One Week, One Thought | 12th July 2011 | 22:11 PDT

Walking through town, the suburbs, the parks. The keynotes that this place is amazingly lacking in self identity. It all feels familiar but different, even the people here, look like someone I know, but... Not... Like, I'm in Ray Bradbury's short story 'A Sound of Thunder'.

As the expression goes, "too many cooks, spoil the broth". It feels like this is happening here, with influences from Britain shaping its history and mentality, America shaping elements, like road signs, suburban houses and Far East shaping the cityscape and business acumen. None of them are subtle either, they're all taking their 110% of having a strong presence here.

Where am I again?

It feels that Vancouver has the above-average of things but not quite enough to stand out to be the best and be a 'something'. My week here so far has been pleasant. That is it, that's what this town is, pleasant, everything's ok, pleasant, safe and everyone's happy. (Hastings and Main isn't on the other hand as that's where the drug fuelled homeless reside, even they are pocketed within a few blocks, and EVERY city has their own down areas, why should Vancouver be any different?)

This is, by no means, meant to be confused with boring, there are things going on and lots to do, just at a slower pace than what inner-city people are probably used to. Things happen... Eventually, like a fine wine - it takes time.

Hmmm, yes very... pleasant!

Thanks to the events being put on by the locals and passion for the city and what this city stands for, that there is a fantastic harmonious sense of stability amongst the diversity of the residents - that I have never seen before. I am yet to roll up my sleeves and see what's what, for myself.

but as it stands, its all very pleasant (except the variable weather, that I hate having to deal with - just be sunny!)

Where everybody knows my name | 11th June 2011 | 18:11 PDT

Hopping on the Skytrain from Downtown, looking for somewhere to visit I notice a place I should immediately visit before anywhere else and being the conceited, narcissistic, self-absorbed, self-centered, vain person I am, naturally this place is Rupert on Rupert Street

It's like being famous and having your name up in lights

What I great town, it's not ugly or dull looking as luckily I happen to love big faceless shopping warehouses and super-suburban scenery, it's what makes Rupert Town unique and simply super! I skip out the station and I turn right and walk off up a hill into the (f)unknown.

It's actually very green once you leave the station area, 20 minutes walk down Rupert Street, I grab a drink of RupeBull (like RedBull but better) from the Rupert Town Pantry which is no way just a Chevron petrol station, it's a pantry! I am then greeted with Rupert Park, with a large expanse of green, children's playground, a view over Burnaby and beyond. It's also home to Rupert Park's Pitch and Putt!

Tiger Woods has got NOTHING on me!

Now, I hate golf, it's a boring, slow, elaborate game of "chase the ball" for adults and I'm not very good at it. But hey, hang on now, I'm in Rupert Town, everything's simply smashing her. I bite the bullet for the sake of my namesake place, I pay my money and grab some clubs and get on with enjoying the joy it has to offer.

As time was a constraint as I still have so many wonderful things to enjoy about this great and marvellous town, I play Prompt and Putt, where you line up your shot and smack the ball (no test swings) and run after the ball, before it has a chance to settle in the grass, you line up and smack it, until you've done 18 holes, totalling 1235 yards in about 45 minutes and only 28 over par, which thankfully being Rupert Town was the perfect score to be totally awesome at golf and I now love with this fantastic brilliant sport.

I turn back on myself and experience more of Rupert Street, I see a park called Sunrise Park, which provides a brilliant vista over north and east Vancouver, with all it's inspiring highrises and sprawl with dull stupid mountains in the background.

Trees playing in the park

(Turning sarcasm off for a moment) I notice a small shack of a shop on the corner of Rupert Street and East Broadway called SushiHolic, cheesy name aside, this is an incredibly amazing gem to have found, very friendly service, reasonably priced and extremely delicious food, probably the bestest freshest sushi, I have ever had the pleasure of polishing off. This is very much worth me going out my way for to devour more.

