The Rotaract Club of Vancouver-UBC is a campus club like a mushroom: it looks small and self-contained at first, with about 35 current members, but digging a little deeper reveals the vast mycelium underneath. The club is just one branch of Rotary International, one of the largest community service organizations in the world. It’s active in 180 countries, and our local incarnation is one of 10,000 others around the world working like pistons in a well-oiled engine of community service fundraising.
But efficiency gets boring; sometimes you just want a little destruction in your life. The Rotaract Club gets it, so this Tuesday, they wheeled scrapped cars into the courtyard outside the Nest and handed passersby bats.
“[Last year] we just kind of did it and it seemed like a good idea,” said Sara Lee, an executive with UBC Rotaract’s fundraising committee. “Then we saw the response [Car Smash] got from UBC and we were like, ‘OK, we have to keep doing this.’”
But the single car that the club got last year wasn’t quite enough to soak up all of campus’ repressed rage. This year they partnered once again with GotScrapCar, a Vancouver-based scrap car recycling company, to provide students with both an old Mazda Sport and a beat-up Kia hatchback for their destructive pleasure.
The club offered one swing at them for $3, five swings for $10 and some time with a can of spray paint for $8. I opted for five swings, signed the waiver, and grabbed some safety goggles and a bat to live out the Carrie Underwood fantasy I never knew I had.
GotScrapCar had removed any glass, chemicals and electronics from the chassis (i.e. the fun targets), so I mostly aimed at the unsuspecting Kia’s front hood. By my last swing, I’d made a pretty good dent.
But sweet, wonton mayhem wasn’t the only agenda at this year’s Car Smash. All proceeds from the event went to the Rotary Education Fund, an international scholarship program that awards around $7.5 million in scholarships per year. The Rotaract Club is a community service organization after all, and handing baseball bats to stressed out students at the start of exam season might not fully qualify.
Car Smash’s sponsor, GotScrapCar, also does community service.
“[It’s] owned by this guy named Noble; like, the sweetest person ever,” said Lee. “When they get [scrap] cars, they’ll bring the shell to schools so little kids can learn… how to work on them.” Lee explained that this effort opens doors to kids who might be interested in going to trade school instead of opting into a four year university degree. GotScrapCar also provides chassis to Vancouver’s firefighters to use for training runs, giving them valuable experience with vehicular rescue techniques.
Rotaract organizes regular community service “Days of Kindness” where members walk around campus and hand out little notes or treats to passersby:
“[We do it] to try and lift spirits before we head into the nightmare that is final exams,” said Lee.
They’re also organising a clothing drive April 3, with donations going to the DTES Women’s Center and Seva, a charity which treats blindness in middle- and low-income countries.
“If you want to get involved, you can always message our Instagram, @rotaractvancouver. And we’re always at Club Fair in September and January.”
So maybe you missed Car Smash this year— is all that pent up energy still rattling around your ribcage? Don’t worry, you don’t have to wait until next March to let it out.
Destroying something beautiful can be fun, but it isn’t the only way. Instead, you could channel that into the community with the Rotaract Club. Or you could just call Noble and beg him to let you into his scrapyard. Your choice, I guess.