Tajine

Williams Sonoma is selling this fancy schmancy tajine... Reminded me of one of my friends, whose mom proudly talked about this tajine that she got all the way from la Françe - it is one of the best ones she said, a cast iron one... I really had to fight myself from reminding her that a tajine is in fact a Tunisian or Moroccan dish/vessel and not a French one and that it should be made of clay, to impart the proper taste!! When I actually saw her tajine, it was in fact much worse than I had imagined... Kind of like this one... I bet this Williams Sonoma tajine also sells for $100-200 at least.If you buy a real tajine from a real Moroccan shop for $25, how can you show off to poor postdocs though, right?

Fifth Avenue Cinemas

Fifth Avenue Cinemas - look at that external ticket booth - but they just maintain that - they have those ticket machines inside... Not as quaint and cozy as Cinéma Beubien, but quite nice actually...

Biutiful was good, but Incendies was more powerful... and coherent too... I guess I ama little tired of all the incoherent talk of my landlord last night...

Hippies Renounced!

Oh my god.... I officially renounce hippies!!! In retrospect I think the landlord was stoned... but since I didn’t smell it, I am thinking maybe he was on crack... He was also super edgy which makes me think so... but at that time I didn’t realize that so I was just sitting and listening to his hysteria, not knowing if I should get up and go... A lot of woodoo science stories, yep, about that guy who thought good thoughts and made water crystalize in beautiful patterns and the physicist who explained this phenomenon using quantum mechanics... I remember seeing this in “What the bleep do we know” and being outraged... So when I went home I looked this so called physicist up - sure he was at Stanford at some point, but he hasn’t published anything since the 1970’s, anything physics that is... Who said physicists can’t go bananas...

Am I going to Japan for this guys conference? “Hell no!” I said... I was being pretty polite, until then, but that really broke me I think...

At one point I was also told that my short-sightedness is purely a condition in my head!!!!! That we both should start practicing to go eye-glass free!!!!

Granville Island Public Market 3

The strawberry picture, with my hand placed next to the strawberries, at the same depth of field (no optical illusion here), will not be a reason I will like this market....

Granville Island Public Market 2

So then, that was the first time I felt like I liked Vancouver - previously the best I had felt is that maybe I can learn to like this place...

Granville Island Public Market 1

Went to Granville Island Public Market today, with my cynical goggles on - I mean it can not possibly be better than Marché Jean-Talon, right? Wrong, it turned out.

The island, upon entrance, reminded me of Îles-de-la-Madeleine - so obviously I was in love already. Yeah it is also touristy, but well, so is Îles-de-la-Madeleine... There was this street performer, yep, those that make me stop and gape in wonderment. He was doing one of those chain-me-and-I’ll-unchain-myself trick which is also cool, but what gets me most is their wit... And as fate had it, one of the audiences that he called upon, happened to be a Montréaler... So here I am already crying... And I walk into the market itself... whoa... I immediately noticed the fresh fish selection much much better than in Montréal, obviously, and the pasta and chacuterie almost as good as or better than ours, not so obviously... The Vancouverite who sat next to me in the plane on my way here said at some point “the food is better in Vancouver, than Montréal”, to which I gasped, “really????”, sensing I must be offended, he immediately said “well just a notch”, to which I thought “pfft..”. I am having second thoughts about the “pffft...” now... The chesee I think Montréal might win - I have mentioned before that Montréal has excellent cheese?

Stunning views of downtown, and rich yachts on False Creek (so called because it is really not a creek, but an extension of the ocean itself)... Me thinks me is sold...

Oh also they had a big sign for a fisherman’s wharf.... mmm mmmmm... I can nit wait t get my own place...

Semi trip

took a half hour ride in a 40-foot long trailer, with a dog... and a man (a Quebecois man may I add, who spoke with a non-urban Quebecois accent, which most of my Montréaler friends do not have... but since I would hear it like 25% of the time when I was there, it made for a nostalgic trip down memory lane...) Also my first half hour of French conversation in two weeks...