians who spent a lot of time in Ukraine about why they were still there, I mean, people who were there for decades that had no Ukrainian background, or people who had just come for a few weeks they all said it felt comfortable and we I tried to put my my finger on exactly why and I think yeah it's the diaspora thing but actually if you think about there are many many people of Ukrainian origin who became policymakers and shaped our country from early days uh uhors, as senators, as lieutenant governors, as leaders in the military.

And they were developing policy and institutions and growing the country as well in a way that reflected their values. And I think that's a part of why it feels comfortable when we go there. What was COVID like in Ukraine? Ukrainians have dealt with hardship, always. And for them, COVID was very different than I think it was experienced here. I was here a couple of times during COVID and saw snippets of life in Canada. But Ukrainians had to get on with life. Like they couldn't stop. I mean, there were some lockdowns, but only the front door lockdown, not the back door

of the beauty salon or the pub or what have you. But for me and for all of us as diplomats, it was actually really, really hard. And in some ways for me, it was scarier than during the war because we were entirely cut off. We were entirely cut off. Ottawa shut down. No one knew what lay ahead. And we had to figure it out on our own. So it was like a little, like we were like this little space capsule and the tether was cut and we were on our own. But life was a lot more normal there than it was here. We put precautions in place. there than it was here. We put precautions in place, we stayed healthy. And at what point during that process, so as I was doing my homework this afternoon, I was reminded that you left Kiev for Lviv, closer to Poland, in mid-February. So there was some sense that an invasion had stopped being a hypothetical and was a very live possibility.

What was that process like of realizing that it might turn into a hot shooting war? It was very methodical. It was based on evidence and what we were understanding and what very smart people knew about what it takes to get ready for a full-scale invasion. And it was also surreal. It was really surreal to have people say to you, OK, if in one week this is happening, then it means it's closer to war.

If this is happening, then it's not closer to war. And with every passing week and every passing day, it got closer, it got closer and closer to war. And, and, and things do get really methodical. And you have to be very clear about what your thresholds are, what your tolerances are, what the threat to, to you is. And as ambassador, I was responsible for the lives of all the Canadian staff and their spouses and their kids. You take that stuff very seriously. I have to assume that there's this rising voice of concern in your head, but also somewhere in the embassy there's a whiteboard with a work plan.

What would the work items be on that whiteboard in, say, December of 2021? What did you need to do for the Canadian community in Ukraine and for your team? What sort of stuff was on that? So for the team, I mentioned spouses, kids, safety, first concern. For Canadians, what might they need? You start running through the hypotheticals. How many Canadians? What do they need to know?

What does our advice say right now? What should it say? And when are we going to check it again? For the physical property, you're always concerned about the security of the technology that's in there, the security of your assets. What can be cleared out?

But there's also concern for local staff. And what do they see happening around them? And they understand why. And so there's a strong communication aspect to that as well. Then there are people back in Ottawa, and it's what they need. What do they need us to find out? What can we tell them about what's going on here? I mean, the reason we have diplomats abroad

isn't so they can regurgitate what's in the news, but they can feed back the information from behind the curtain. That texture, that feel, the sentiment, where things are going to inform really good public policy decisions here. And there were big public policy decisions being made here in January and February, as you may remember. Did you have a sense of President Zelensky at that time before the invasion? He was a surprising winner in that presidential election with a very unorthodox background.

