East Hastings

I wanted to walk around in Chinatown, and the night market, advertised as the first of its kind in North America, and I imagined it to be like Beijing's famed Wangfujing Night Market. And part of me also wanted to re-create the magic of the China trip I took with my brother. Sort of like sometimes I like to recreate the magic of the San Fransisco visit I made when my sister lived there. I took no trips with my sister since, and a couple with my brother, but those two trips still hit a sweet spot in my memory. Anyway when I actually went to the Vancouver Chinatown night market, around 6 or 7, it really disappointed, even when I expected much less than Wangfujing. But it was ok, there was some street food, not nearly as exotic as in Wangfujing, but hey... And some band playing...

Chinatown itself was so desolate: most stores closed: and had a haunting calm about it, like everyone had gone indoors, just before the storm hit. There were several grocery stores open though, and as I passed by, someone would pop their head out and ask me if I needed help. I was just looking, mostly inhaling the pungent smells of the dried seafood, partly because it also reminded me of some grocery/mom & pop stores in Sri Lanka, where dried fish was an essential; a smell pungent enough for me to not want to have it in my home, but to want to inhale, as I passed them in a store in Chinatown.

Earlier, I had stumbled upon a fire-truck exhibit in Gastown, and stopped by to take some mundane photos. The fire-trucks were pretty cool though, with tiny pistons and all the hydraulics showing, in those ancient trucks.

Then I stumbled upon a yard sale, at the border of Gastown and East Hastings, but still within the rich portals of Gastown. So I thought, yey, the rich people are selling their old stuff, maybe I can cut a deal or two - I am looking for a couple nice lamps for my apartment. As I walked around looking at the things spread out on the floor, I realized these were mostly things scraped from lower middle class homes, some maybe even lower - things that people might have put in the garbage, and other people had gone and retrieved. They were not dirty or anything like that, sort of like things you would find in a standard Salvation Army (in North America, as one my French-from-France friends and I observed once, things don't have to be super run down for people to just dump them).

One of the sellers, a woman about my height and my age but way more athletic, in shorts, a full length sports bra-top and running shoes, invited me to take a look at her things - a tiny black dress, a bra even... she would put it against her body and say - "see it is beautiful, not many people would fit into this, I can so see you in this". I said "well I am not really looking for anything and that is too fancy anyway" - she said "yeah clothes are hard, most people are looking for electronics etc". "Are you a professional photographer?", and this question really threw me off - 4 years ago, this camera would have prompted that question, but these days everyone has this camera, and I even had just the 18-55mmm lens, which is really very common (even with all this talk about the economy being so low, people seem to have a lot of money, even people who have no idea how to compose and frame a shot are buying this $1000 camera as their first, because people are always lost between what they need and what they want). I said I wasn't and she asked me what I did for a living and after having said what, and having asked her what she did, she replied "I am an advocate... you know... I deal with the people here... you know... it is not just homeless people... you know... you know what I mean...?" in a very not-articulate-enough for an advocate sort of way. "I live here" she said, waving at the huge building nearby, which wasn't Gastown rich, but rich enough still. I told her one day I want to do a photo project of this area and I am glad she told me this and hopefully I will see her again. "Oh yeah, we do this every Sunday... you know..." she said as she hopped from one foot to the other.

I was taking pictures of people's stuff, a magazine with Trudeau's picture, most floor-spreads manned by Native American looking people. "Hey camera girl!" - I turned around to find this guy with a huge Rubbermaid box around his neck - "take my picture" he made a face... I snapped several. "What's your name?" "Tinhead. I am from Montréal, that's what English Canada calls us" he said with a perfect English (as in non-French, not British) accent. "Ah! so you speak French?" "No no... my language part of the brain is not that good" - I thought it was funny an Anglophone in Montréal would differentiate himself from English Canada like that (pleasantly funny). "So what do you do?". I told him I am a physicist - it is always hard for me to say this without sounding pompous, but if I am going to do a project here, I will have to start off with an honest foot. "Are you studying particles, like that big thing in Europe that is smashing particles?". "I went to McGill, studied philosophy" he continued. And he continued to tell me little Science tidbits - trying so very hard to impress me - 'look I am not a stupid homeless guy... I know stuff...'; I was actually impressed, he didn't always have it right, but he knew more than some people I know who have all the time and access to this information. He would go on to ask me where I was before etc, and each time I told him, he would say "far oot eh?", even when he asked if I know TRIUMF, and I said, "yeah I work there", he said "far oot, eh?" - so it wasn't really a reference to 'far out', more like his way of saying 'is that so?'. I was having my, as usual loud laughter, and several people stopped to check out the unusual combination of the two of us, not knowing if they should interfere, since it looks like this homeless guy is harassing this poor little girl. And he kept looking around in fear every now and then, like a little puppy who has been beaten many a time for foraging through other people's trash: "I am just afraid your boyfriend might show up and beat me up". "No no don't worry, he is really not like that", I said, in the hope of calming him but also in the hope of being cautious - I might have even said 'he's home working today'. He gave me his real name and his address in some motel and the room number, "if you don't come it is your business" he said. I took them and said, "oh I am sure I will run into you here again". "There are all these girls who are raped and abused, who come to me... I give them a good night's sleep, never touch them" he assured me and continued to tell me some rape/abuse stories. After hearing them all, it instantly dawned on me, if I am going to do this photo project, it will not be easy - it will be so stressful hearing these stories - I might have to actually spread it over a few weekends, finding refuge in physics, during the week.

I also remembered someone talking about this documentary about East Hastings, and mentioned this total drug addict, who was apparently from a rich home in England, she even had a horse growing up apparently. Now maybe these stories are true, but if I were them, I would have certainly made up stories as such, of going to McGill, of being an advocat. So my logical-don't-you-try-to-trick-me brain will have to be held back too if these projects are going to happen.

Later I passed by Insite, the supervised drug injection site, a pilot project, the first of its kind in North America. It was just a nondescript building, its name not written, looked like a regular shop but with no obvious products to be sold - like maybe a travel office or something, but without the banners and advertisements. There were several people standing outside and inside.

So you always see people doing insanely stupid things, right? and you think 'oh c'mon, are you stupid or are you just an insensitive jerk?". And that is what I asked myself: my hands automatically raised my camera to my eye and snapped a photo of Insite, as my brain was still trying to decide if this was a good idea or not. A woman yelled "wait, did you just take a picture of me?" "errr... yes..." ok now my brain has decided it was a bad bad idea... I immediately apologized and erased the picture, I said I just wanted a picture of the building, but yes she was in the picture and I am erasing it. She calmed down later. Some other guy passed by threatening "you better listen to this lady, this is not a place to photograph people" - I apologized again. The woman later approached me and said how she is much better now, and during her high on heroin days she was way more psychotic than this. "Are you an under-cover cop?" she asked half jokingly. "No no... I just wanted to take some pictures". She thanked me for being 'so friendly' about it all.

I was so shocked at my own naiive and insensitive behaviour, when I later went into Chinatown's night market, I ordered pork dumplings when I wanted pork steamed buns and when the guy gave me the dumplings asked 'are these dumplings?', because in my confused mind, I was saying dumplings but meaning steamed buns. In life, the wrong you yourself do, is way harder to forgive, than those that others do... You are the hardest person to please...