CANADA — Setting the Scene
The dark street stretches ahead of me, a cascade of red and white lights flowing between skyscraper after skyscraper. Beyond are vast mountains, their dark, forested slopes swathed in heavy rainclouds. To my left, I look out over English Bay, the sun setting over the sea, ripples of light undulating beneath me as I cross the Granville Bridge. I’m being driven around by my landlord, Joel, a charismatic Californian with a baseball cap glued to his head. As I pass through the city, he remarks drily on the various attractions — the hollow log, the palatial McMansions of Shaughnessy and the mermaid in the surf (which turns out to be called ‘girl in a wetsuit’. Occasionally his enthusiasm for the minutiae of Vancouver gets the better of him and he exclaims wildly about the high quality of the stairs in a Gastown hotel or the vast population crammed into the tiny downtown area. It is dark by the time we arrive back at my new home and I am only too happy to crash, exhausted into my bed.
Day two passes in a blur, with banks, bikes, cellphones and a wild goose chase for free wifi all on the agenda. Waking up at 5:30AM, I look out on a grey and moody day; rain cascades from a heavy sky as I walk slowly through the local park in search of the Pacific. Twenty minutes from home, I arrive at the beach- a gravelly scrape nestled between a railroad and an almost unbelievably huge cargo ship. The main road passes by and the noise is overwhelming- this park is not a place to relax, more an afterthought, trapped by the sounds and smells of industry. Perhaps it’s not the best place to start the day, I think, as I traipse back through the concrete and steel of the local amusement park, a world of fun made gloomy by the hour and the weather — lone residents scuttle purposefully between the vast buildings, never once glancing up to the leaden skies.
A few hours later, I’m sat in a Starbucks on the main drag in my area- ‘Hastings’. I’ve been warned that Hastings is one of the hotspots for drug addicts and so the rate of crime is high, but this far out of Gastown, the locals seem friendly and there are smiles on the faces of the people walking the streets. My coffee does its trick and I prance back out into the city; the rain has now stopped and although the sun has yet to break through, the air is warm, further inspiring a hitherto hidden optimism. I discover the tranquil, beautiful streets between the main thoroughfares; clapperboard homes with big green gardens, borders neatly defined, with beautiful collections of flowers in every other lawn. On the wide, empty roads, sleek modern cars are the norm here, while occasionally an old American gem shines through. It’s bin day, so the back streets are lined neatly with recycling, alongside children playing happily on bikes; I pass a trash collection lorry, which lumbers down these narrow roads between the backs of the houses. Off in the distance, beyond the telephone lines, the skyscrapers can again be glimpsed; tomorrow I’m off to downtown and I can’t wait!
Originally published at fortysix.weebly.com.
