Here we are in morden, manitoba.
[cheering & applauding]
Couple hours south of winnipeg.
30 minutes north of north dakota.
Right in the heart of picturesque pembina valley.
Now, I'm not sure, in the prairies,
How you define valley.
[laughing]
Like, I'm sure it is, it's just...
I haven't seen the sides.
[laughing]
I feel like I should be able to see the sides,
Like there's nothing in the way.
I should be able to see the sides.
Is it still a valley if you can't see the sides,
Due to the curvature of the earth?
[laughing]
When you grow up in a small town in newfoundland,
You see that people have a sense of humour
About hard times.
Check, check.
I turned that into a career and hit the road.
[mc] mr. Jonny harris!
Now I'm on a mission to find the funny in the places
You'd least expect it,
Canada's struggling small towns.
Towns that are against the ropes, but hanging in there.
Still laughing in the face of adversity.
This is morden, manitoba.
♪
Woo!
♪
[indistinct speaking]
[cheering & applauding]
Morden's known as the city of discovery.
That's right, city.
Unlike most of the towns that we feature on this show,
The population here is actually growing.
It's one of the fastest -growing communities
In manitoba.
You didn't move to the city,
City status was bestowed on you.
It's like the mountain came to mohammed.
[laughing]
I'm only joking, there's no mountain, there's no mountain.
[laughing]
If the second mountain came though
They could probably call the place a valley.
[laughing]
There's a growing population, growing industry.
The trouble here happened in the summer of 2021,
When morden experienced a severe drought.
♪
Actually, it was worse than severe.
The way they categorize them,
A d2 level is a severe drought.
Summer of '21, most of southern manitoba
Was in a d3 status, which is extreme drought.
But morden and the surrounding area was in d4,
Exceptional drought, which kind of sounds like
I should congratulate you on that or something.
[laughing]
You know, it wasn't until I got here,
I realized how bad the drought was when I saw
That weird, beached whale by your town sign.
[laughing]
[applauding]
♪
I spoke to morden's water warden,
Campground manager, brian thiessen.
[cheering & applauding]
The lake, it's not just sort of like a draw
For campers and tourists.
I mean, that is the source, would you say?
Oh, absolutely.
Nearly all of town relies on that as their water source.
He told me lake minnewasta is a man-made reservoir,
And it provides morden with 90% of its drinking water.
And during the drought, there was real danger of
The community running dry.
The saying kept being, "we just need a good rain."
That's all we need is just one good rain and the lake
Would bounce back, and we'd be okay, but...
It never came.
And then when July hit,
That's where the real concern was.
The water just kept going down.
People watched as your water supply got lower and lower.
Brian said on the hottest days of the year, in July,
The lake was dropping an inch every two to three days.
And then if you take a look at it as like a bowl,
The closer you get to the bottom,
The quicker it goes down, so that grew exponentially
As the summer went on.
Lake minnewasta dropped no less than 15 feet.
It was weird for lifeguards, you know, someone was,
"ah, help, I can't swim."
"well, can you touch the bottom?"
"no, I can't!" "well, you will soon."
[laughing]
There were a lot of people that were very fearful of
What was gonna happen.
There was, there was concern, for sure.
It was bad.
A state of emergency was declared.
The water conservation measures were put in place,
You know, things like you couldn't fill your pool
Or your hot tub.
-You waste nothing. -Yeah.
Nothing goes down the drain
Unless it's done something else before.
So, if you wanted to wash your hands,
You catch that and then that goes into,
Let's say the tank of the toilet, so you can flush it.
People were saving water, reusing it.
Maybe if you could put it in the tank for flush the toilet
Or give it to the dog or your least favourite kid or...
[laughing]
Construction companies that were doing any work in town
That needed water, they had to haul in their own water.
They closed down the splash pad in morden park there.
Everybody had to change the way that they did things.
Like, this was the only time where a bartender
Would insist you have a few rum and cokes before
They'd give you another water.
[laughing]
"okay, buddy, take it-
You've already had a couple of waters.
Just take it easy, okay."
[laughing]
We wouldn't have made it through without the way
Everybody did as much as they could...
And still be presentable at work...
Without missing a shower too many times in a row or
Not washing their clothes.
You know, as you can see,
I don't have any water up here with me tonight.
So, I'm doing my part, as you can see.
