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Vancouver: Gems.

Monday, October 20, 2014

I just came back from being in Vancouver for a little over 2.5 weeks.
I had such a good time. I can't tell you enough how good it was.

Seeing this reminded me that oh yah, Vancouver likes to have some weird and slightly amusing highly manicured plants. And it's funny because this was also the first thing I noticed when I first came to Van back in 2005.

The easiest way to describe why my visit was great was that it was a novelty coming back. Things were familiar and new at the same time and there was just enough time to feel only this. Rain was refreshing instead of being a reminder that it was the start of a season that would last for what seemed like an endless amount of months. Grey skies were pleasant to wake up to (for the past year I have been sweating from just...existing). Riding around on bus and just watching everything and everyone instead of fiddling around on my phone because I had taken this way so many times before. Walking routes I used to take and seeing what has changed and been replaced or remained the same.


Got to stay with Jane for a bit and have some good hangs with her and her endlessly loveable cat Dig Dug.

This used to be an ordinary sight to me. But there were many moments this year where I dreamed about this place and eating piles of this stuff...which I proceeded to do when I got the chance.

I forgot about areas. Places I walked several times but completely didn't remember until I returned. This is one of them, I loved this spot, it's lined with gardens (some bursting with vegetables and flowers) and if I ever felt shitty I would just walk along it to help me feel better. Or it was just a nice way to break from walking along houses and feeling like you were somewhere completely different.

Herein begins my unintended photoshoot with Jane haha:






Aw.

Happy cookies.



Some pretty dumpling shapes.

Jane, Megan and I were walking and all of the sudden started picking up acorns from the ground and got really into it. By the time we got home, a lot of them had fallen apart.

Oh look another picture of Dig Dug :)

Had so much delicious food. So many meals with friends. Thank you again to everyone who ate with me, it was really nice and I had such a good time spending time with you guys and hearing about what's been happening with your lives.

It was also nice to be able to cook meals. Hearty, cozy, and overindulgent ones. Like roast chicken. Risotto. Mussels. When I am travelling, even though I live in places for somewhat long stretches at a time, cooking is just not the same. Especially in a tropical climate. The kind of cooking that I really love is the ones where the dishes take awhile (haha and create steam and heat), where it's an excuse to hang out inside and take your time and watch lots of tv or a movie while things cook. Basically lazy delicious cooking.


Last meal.


I got to do all the things that I love and forgot that I loved. Before coming to Vancouver, I was feeling either slightly ambivalent or kind of scared. Because it brought up questions of what I was doing with my life, that one day I will have to come back and set more solid roots (either there or at least somewhere), basically just making me confront life and making some choices I don't want to and am not quite ready to make. And even though it was a brief amount of time that you only really experience the best and exciting parts of being in a familiar city - it reminded me of what people always say when you leave a place - you can always come back.