Reinvigorated, I stop off into Trail Appliances at Rupert Square to look at amazing things, like fridges!! and ovens!! then, I go off piste and stumble upon the Vancouver Film Studios to look the amazing Canadian creations being put onto celluloid and I was a fence width away from being in my first major blockbuster, but I was greeted with the amazing view of nothing going on - I instead, head up Boundary Road, where I get talking to a bank security guard who offers to give me a set of golf clubs for free, just because. I notice as I was talking to the guy, a Starbucks and a warehouse called Charlie's Chocolate Factory.

See! Not one bastard factory!!

I enter this sweet-tooth's paradise to be greeted with not one single factory or chocolate making process, but instead a massive amount of shelves stacked with chocolates and sweets with a central island of handmade bite-sized chocolates - I buy a few and pop into Starbucks.

I walk to Falaise Park and sit on a bench to drink my latte, slowly eating these expensive supersupersuper-sweet chocolates, overlooking parts of Downtown peeping over trees but more importantly proudly surveying this great land and admiring the pure brilliant brilliance that Rupert is (and Rupert Street).

Tree's dinner time and they had to go home.

Thanks Rupert for supplying Rupert a marvellous day out.

Very Much Alive for 125 | 10th July 2011 | 23:46 PDT

Relaxed, chilled, "at one" as I'm sitting in Stanley Park surrounded within a clearing of trees, sitting on an old makeshift picnic blanket, with a cold drink in hand, the sunshine warming up my back giving light to whatever is playing out in front of me, sharing this scene with a few thousand people, talking to fellow revellers in a make-shift constantly shifting and changing community as people migrate with the flow of needs and wants that they require throughout the day.

Nice of the whole of Canada to come and enjoy this celelbration

This is the Summer Live festival in aid to celebrate Vancouver and its 125th birthday. First thing you notice how organised and smoothly this has all come together with volunteers more than pleased to help people. Walking around the stalls selling a variety of foods that reflect this city's diversity, merchandise tables of local businesses, sporting events, kids areas and seeing families play with their kids and groups of people merge together to share the main pull of this festival, the music of local Vancouverites.

Split into two main stages, the Main Stage for families and pleasant people and the Trail's Edge for the low-life degenerates of Vancouver, the 22-32 year old category, that like to do awful things like listen to Indie and drink beer, makes me sick to the core, how disgusting and vile these "yooofs" are, so I joined them and this is where I resided for the afternoon.

tiny people, BIG screen

Due to the burden of procrastination and it's addictive nature, I only manage to see the final song of the energetic folk indie band The Belle Game, but that got me pumped enough and wet at the mouth wanting more, damn you self-inflicted laziness!

Next up was Dustin Bentall Outfit, a modern replicated Johnny Cash twisted blend of the wild west, being an assortment of musicians from different bands - seemed like everyone had their go at the spot light and there was a great ambience as this guys went on to do their thing.

We Are City took the reins of this stage to produce some incredible progressive rock, warming to the crowd instantly with their going-nowhere stories and overwhelmed nature of the event, perhaps also having a new band member and only knowing a handful of songs, probably contributed to the nervous energy, but once they found their stride and got into the zone, the music was a raw deep, soothing, powerful eclectic mix of styles.

Band playing. Crowd Dancing. Cameraman recording

Final headlining act came from Indie Pop band, Hey Ocean! Who hadn't played Vancouver in over a year, drew the biggest crowd and with their positive presence, happy attitude treating the stage as somewhere to play and not somewhere to wok and promote, those vibes accelerated 10-fold to the audience and it got everybody moving on their feet and sporting a big broad smile. They were a perfect upbeat end to an amazing day.

More please Vancouver.

OK! | 9th July 2011 | 16:33 PDT

I love Starbucks, well not love but I like them a lot but, one thing Downtown has too many of are, Starbucks. There's 2 on every corner and 3 in-between each Starbucks between each 4th Starbucks, there's a Starbucks. I enter one of them thinking, being a chain they're all going to be the same and you know what, and you'll be dumbfoundedly shocked and flabbergasted to find out... ... ... They're different!

Just not in interior decoration, signs, merchandise, music, uniforms, layout, menus or customers but, in drinks (you get a LOT  less), price (though they cost a LOT more) and baristas...