As you can smell, maybe.
I don't know if the front row...
[laughing]
I thought that was interesting that everybody
Sort of tried to do their part.
It's not very often you see examples of a shortage
Of something bringing people together.
That wasn't how it was in my neighbourhood
During covid with toilet paper.
[laughing]
[applauding]
♪
In an agricultural town suffering from drought,
Sometimes you just wish some help would fall from the sky.
That's where pembina air comes in.
I talked to operations manager whose job
Demands she keeps her feet
On the ground, but her head in the clouds,
Vienna peters.
[cheering & applauding]
Pembina air services is our family business.
My dad, myself, my mom, brother, and sister.
We've been here, I believe, since 1999.
So, a long time. I mean,
Southern manitoba, farming industry is huge, right?
Crops are everything so, we do our best to
Take care of local farmers, from the air.
And they can spray any number of things
Like fertilizer or seed.
You know, they use gps, and they find out which fields
They're going to spray and what they're going to spray.
And she said also the direction,
Which I didn't know that was even a factor.
I just assumed it would always be down.
[laughing]
Farming and aerial application,
It's very dependent on the weather.
So, morden and a lot of southern manitoba
Experienced a drought.
So, that meant a lot less work.
Vienna said that because of the drought,
The number of acres they would normally spray
Was cut in half.
So, half the income, right?
And that's why we had to cut staff.
So, it was tough financially for everybody.
Like, she said that she had to lay off half of her staff.
Now, it could have been worse, I guess,
At least they weren't up in the plane
When she let them go.
[laughing]
She told me that they took a couple of local farmers up,
Clients of theirs, just for a recon flight,
So they could sort of see what was going on.
Because of the drought, they wanted to
Kind of see where things were at.
And, they said to dad, you know,
"don't take us up again," in one of these drought years,
Because it was pretty scary, I think,
To view the fields from that perspective.
Because nobody was growing food.
And all these fields were just-
And I can imagine how upsetting it would be.
I get upset on a flight when it looks like
There's going to be no food.
[laughing]
The other thing that saved the business
Was sheer determination.
A little bit of volunteer work, I'd say,
On my part and as well as my brother's just because it is
A small business and we had to make ends meet
With the drought.
We were able to, you know, push through.
She said that she and her brother both plugged a lot of
Unpaid hours just to keep the business running.
I mean, every day, one day at a time of
Figuring out how to move forward.
This has been a good summer.
Perhaps next year when,
Let's cross our fingers first,
Another good season.
-Yeah. -Mhm, mhm.
Vienna not only managed the business,
But managed to keep a can-do altitude.
[laughing]
[applauding]
♪
Next, I met a couple who moved to morden.
Why? Mostly just to get a breath of fresh air.
I'm talking about mrinmoy and niby moulick.
[cheering & applauding]
We used to live in delhi,
Which is like the capital of india.
Populated, and we were done with it.
[laughing]
My daughter having some problem, also,
With the pollution.
They told me that the air quality where they were
Living in delhi was so poor that it was affecting
Their daughter's asthma.
They knew they wanted to move.
We were looking for any place to actually migrate and...
We googled different migration programs.
What jumped out at them was
Morden's immigration program.
They said it looked enticing, and they figured, you know,
Rural manitoba is a place where you can breathe easy.
Which is true except for, you know,
When it hits minus 45 and...
You get some frost buildup in your windpipe.
[laughing]
We just mailed them a general email.
And we heard back from them, which we usually-
It's surprising 'cause usually people don't reply back.
And then, eventually, niby came over for
An exploratory visit to check out the town.
And she said she was super impressed.
There was a lot of things which was
Already lined up for me.
Someone's picking me up from the airport.
They had fixed up all the hotels and everything.
She flew over, they came, picked her up,
Brought her into town, had the whole itinerary done up.
Sounded pretty deluxe, considering...
You know, here I am putting the town on national tv,
I had to drive my own rental from winnipeg airport.
[laughing]
Like, they made sure that I had an appointment booked
With the mayor, just to tell us how the town looked like.
It's like, the mayor wants to meet me?
And who am I, right? Why would he like to meet me?
She met the mayor. Niby, it was so funny.
She was like, "oh, I couldn't believe it."
I mean, here she is just checking out the town,
Having a look at the school.