TV comedy. What did you make of the guy as the crisis was looming? I had a lot of opportunity to spend time with President Zelensky before the full-scale invasion. And the neat thing about him was he's just the same guy sort of sitting across the table eating dinner as he was on television. And today, the man you see on television, that's him that's him it's not an act he's very straightforward he um he's a man who likes to understand the details he's not afraid of

the complexity and does the thing that i think a good leader does which is delve into an issue to understand it and then pull back out to make a decision. And before the full-scale invasion, one of my big briefs was on the reform process that Ukraine was undergoing in order to become a member of the European Union, a member of NATO. And there were a lot of really difficult decisions that he had to make. And as the G7, we watched those up close, because there were ways that those decisions could have gone that wouldn't have been ideal and wouldn't have sort of measured up to what the Ukrainian people said they wanted and what

the president had promised to do. And I watched him make those decisions up close. And he made the right ones. He has principle. He has deep intellect. He's not afraid to ask questions, and he's not afraid to have tough questions put to him. Now, when the crisis starts to get to the point where no one really knows what's going to happen next, there comes a difficult moment for you and your team. You had to pull out of town for a bit. You had to leave Kiev, go to Lviv, and you had, you were part of the neighborhood. So what was that like leaving and then coming back? It was hard to leave. I guess maybe it was made a little bit easier by going first to Lviv before we had to leave the country on the 24th. We left Kiev under, very, very early in the morning, in February in mid-February, and it was dark.

We took down the flag and we left. The only person to say goodbye to was the guard who was on duty. I shook his hand and I said, take care of the place. And left and wondered under what conditions we'd be coming back. In Lviv, when we had to leave on, you know, we were there for about 10, 12, 14 days. When we had to leave and we made the decision that we had to leave the country in the morning, I said, no one does anything, no one moves anything until I talk to the young people in this hotel because they've been watching us.

Everyone was watching us. People knew our cars were there. And I said, I have to break it to them that we're leaving. And that was a really, really, really hard moment because they said, you're abandoning us. And I said, no, I think I need to go somewhere where I can make sure I can do the best job for you. And so we left and crossed the border and stopped as soon as we could and set up camp there for the next couple of months.

And I think we did really, really, really important work as the full weight of the international humanitarian community sort of arrived in Zhezhov, Poland. These are people who came who had experience in Yemen and Iraq and Afghanistan. And myself and other colleagues, our job, we felt very strongly, was to help them understand Ukraine, a fully industrialized country with supply chains

and with multimodal transport and all kinds of things that they weren't used to working with. And so that's what we spent time watching that move in until we could move back in ourselves. And that was incredible. You and I met at the Halifax Security Forum about a year ago. And we talked about whether I should go to Ukraine. And I said, and we talked about whether I should go to Ukraine, and I said, look, I've been in combat zones. It's not my meat and potatoes assignment, but I'm willing to do it.

I'm just not sure I can add value. And you said you'll add value to yourself, that it's inspiring to watch these people at this moment. Tell us a bit about that. You'll go to cave, and you won't feel like you're in a combat zone until the moment you are hearing the sirens. And until the sirens go, you'll see a beautiful city with incredible design, fabulous food,

great clubs, jazz, you can go listen to jazz there, and a people who are doing everything they can to continue living life, everything, despite what's around them. And then the sirens will go, and you'll see how these people react, and some of them react and a lot of them don't. And you'll feel the weight of a major international conflict

on your own mind, and what do you do? And then you'll feel the weight of a major international conflict on your own mind and what do you do um and then you'll get the all clear and you'll go back to to this um ukraine is um the people have been i i watched this in a microcosm during covid they just keep going they have no choice they understand that i'm not sure that we have fully internalized this yet. What awaits them if they stop fighting is torture camps, control of their democratic processes, if you'll even be able to still call them democratic processes, waste of infrastructure and an economy, the death of innovation, more people leaving the country. So they can't stop. And everyone feels that they're fighting the war in some way. Everyone's got their front. Is it the economic front? Is it continuing to teach children? Is it continuing to

lobby from inside or leaving to lobby for support? Is it raising funds for their brother or cousin or complete stranger on the front who needs something? Everyone is fighting, but they can't let the exhaustion get to them, and they are also living life. You've seen over the last year, over the last several months since you've been home, signs of fatigue in so many Western societies with this conflict.