"How can I help you?"
"Small Latte, please"
"Two of them?"
 -  I look behind me to see if someone has jumped on my back and therefore my order, but I'm the only one in here without a drink in front of them.
"Nope, it's just me!"
"I can see..."
 -  ...but...
"...You're not from here are you"
"I'm from England, just got here!"
"Awesome!"
"Yeah it is. Hey, is there anything I should do, while I'm here?"
"OK!"
 -  She walks off to clean the counter behind her.

Feeling a little bemused, I get my coffee and go sit down, half gazing out the window, wondering what exactly happened to me just then and idle moments go by.

Bemuse, meaning. To puzzle (via toy-tma.com)

I'm mid-sip of my coffee and I'm tapped on the shoulder, resulting in the spillage of valuable drops of expensive precious caffeine down my top.
"Haha, you spilt some silly"
"Ha, ha"
 -  It was my OK Corral barista from that moment a go.
"Sorry to bother you, but there's a free festival this weekend at Stanley Park, might be worth it."
 -  Wow, That's actually incredibly kind of her to come up to me and tell me that.
"That's actually incredibly kind of you to come up to me and tell me that, thank you!"
"No worries, enjoy your stay"
"Thanks, I will!"

It's going to be slow burner to assimilate to these here Canadians and create an  understanding, but I'll get there on the end.

No wonder | 8th July 2011 | 21:42 PDT

5 minutes into mandatory work, it gets to the point where it's no longer fun, leaving me two options: Continue and risk suicide or stop and explore this amazing city, I've just arrived into.

Finding the door to the outside world, I take a few steps in the glorious sunshine and breathe in the fresh air, as I plunge to my death... Not really.

I actually find the another door that leads me to the ground floor at about a safe sensible speed an elevator would normally operate at. Now, from what I've seen of Vancouver so far, is that is seems like a giant park but I decide to narrow down to just prominent area, I am going to circumnavigate the seawall of the 1000 acre Stanley Park.

I walk to the entrance of Stanley Park and I'm greeted with a Harbour called Coal, which as Coal Harbour (its name) suggests, is a harbour. You know the drill with these things, flat water, big and small white boats, wide walk way to stroll around the perimeter.

To the right, Vancouver skyline looking pretty "samey" with it's consistent height and colours of grey, silver and glass still, a brilliant sight. Sweeping left, the white meringued tops of Canada Place reaching for the sky, this ends the buildings and is where industry begins, as you see huge cargo containers await on standby to enter the docks with seaplanes coming in to land in seemingly tight spaces whilst small boats, whip in, out and around this busy harbour.

Yawn, God I'm freaking bored of you already

In the farthest distance, a green piece of land flows above the horizon with an impressive looking bridge connects it to another piece of green land, as industry reappears in front of it, with massive transporter ships arrive light in the water and leave heavy and deep. Supplying a backdrop for all this, residential homes crawl up, eventually losing ground to giant trees, that race up the steep slopes of the mountains and valleys to the top until they disappear to display a naked peak of brilliant white snow.

Ahead of all this the eastern side of Stanley Park cuts into the panoramic with its 250ft lush green trees, with the Jubilee fountain from Lost Lagoon peeping over the treescape, this all leads back to big and small white boats idly bobbing up and down while I take all this in.

Like those crap jokes, it's better when you're there

I stroll along the 9km route along the edge of Stanley Park at the water's edge as this magnificent scenery unfolds to show off the vast size of the industry of all different types to remind you why this city exists all guarded by Lions Gate Bridge towering over everything. Which leads to English Bay the main entrance to all this activity, with it expanse of mesmerising cloud formations, disappearing over the horizon.

An Anorexic Golden Gate Bridge

Walking along this route, with the cool sea air and sunshine warming your face, as cyclists and rollerbladers whiz by you. You begin to see why Vancouver is always ranked highly in "liveable city" rankings for more than a decade.

First Attraction. Done. | 7th July 2011 | 15:53 PDT

I was meant to be relaxing down Denman, Robson and Granville streets, as they're what I should be going down to experience Vancouver's Downtown and West End.

