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Sometime during our week in Vancouver my best friend remembered one person's critique of our small city: "Edmonton is small fish in a small bowl." Now that I'm back home I'll have to agree.

Everything is bigger, brighter, smellier, and more animated in Vancouver. The panhandlers wear signs that say "I need money for weed." The crazier ones shout to a night time audience "Kick me in the ass for four dollars." And some have beautiful cats.

On a boring day we would end up in English Bay where we would watch the rich meet the poor or the young meet the old or the sober meet the drunk. It was an eclectic mix of all human beings enjoying the warm weather. One day while we lounged on the grass we watched a young man trip out on some sort of hallucinogenic drug. He was alone on a bench facing the ocean and completely in his own mind. Who knows what he was seeing, but the big smile and the hearty chuckle he let loose made me think it was spectacular. I've never wanted to chemically alter my state as badly as I wanted to at that moment.

At night we would sometimes sit on our hostel's window ledge and watch the action on the street. Once we watched a fist fight. Another time a pregnant lady yelled "I'm going to kick you in the face Jason." On other nights we would giggle in our bunk beds with our door open hoping other travellers would feel welcomed into our dorm room. Our only visitor was Charlie Skidmore -- the surfer from Long Beach. He smoked a cigarette on our window's ledge and finished our bottle of Butter Ripple snappes. He entertained me for twenty minutes then he left.

I didn't have to work and I didn't have to worry. Everything was taken care of. I was completely unaware of the world around me and its current events. There could have been a huge massive blackout and I wouldn't have known (Hee). There are so many stories. Eventually I will write about the fabulous concert we attended, the gothic bar, which included tears and revelations, and the mouse in our hostel.

posted 2003-08-20