Electorates that are making surprising choices and legislatures where the question, how is this our fight, is asked more and more frequently. What's your reaction as you see that sort of danger of feeling that this isn't a fight that can be won? It is a fight that can be won. Number one. And Ukrainians have never once asked for us to be involved in it in any other way than to provide them with the tools and the resources to win the war. tools and the resources to win the war. I think that to anyone who says, oh, we're tired,

I might say, well, let's do the thought experiment. Let's be tired. Let's down tools. What does that look like? Are we ready for that? Because that's a whole other set of problems. At the outset of the war, and I think even still today, we say that Ukrainians are fighting for the same values that we have. And they en masse as a society said, we want to be European. We want to break with our Soviet past. We want to break with this very, I mean, talk about kinship ties with Russia. We want to make those difficult decisions, as Zelensky has made on things like judicial reform, in order to become a part of a community where democracy, rule of law, human

rights, all of that means something. How many countries are there out there like that right now? And we, Canada, as a middle-sized country, we need people in that club. These are people who are willing to die for that. All we need is to give them the material so that they can stop dying. And they can once and for all say to Russia, stop, enough. And it's not them saying to Russia,

stop, enough. It's all of us saying to authoritarianism, stop, enough. The only problem with this... Go on ahead. The only problem with this format tonight is that I have to keep the conversations shorter than I'm used to keeping them. We're already a little over time. than I'm used to keeping them. We're already a little over time. But let's treat this as the beginning

of many more wonderful conversations and hard conversations about the choices that we all face in the West. Larissa Galazza, thanks so much for your work. Thanks for joining us. Thank you. The first thing I knew about Katie George before I heard her sing was the reaction of her colleagues when she started to have some career success. She's a young jazz singer from Alberta.

She'd been living in Montreal for a while. And about two years ago, when she was nominated for a Juno, some of the leading musicians in the field, people like Christine Jensen and Lila Bialy, said, Katie got nominated. This is a big deal. It's about time. People who are leaders in any field are not competitive. People who are leaders in any field look around for the next generation of leaders.

They are always, and this includes people who are in the endless battle for melody and swing and good music, they are always happy to have reinforcements. And that was the spirit in which they welcomed Katie George to the field. She's here tonight from Calgary. I asked her, can you come? She said, I'm in Calgary. Of course we'll come. She's here with pianist Mark Limacher. Please welcome Katie My optometrist told me that my eyes are fine But I've been told that love is blind Should I walk around so freely with my eyes closed

Until I freely walk into my new boat My podiatrist told me that my walk's ideal But my head is nowhere near my heels Should I somersault in every which direction until I meet a suitable connection? I spend hours and hours and hours just talking to my trusty GP. But the doc says I'm showing no symptoms, and I'm not sure how that can be. My cardiologist told me that my heart is neat, but should it not be skipping beats? So I'll give myself a minkus of the hiccups, till I skip a couple beats and become lovestruck.. My optometrist told me that my eyes are fine.

I've been told love is blind. Should I walk around so freely with my eyes closed? Until I freely walk into my new boat. My podiatrist told me that my walk is ideal, but my head is nowhere near my heels. Should I somersault in every which direction? Until I meet a suitable connection. I spend hours, hours, stuck into my dream. The doc says I'm showing no symptoms and I'm not sure how that can be.

My cardiologist told me that my heart is neat, but should it not be skipping beats? So I'll give myself a mink, I solve the hiccups, till I skip a couple beats and become lovestruck. Thank you. Katie George, welcome over here, okay? That's a hell of a tune. Who wrote it? Oh, I don't know. No, it was me. Thank you. I think I asked you to sing My Cardiologist,

but that's actually my optometrist? It is My Cardiologist. It's more fun to say than optometrist. Okay. You can write a sequel called My Substacker. It's in the works. Next album. I didn't mention, because I got tired of hearing myself read my notes, so I left my notes behind. I forgot to mention. Katie is the youngest singer ever to win the Juno for Best Vocal Jazz Performance in two consecutive years.

