This is a reanimation of the Vicaribus blog as lived by Miro Kazakoff and Ehren Foss in 2004 and 2005. The photos may be spotty.

More Walking Around and Stuff

Posted by ehren

It turned out to be a fantastic idea to ditch the bus for a night and stay in a hostel. Assuming, of course, that the bus has not yet been towed. I returned at 6 or so for their organized "Beer and Bowling" night out, and for a while it was looking somewhat dicey: Myself, a grim looking dude who turned out to be THE information technology professional from Whitehorse, Yukon, and another guy (Adam, a former surveyor on the Heathrow Terminal 5 project) who turned out to be pretty cool. Then at the last minute about ten other people showed up: Michelle and Allison from Scotland, Stephano from Italy, Charla from London, two Germans (Sana and...), Ozzies Jane and Claire, and a few others I didn't manage to meet. Note, this is probably my most impressive display of remembering names in at least a year.

The bowling was a strange version of candlepin: 5 pins, different point values, 3 rolls per frame, standard strike and spare rules apply. Or, maybe that's regular candlepin and I'm misremembering how it went in Boston. In any case, I bowled abysmally until the second game when I knocked down 5 strikes. The bowling, though, was secondary to talking to everybody about their travels. On average, these folks were committed to 6 months or more, some almost ready to go home, some just getting here, some floating around on a year-long work visa. Stephano's english was iffy, but I managed to teach him scorekeeping ("Mark it eight, Dude."), and I have mostly no idea what the Scots and I talked about. A snippet:

"Diz yeah boos ev a hob?"
"A what?"
"A hob. Ya noo, for cookin' beans an sootch."
"A stove?"
"Yeh."

We bowled two games, and then there was a general movement back to the hostel's pub, where we all drank too much until around 1, when I stumbled back to sleep. My two Swiss roommates were already efficiently asleep.

On the topic of employment, I haven't completely written off the idea of full-time freelancing. I know there are a dozen or so major sites that cater to the industry, but I've never sought work through them. Luckily, all my contracts have been through friends and coworkers. Anybody reading this have any advice, eh? Life on the road is substantially cheaper than urban rent/expenses, so the big question is whether or not I could expand my operations quickly enough to cover that change.

This morning I woke up at 8, snagged a light breakfast at the hostel, took care of this and that online for an hour or two, met up with Miro. Turns out the bus will be quite full this evening! Over bowling last night Michelle and Alison, and Charlie, and Adam each expressed interest in getting a ride to Jasper. With Miro's three that brings the total (including us) to 9, which will be a new record for in-motion occupants. I don't expect to challenge Raj's party count of 25+ anytime soon, but given how things are going, who knows.

I attempted to walk to Granville Island (not really an island) but that turned out to be a mistake, as the bridge flies high overland about a half mile inland before pedestrians are allowed to exit, so then I had to backtrack most of the bridge length. I ate my second meal of supercheap sushi (mmm... risk of food poisoning) and then walked around the Granville area. I liked the bent of it, half semi-indoor food market, two thirds artist galleries and studios (I kept discovering more alleys). If you look in the pictures you'll see a set of this awesome powder-blue street performer charming the living daylights out of a tourist. The best gallery (looked like Rube Goldberg, inc) was closed.

After that I took the mini-ferry 200 feet across the waterway for $2.50 instead of walking a half hour back around, and toured the Yaletown area. On a lark I walked into the Mini Cooper dealership and almost talked myself into a test drive. If we were slated to hit another urban area on the trip with a day or two to kill (we're not) I'd seriously consider signing myself up for a BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Porsche, and, what the hell, a Hummer test drive. I'll never buy any of those cars (new), but wouldn't it be fun to pretend... and relive the days of valet-dom.

I think I've seen enough of Vancouver. It's said to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world, but I'm sure that comment was made in 1994 during the last clear day. Every big city has a few hip, trendy, moneyed areas to walk around in, but they're all more or less the same. I'm glad it's time a gain for mountains.

One more anecdote: I was walking down the street yesterday and a drainbow/homeless guy asked me "Blah blah blah, blah?" with the tone and rhythm of "spare some change, brother?" and without missing a beat I responded "Blah, blahblah, blah blah blah." We both smiled but I didn't give him anything.