She asks about the tap water, and they say,
"you gotta meet the mayor."
[laughing]
That's why we don't want to move anywhere else.
Yeah.
Yeah, this is like a community which
We can rely upon.
But you know, moving to a new country
Isn't easy for anybody, and it was no different
For niby and mrinmoy.
Morden helped with the move, but they still had to hustle.
They both held down several part-time jobs.
I got a job at mcdonald's.
I work in the night shift mcdonald's.
-Walmart. -Walmart in the morning.
Until they saved enough money to open
Their own cleaning business.
Like, right now, almost like 20 people
Are working in my company.
And, I'm thankful that I can give them a job.
Most of our employees are newcomers.
Now, they're helping new mordenites that are
In the same position that they were in.
Initially, when you come to another country,
The language is always a barrier.
-Exactly, yeah. -We don't mind that.
We'll give them part-time job.
-We'll give them hourly job. -Full-time job, also.
Full-time job. Whatever they require.
If they don't know the language,
They can still train them in it,
And somebody can be working and earning
While they get their bearings.
So it just makes life a bit easier.
That's their cleaning business slogan,
"easy on new mordenites, tough on stains".
[laughing]
[applauding]
♪
Now, as soon as you drive into morden,
You know something is going on.
You see some curious sights.
You see bruce the mosasaur.
You see archie the giant sea turtle.
You see that big, terrifying toothy fish.
You can stick your head up and
Get your picture taken through his mouth.
But I still didn't know why morden was the
"city of discovery". Did I want to learn?
You bet jurassic.
[laughing]
I went and I boned up on fossils with executive
Director of the canadian fossil discovery centre,
Adolfo cuetara.
[cheering & applauding]
Fossils in this area date back to a fascinating
Geological age, the cretaceous period.
Okay? This followed the jurassic period.
And if you're into the jurassic period, you know,
Lots of people are, and good for you.
[laughing]
But the cretaceous period is full of all these, like,
Weird and wonderful aquatic beasts.
83 million years ago, the sea was...
Higher than now, quite higher.
So there were interior seaway, like a giant channel of sea.
This place was underwater.
There was a seaway from the arctic that came down
Through the middle of canada, and the middle of
The united states, ended up in the...
Gulf of mexico.
And all these unbelievable fossil discoveries
Had been made right here in morden.
We have around 1500 specimens.
Different specimens that altogether are
More than 20,000 fossils.
But in display, we have like probably 5% of that amount.
Adolfo explain to me right now the paleontology world
Is discovering morden,
While morden discovers its own discoveries.
Let me explain.
[laughing]
Fossils in this area started to be collected
Back in the 1960s.
And only recently people like adolfo have been discovering
How significant some of these finds are.
Like, bruce, the mosasaur...
Morden has the largest mosasaur on display
On the planet.
This is the guinness world record.
This is the largest mosasaur in display in the world.
This is 43 feet long.
It looks like a cross between a whale and a crocodile.
And it's got like fins, but it's also got rear fins,
So they sort of look like undeveloped legs.
Very unsettling.
But the scariest thing is its mouth, this enormous,
Long mouth with huge teeth.
And then it's got another set of teeth behind its teeth.
It's got a mouth in its mouth...
Like the alien in alien.
[laughing]
It's just a terrifying -looking thing.
I can't imagine if you saw this thing coming up
Through the water at you...
I freak out if my foot touches some seaweed.
[laughing]
Can you imagine a mosasaur got a hold of you?
"oh my god, the mosasaur got me!
My leg's in its mouth, and I think my foot
Is in its other mouth! Gross!"
[laughing]
But they were all eating each other, for pete's sake.
Violent times, the cretaceous period,
It was terrifying.
The mosasaur would often eat giant sea turtles.
That's why they got archie over at the co-op,
And bruce up by the hotel. -[laughing]
Be a bloodbath, otherwise.
Adolfo said the centre brings in about 15,000 people a year.
And he said that will increase dramatically.
We now are the hidden gem of manitoba.
Nobody knows about us, but hopefully,
In a couple or three years, everybody will know.
If you want to see bruce the mosasaur,
The largest mosasaur, which jumped out of the water and
Killed indominus rex and saved the day
At the end of jurassic world...
[laughing]
You want to see that, you got to come to morden.
