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Protesters show some humour with a 'no-fishing' sign after a night of heavy rain and wind at the park they have taken over as part of the Occupy Toronto movement on Thursday, Oct. 20, 2011.COLIN PERKEL

Mark Chang has never been part of any protest movement before.

But here the 44-year-old Mississauga resident is, manning a booth at Occupy Toronto. The father of two was laid off from his construction job in the summer. Now, he's out of work and worried about how to pay for his daughter's post-secondary education.

The layoff came after a string of low-paying positions in the restaurant, financial and construction industries (his name has been changed because he says he's embarrassed about his situation). He says he's stuck in a rut. "In the end, you have just enough to pay the bills. It's hard. You're full of stress."

His story is one of an array of tales of why people have come to the Occupy movement.

They are, today, a small, rag-tag group in drizzly rain. But diverse - the young and the old, white, black, Asian, people in wheelchairs, the homeless, the well-dressed. Folks in the neighbourhood wander past, many with dogs, curious to see their local park overrun with tents and make-shift shelters.

Their movement is still small and largely unarticulated, though income disparity seems at the root of it. It's certainly attracted attention of the Top 1 Per Cent.



The Occupy movement "recognizes there is no easy solution and -- to their credit -- have avoided being captured by particular solutions," Ed Clark, head of Toronto-Dominion Bank, said in a speech Wednesday evening. "But the message [of both the Tea Party and the Occupy movement) is the same – they don't like how the world is turning out."









The place is, at least now, an anthropologist's dream – a place without currency, where bartering is used to exchange goods and services, people cook for each other (I am offered free food several times), create an informal library and where, in theory, everyone is equal and everyone has a voice.

The first person I speak with, a young man with a black dog in his arms, tells me the the mainstream media has completely screwed up this story and that I will find no one willing to speak with me.

He's wrong.

After Mark, I speak with John Erb, who has Canadian flags on his hat, a plate of beef stew and grapes in hand. "People have lost heart and the mainstream media have not listened to us," he says, pointedly. "They've come here to have a voice."

He won't say what personal reasons brought him here, but says the financial system is broken. He implies this little tent city is utopia, where responsibility is shared by an army of volunteers and everyone is (in his words) equal. "Many here have told me this is the happiest they've felt in their lives," he says.

Behind him, the general assembly is underway. Various speakers take turns in a largely procedural session -- a march is planned for Saturday, the camp medic introduces himself, people are urged to keep things clean. This afternoon, there is a session on Talking to the Media.

"We're here to start a revolution, not drink alcohol. Please keep alcohol out of the park," says one young man (the crowd may be diverse, but most of the speakers, it must be said, are white young men).

There is chatter that protesters have been complaining about a lack of condoms provided.

At the back of the crowd, a muscular man in a knitted cap is observing. Paul Pyt is not a protester. He's a guy who happens to live in the neighbourhood. He's also currently out of work, after stints in the aviation and trucking industry. He immigrated to Canada from Poland, grew up under communism and is deeply sceptical about this movement. He supports the right to protest, and take over his park, as long as things remains peaceful. It's better than apathy. But he doesn't think it will change anything.

He shakes his head at all this talk of equality.

"As children, we all had equally little food on our table. That was equal, I guess," he says.

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