Vancouver-Seattle

Currently typing this from the Green Tortoise Hostel in Seattle, by the Pike Place Public Market. Seattle and Vancouver are both similar in that there's a lot of waterfront to walk on, and parks everywhere.

Stayed in Vancouver for the past 3 days, basically pounded the pavement around downtown in the mornings and visited friends for eating in the afternoons/evenings. Was situated in Davie neighbourhood, lots of rainbows... :) It's in the "south end" of the downtown peninsula, so English Bay is a block away. Even on warm sunny days, the cold wind off the sea makes for a chilly but brisk walk. Lots of dog walkers, joggers, bikers, etc... From there, walked up Denman to Stanley Park, made it halfway around to within eyeshot of Lion's Gate Bridge before getting really hungry.

Was going to meet a friend Farnaz in Burnaby for lunch, so walked over to the Burrard Skytrain terminal. It was a bit of a gong show after that.... missed the transfer for the Millenium line so had to hop back a couple stations. After getting to the station, waited for my friend for about half an hour before looking at my phone and realizing I had been booted off the network somehow, so wasn't receiving calls. Figured she would be sick of waiting by now so hopped back on the train to downtown, when I got a call from her and we figured out that we had been waiting at opposite ends of the station. :P OH MAN... so turned around again, and finally saw her after an hour of these shenanigans... Good to see her though, and she's working for some surveillance/security company programming in C++, so doing good. We were both in consensus that grad school, while a good experience, isn't something that we ever want to go back to....

Headed back downtown to meet up with another family friend who was a lawyer at Harper Gray LLP, and got to see the seriously impressive view from their offices (32nd floor). Even better that it was late afternoon, so everything was a warm golden color... Could also see English Bay from there...

Walked from there down to a Chinese restaurant on Cambie, 6 blocks away from my family friend's place (a nice find for her). Met up with an auntie and uncle who had moved out here for retirement (a common trend amongst the Chinese community in Winnipeg), and had a nice evening reminiscing about old friends while eating Peking duck and crab. This was actually the first time I enjoyed crab, because there was actually meat inside the legs! I guess it's because it was really fresh... The uncle is known in his neighbourhood for running around the park ("it's you! I know you!" from the local kids), and the auntie regularly sings Cantonese opera on Tuesdays with a bunch of other ladies in Vancouver (apparently there's a big difference between Cantonese and Beijing opera... will have to listen to it one of these days).

The next day walked up the other side of downtown to Gastown and Chinatown. Basically just wandering around until something caught my fancy (which wasn't often). Gastown has that famous triangle skinny building, and Chinatown had this Kwai Chang Kane-Chinese lookalike (you know, from Kung Fu the Legend) in a gift shop who taught Wing Chun kungfu in the back... how awesome is that? :)

For some reason, Canadian geese everywhere... in the parks, on the streets, in the air... I guess like other Vancouverites, they see no need to leave for the winter....Had an hour to kill before meeting up with other friends for artistic lattes so went down to English Bay to finish my book (Ghost Sea by Ferenc Mate, an excellent sea adventure/ethnological study on the Kwakiutl people of northern BC). It was sunny out so I figured I could find a warm spot along the beach to read, but the cold sea wind drove me from bench to bench until I figured out the best strategy to find a reading spot: just follow the sunning geese. :) Parked myself beside a flock enjoying the sun in the shelter of a few tall leafless trees.

Met up with Jacques and Jess for lattes decorated with cream and powdered cinnamon at Artigiano's, in Kerrisdale, a neighbourhood with funky little shops/cafes/restaurants/lingerie stores (??). Talked about movies, new and old, and how the upcoming "Forbidden Kingdom" would probably be very light on plot, but would be worth seeing for just one thing: seeing Jet Li and Jackie Chan in the same movie! :P

Got dropped off at Kitsilano Beach, with an awesome view of downtown, so took a short walk among all the dog walkers. Then headed back up the hill (I forgot how hilly Vancouver was, my butt is hurting from all the unaccustomed exertion :P) to BC Sushi, a pretty good all you can eat sushi place. Slabs of sashimi, really fresh and even sweet sea urchin! Apparently there's no decent sushi for a decent price in Australia, so ate my fill that night. The first sushi place I've seen where the waitresses put in the orders with PDAs. :P

Caught the bus back downtown (total noob with their faresaver tickets, but whatever), and spent the remainder of the night looking up details of Seattle for the next day. Unfortunately the greyhound bus was running slow so didn't get into Seattle until 4:30, too late to do much of what I planned, but there was a "First Thursday" free art walk in all the galleries including the Seattle Art Museum, so it's not all bad. Will try to hit up Fremont (with the bridge troll) and Capitol Hill tomorrow, basically just pounding pavement some more and maybe seeking out random landmarks. I have a small project while I'm travelling, there's an obscure album by Takagi Masakatsu (classical/electronic/visual arts) that I've been unable to find anywhere in stores, so perhaps I'll be able to find it here, where indie music is almost a way of life.

cheers, Ange