Instead, I was too occupied with Vancouver's welcoming committee and main attraction, resulting in the only bits I saw was concrete floors, paving slabs, thanks for the greetings rain. Seeing as its July it seemed that this place didn't get the memo that it is in fact, summer. Therefore, I wasn't at all prepared for this downpour so I also got to experience clothing stores.

You would think buying a waterproof jacket in a town that once had 300 days of rain, nope! This is probably why the residence have umbrellas that they carry around with them and respect with their lives, like a samurai treats their sword.

I couldn't find any photos of real Samurai from back-in-the-day (cellinifinegifts.com)

When I found a store that's likely to sell a waterproof, you have to look for it on your own, you're screwed if you ask for any assistance.

"Hi, I'm looking for a waterproof jacket"
"A what?"
"A jacket... That's a water... Stopper"
"Oh, you mean a shell..."
 -  Do I? I appear to be shopping for turtles, all of a sudden.
"If its a water stopper, I can wear, it probably is what I'm after, yes"
 -  I shrug, doubting my very reason why I want to be dry in the first place.

 -   Which is met with one of two replies.
"Sorry, we don't sell those"
"But,  you're a sports/running/clothing store"
"Yeah, but its summer"
 -  I then apologise for getting it wrong, leaving a puddle of water around where we shared this conversation.

 -  The other reply "Yes!..." Winds up following the shop assistant to some remote back-end of the store, through a booby-trapped hedged maze, until you're presented with a rack, with an item of cloth on it.
"...This is what we have, but they aren't waterproof, they're just shiny-like-a-waterproof"
"That's brilliant, just what I'm after. Thank you very much"
 -  I wait for her to disappear before making my exit

Though, not before I pirouette and grand jeté out the door (via redbubble.com)

I eventually find one in the end without any help. I was extremely close to paying a deaf homeless person $50 for it, but least he would've understood what I wanted.

In Canada, Just | 6th July 2011 | 21:31 PDT

After an incredibly clear picturesque flight over America, where I could see for miles, we drift over amazing scenery such as, Mount St. Helen and the islands in-and-around Seattle and as we swoop into Vancouver, I look upon mountains and Downtown in wonder.

Must. Fight. Overwhelming Urge. To. Pop It

Yet, here I am, sitting here, in an extra set of customs checks and waiting to be cleared in a very unwelcoming grey room with fellow immigrants looking to weasel their way in.

I'm thinking to myself, what am I doing here, not in this customs hall but Canada or more specifically as Canada is pretty big, Vancouver - what the hell am I going to do with my time, I've nothing to accomplish whilst I'm here, nothing to aim for, just seems like a pleasant place to spend some time, so that's what I'm doing.

I don't know much about Vancouver either, I do know that:
 -  It's known as North Hollywood because its cheaper on-location filming and it's meant to sort of look like New York.
 -  52% of locals don't speak English as their mother tongue.
 -  30% of the city's population are of Chinese heritage.
 -  There are two seasons: Wet and Damp
 -  Good reviews say its great, outdoors, clean city.
 -   Bad reviews say its awful, expensive and if you take away the buildings, trees etc. It's full of miserable people. This makes sense as wet people are seldom happy.
 -  Constantly regarded highly as most liveable city in the world.

Cheer up, it might never happen (via melbourneinphotos.com)

My knowledge of Canada/British Columbia isn't much better:
Before the boundaries of North America were set in stone around the 1800s, British Columbia used to be called Oregon County and stretched up from the top edge of the California (then, Mexico) all the way north in more or less a vertical line up, which both Britain and America staked a claim. Britain wanted Canada's country line to be horizontal from top of California all the way across. America disagreed and placed the line at the base of the state of Alaska. America had 2 wars  going on at the time and didn't want a third so a compromise was found.

Probably easier to understand (via wikipedia.org)

I'm still waiting in this grey room, no Canadian can believe I'm spending 3 months here, just for the sake of it. After a few grilling questions about me and my bizarre reasons to be here, and a long painful wait totalling a time longer than my flight here, I'm allowed through into the open expanse of... Canada!

Good Evening Vancouver!

Allo there!