That's for your albums from 2021 and 2022. Your album for 2023 is your duet album with Mark. Yeah, that's right. Which is called You're Alike, You Two. Yes, sometimes we're alike. What's it like to perform in a duet context? Normally you have a drummer who you're very fond of and a bassist and a piano player. What makes the duet context different? I find it more fun.

There's more freedom to it. I enjoy that freedom. We can kind of do whatever we want. Mark surprised me with an intro that I wasn't expecting, so thank you for that, Mark. But, you know, we go with it, and sometimes I will surprise Mark with a key change that you're not expecting. And we go with that. He actually surprised me by going into my theme music while I was reading my intro.

And then I realized that that was an option, so I decided to just go with it. He's a very surprising guy. We're all doing jazz here tonight. What do you have planned for 24? Another album, hopefully recording an orchestral album, which Mark will be arranging, which would be wonderful. More touring, different countries, different places, different people. Living the dream, as they say. And Mark, you've got an album out too called Things of Little Consequence. That's right. Which is a chamber music album. Yeah, I am a composer by background. And so, yeah, I joke that the music I do for me might be brand damaging for Katie. But that having been said, I, you know, here we are.

So yes, you can see that that's on the internet. I don't have physical CDs because I very much not things. Well, the night's young. What considerations, I'll stay with you for a second. What are the considerations that you're dealing with when you're accompanying a singer?

What are your hopes and fears? And what's it like working with Katie George? Working with Katie is a superlative experience. I think she is the best musician of any kind that I know. And I'm not just saying that because she's standing here looking at me.

I would say behind the back. Yeah, no, I mean... I like the duo because it's flexible. It is more in fact like chamber music because we could go in and out of different things or even make medleys up on the spot or change keys.

And it becomes very improvisatory, but it's also, you're connected to the same... It's kind of a strange experience to describe, actually. I feel like we know what we're supposed to be doing, right? And then we'll see what... And then we don't do it. I thought you'd like that intro. And by the way, I thought you wanted underscoring't do it. I thought you'd like that intro.

I thought you wanted underscoring at the beginning. I thought it was very classy. No, I was sitting here going, shit. And then I thought, no, it's a thing. Yeah. Anyway, we'll get it. We'll do it next time, right?

I will thank you both for your comments on your music because we don't often get a chance to hear musicians say what they what they're up to up here and then i'm going to say good night but i do want to say that katie's going to sing one more song for you i also want to say thank you to the National Arts Centre for hosting this live recording. It is always a pleasure to be here. The Paul Wells Show is produced by Antica in partnership with the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, where I never get tired of saying I'm the

inaugural journalist fellow in residence. Our producer is Kevin Sexton, who's here making sure that the sound all sounds good. Our executive producers are Laura Reguer and Stuart Cox. If you subscribe to my Substack, as you do, you can get bonus content for this show as well as access to my newsletter. You can find that newsletter at paulwells.substack.com. Take it home, Katie George. Thank you. Thank you. An icy glance might ordinarily chill me But cool romance is hot this time of year

And if by chance you have the desire to thrill me I wouldn't object to holding the glove of someone so sincere A frosty kiss might customarily bore me Destined to settle

and fade like snowflakes by a fire But one from you Would never be welcomed so poorly I couldn't refuse a peck on the cheek From someone so admired So what do you say, sir? It seems that the winter stars aligned

Just in time for some fun And hippie parade, sir I was aligned just in time for some fun And hippie parade, sir Now when we attend the parties we won't arrive each as one A certain phrase might momentarily stun me For sentiments so rich are rare to hear. But in a daze, eventually I'll give my answer, repeating to you what you said to me. This perfect time of year 🎵 So what do you say, sir?

It seems that the winter stars are light Just in time for some fun And hippie barracer Now when we attend the parties We won't arrive each as one. A certain phrase might momentarily stun me. For sentiments so rich are rare to hear. But in a daze, eventually I'll give my answer.

Repeating to you what you said to me This perfect time of year Thank you.