[cheering & applauding]
Spoiler alert, probably should've put in
A spoiler alert in there.
[laughing]
[applauding]
♪
I was told morden had a great special olympics program,
But covid threw a pretty good curveball and shut it down.
Kids with disabilities in this area
Were left with no sports at all.
So parents got together, and
Challenger baseball has been a real homerun here.
I talked to a couple of people
Who've been hitting it out of the park,
Courtney yeo-thiessen and evan hesom.
[cheering & applauding]
Courtney is a high school teacher.
She was involved with the special olympics program.
And when challenger baseball came up,
They needed a coach.
She volunteered even though she said
She didn't know much about baseball.
I can throw a ball, I can catch a ball.
But that's about it.
I've played sports, but I'm never really a baseball fan.
Which became apparent to me when she asked me
If I wanted to throw out the first field goal.
[laughing]
So, the kids ended up teaching me more about
Baseball as the seasons go on.
Evan's one of the players. Evan has spina bifida,
But loves baseball and is
Very knowledgeable of baseball.
He knows everything about it:
The rules, the strategies, the players.
He also knows what he likes and what he doesn't like.
For me, the position that I mostly play is...
Pitcher or first baseman.
He likes to play first base or pitcher because
He doesn't like to run.
[laughing]
I'm not a big fan, myself.
Most people say that you put a shortstop
Between second and third.
I like to take a shortstop between all the bases.
[laughing]
But challenger baseball is a modified version of the game
Where each player has a buddy.
For the most part, I can run the bases,
But it's just when I get really tired that
I need the buddy to run for me.
Your buddy can help you out with anything that
You have trouble doing.
Like, at one point, evan was batting,
And I was doing the running- a pinch runner, essentially.
And the point is that if someone else does the bits
That you can't do, you can genuinely contribute
With what you can do.
And when they play against other minor ball teams,
The other team will be given some challenges
To sort of even the playing field.
Usually, they switch hit, which means that they
Have to use their opposite hand with the bat,
And they have to put the glove on the opposite hand.
Which is harder than it sounds.
I tried it with evan, and we were playing catch.
[laughing]
I felt like an idiot.
I didn't think I qualified.
I don't think I should have to put
My glove on the wrong hand.
I don't technically have a disability, but...
I would say I have an inability.
[laughing]
♪
-Oh, I got that! -Nice catch, nice catch.
♪
Got a hole in your glove?
And then, suddenly, he starts chirping me.
[laughing]
♪
Oh...
Would you like me to throw underhand to you?
Ha, ha, ha, yes!
I said, "okay, but I can see somebody doesn't have
A problem running their mouth."
[laughing]
-[cheering] -whoa!
[cheering]
But it was nice to be out there.
It was nice to see some challenger baseball.
Beautiful day in morden park.
It was nice to see people coming out and
Getting together.
And it was good to see this program where kids get to,
You know, genuinely play.
They're not just going to be relegated to, you know,
Being water boy...
Because in morden,
Being water boy can be a challenge in itself.
[laughing]
[applauding]
♪
During the drought, you know, there was no point to pout.
Get some buckets under spouts.
A negative attitude is bull.
The air is clean, and I know what they mean
When they say their lake is half full.
[laughing]
See an old crop duster return to the sky over earth
With old bones strewn through it.
Kids take challenge in stride,
And take a big swing with pride.
As for running, get your buddy to do it.
[laughing]
I'll say the drought of all droughts
Couldn't knock this town out.
And while I know a poor harvest will cost you.
I'll tell those who don't know ya,
That they're tough in manitoba,
Especially around lake minnewasta.
Thanks for coming out, everybody.
You've been great!
Take care, morden. We love ya.
It was done so tastefully. I can't-
I couldn't stop smiling, and my cheeks hurt.
I think it was very funny and awesome.
♪
I hope anybody watching the show finds their way to
Morden sometime, stop by the campground, say hi.
Take a dive into the lake.
I'm sure there'll be water in it.
[laughing]
-Jonny did an excellent job. -Excellent job, yeah.
It was really good.
Yeah, we had fun, yeah.
I thought it was...
Really, well, I thought some of the jokes were funny.
-[cats meowing] -hey, sweetie.
-This is maverick and goose. -Oh, are you serious?
-Yes. -That's hilarious.
Amazing.
Although, they cut off the best part.