Moving Forward to 2019, Looking Back to 2009

 

Words by Beth Bowles & Lakyn Barton

Holy crap, can you believe it’s already 2019? So much has happened, but simultaneously our relationship with time passing is a complex one. I promise I know basic math, but in my mind the ‘90s were only ten years ago. They weren’t. So, in an effort to make you feel old alongside me, let’s take a little trip together down memory lane. 

Here’s what happened in 2009, ten years ago.

POP CULTURE: 

• “Boom Boom Pow” by the Black Eyed Peas was the top charting song.
• Slumdog Millionaire won the Oscar for best film.
• I’ma Let You Finish … At the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech for Best Female Video TO SAY BeyoncÉ should have won. Iconic. 
• Michael Jackson died on June 25.
• Ru Paul’s Drag Race aired for the first time in February. Let’s forgive the horrible ‘glamour’ filter we endured for Season One.
• The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien premiered in June with Will Ferrell and Pearl Jam as the show’s first guests.

 

LOCAL:

• Carl Zehr was the mayor of Kitchener, until Berry Vrbanovic would take over in 2014.
• Brenda Halloran was the mayor of Waterloo, until Dave Jaworsky would take over in 2014.
• The Waterloo Region is labeled the “Hate Crime Capital” of Canada as Statistics Canada ranked the Region No. 1, with 93 incidents reported in the tri-cities in 2009. In 2016, there were 19 incidents reported.
• Construction of uptown waterloo public square finished and its opening ceremony was in May.
• Plans for the CIGI Waterloo campus was announced, construction was completed in 2011.
• Regional council approved, in principle, light-rail transit between Conestoga and Fairview Park Mall.

GLOBAL:

• Barack Obama was sworn in as 44th President of the United States.
• The 2009 Swine Flu caused a panic in Ontario. In April 2009, four cases of suspected swine flu were in Ontario. This number grew to ten cases in five days. 
• An Air France jet carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, disappeared overnight in an area of strong turbulence crashed into Ocean. The aircraft’s flight recorders were not recovered from the floor of the atlantic ocean until nearly two years later in May 2011.