—_--__- BUSINESS — unt your Canadian blessings THE shower toilets in Japan really cleaned up as far as my wife Mandy was concerned. On the other hand, | wnoney s to the Japanese. matters When problems with the fax or medical system start you dreaming there must be A better place to live than Canada, rest assured people in other countries look longingly at quite a bit in Canada. Sure, the distinctly Japanese Toto Washlet toilet — with heated seat, two warm spray settings and a warm air blow dry feature — became Mandy's favourite. Bur patriotism blooms when you turn off Qudorn Street in the nerthern Japanese town of Kitakami and sce a Canadian thy waving outside a two-storey, Dwo- garage house. Banners in Japanese prochim “Canada House™ and “North Country Family House.” “Customers like the North American lifestyle,” said Takahashi, president of several of the Iriyama Group construc- tion companies in Kitakami, 500 km north of Tokyo. “The traditional Canadian design has long life and quality.” While housing prices are only slightly more in Japan than in - many parts of Canada, vou won't complain about most other Canadian costs atter a visit te Japan. While vou can eat reasonably priced rice and noodle dishes, vou could easily pay $40 to $60 tor a melon, S48 for a kilo of grapes, $3 for a peach. Gas, like in many other parts of the world, is around $2 a litre. Blame much of this on a Canadian dollar thar has dropped to one-sivth of its value against the Japanese ven over the past 30 years. But at the same time, appreciate what a Canadian dollar still bus in Canada. (You can even diversity and hedge your bets by investing in Canadian companies that de business abroad to carn foreign currencs.) Despite anv local, regional or national problem you care to mention Canada remains one of the best countries in the world in which to live. Halloween has gone and the Christmas shopping rush has begun in earnest. We plan to use the upeoming festive season as a reminder to take a “count vour blessings” pause now and again — even if Mandy isn't going to find a shower toilet in her Christmas stocking. —— Atike Grenby isa coltmnist and tidrpendent persount financial adviser; bell answer questions in this colunim as space allows but cannot reply personally, Contact him at PO. Box 50029, Santh Slope R.P.O., Burnaby, B.C. V3] 5G3; e-mail Mike at and see previons colmmus at . ae NEWS photo Julis lvergon DEBBIE Laleune, right, with the North Vancouver Schooi District employment training division, helps Afsaneh " Afshar with some information at a career, employment and training session held at apilano Matt Oct. 27 and 28. The second annual event was sponsored by the North Shore News. A North Vancouver company is releasing a product called InfoSurfer that addresses the way office reports are creat- ed. lntoSurter is designed to jet company emplovees locate and view corporate data in the same manner as searching for information on the Internet. GanyMede Systems Incorporated calls this approach = “data surting.~ Anyone who has used an Taternet browser will be able to use IntoSurfer to focate company data. A toned benefit of the new data surfing approach is that emplovees never need to connect to, or view, che com- pany database itself. This means that employees can locate the data they want even. it they don’t know anything about compuicrs or database technology. GanyMede Systems’ direc- tors are Jason Amott and Dennis Amot:. Full details are available at the GanyMede Web site at wivw.intosurfer.net. a29 North Vancouver-based BrainTech Inc. announced Nov. 1 that it has appointed a new director and chief finan- cial officer. Owen Jones, president and CEO of BrainTech, Inc. said Ted A. White is the new direc- tor and chief financial officer of the company. White was an independent — director of Sideware Systems Inc. and a director and) chief financial officer of nwo junior resource companies trading on the Canadian Venture Exchange. BrainTech focuses the design, development © and commercialization of advanced pattern: recognition technologies and products. The company way founded in 1994 and is a public trading company listed on the OTC Bulletin Board. a44 North Vancouver-based SoftCare (www.softcare.com) announced Oct. 19 that sub- ject to sharcholder and regu- latory approval, the board of directors has adopted a share option plan as a company wide incentive compensation plan for Softcare employees, directors, officers, consultants and service providers. Some 20 per cent of the issued common = shares of Softeare are reserved to the plan. The board determined that 1,000,875 new options. for common shere options will be granted to specified employees at a price of $ 1.55 per share. The plan will be consid- ered by shareholders on Nov. 10. 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