Trip planning

I think the cloud finally is lifting. Details for this trip have been
somewhat hellish, especilly in terms of finding housing in certain major
cities, and then I've had this black hole of a week to fill July 7-15.
Plans have changed so many times...and then I realized that I'm still
trying to figure out what I want. It's amazing how much stuff you have
to read to get a sense of what you want. But I think it's starting to
come together. I'm just gong to go wander the Benelux countries. I'll
figure it out later.

Okay, I thought this was funny....

I'm standing in line with my friend to register her for an academic
conference on natural resources. I overhear this:

"So, you're at the University of Alaska, huh?"
"Yep."
"What are you studying?"
"Deer."

Neither reacted, neither thought this was strange, as if studying deer
as an academic subject was the most natural thing in the world. Okay, I
thought this was terribly funny. Truly a whole other world.

Mt. Seymour pics

Jackie consulting the guidebook:


Nadine flamanco dancing:


View from Mt. Seymour:


Mt. Seymour shennanigans. It's amazing how a little snow brings out the kid in you. Chris and Corinna literally romped and frolicked through the snow. There was a lot of snowball action. And here's Sara and Jackie wrestling. At one point they also managed to ambush me, pin me down and throw snow down the back of my shirt. That last part I found to be a bit excessive. Ah...the love. =)


Me and Nadine near the top:

Nadine's visit

My friend Nadine's in town, and I've been having a fun time showing her Vancouver and surroundings.  I know Nadine from high school...I want to say we met through Laura....she was Laura's soccer and band friend, and ended up having a ton of classes with her.  It's been very cool to still be in touch.  The last time I saw her, I think was two or three years ago, when we shared a LIRR train ride to the City (uh, that's New York City, not San Francisco---you Bay Area folks).  We both remember because for a commuter train, it was strangely crowded, and the lady six inches away seemed greatly entertained by our conversation.  Nadine looks the same, but we both seem a little bit wiser and more confident.   Anyway, I've been showing her around, or rather I've been tagging us both along to various events planned by other people namely Jackie and Sara.  Thank you, Jackie and Sara.  

So, first we went on a Jackie-organized hike.  Nadine is the outdoorsy type, so I knew she would like to hike.   What Jackie neglected to tell us was that we would be hiking Mt. Seymour and that it would be completely snowy.  To be fair, I suppose she didn't quite realize that herself since she wore sandals and thick socks.  Anyway, it was gorgeous in that surreal sort of way...snow in June!  And it was completely uphill....I have to confess I was a bit whiny....trudging uphill in snow and having your feet either (1) slide all over the place or (2) sink six inches down wasn't exactly my cup of tea.  But it was well-worth it, and a much shorter hike than I anticipated!  The view was amazing, and the best part was sliding down the mountain on your butt.  Very, very fun.  Jackie's got a decent picture of this on her blog.  I think Nadine enjoyed herself a lot.  She really got a kick out of seeing snow in June.

Then we came back and I---all by myself---decided that to get a real sense of Vancouver, we needed to do something Asian.  I have been wanting to check out the Chinatown Night Market for a while, so we did that.  Honestly, it's really quite disappointing, and the Richmond one is better...bigger, better food....but I don't know.  Nadine was fine, but I had this weird unexpected feeling of culture shock.  I think I'm just used to night markets in Asia---the perfect example of the Chinese value for re nao,  the crowds, the energy, the noise and all that....and this was not exactly that.  I mean, it was crowded, but the food was not so good, and it wasn't even dark out.  I don't know.  We ended busing to Robson street where we ate a disappointing crepe.  Not a good food night, but oh well.

Today, we slept in and in lieu of church had a conversation about Christianity and Judaism.  Then we went off to the Sara-planned activity---Indian food.  That was pretty good, and we both got into some interesting conversations...Nadine about kosher food laws, novels and character development, and I talked lots to Stephanie who wanted to hear a bit about my heart for the church.   We then wandered to Granville Island, which was very fun.  The highlight was the puppet store and playing with all these crazy puppets.  Very, very fun. 

Anyway, Nadine is now with her environmental friends at the UBC campus.  She's here for a conference on Natural Resources, and she's delivering a paper on soybeans in Brazil and how that effects US policy.   She'll be here with me until Tuesday.