Not really. But I’ve been listening to Neutral Milk Hotel a lot lately, and it just sort of typed itself. I had been trying to make some kind of “In the Aeroplane Over the Sea” reference but I was unsuccessful.
So I’m here, and have been for a couple days now, and will be for a couple more. It’s been a lot of fun, and I’ve got lots of photos to share, some of which have already gone up on Facebook, some of which will go up at a later date, and some of which I’ve been told must never see the light of day. So there’s that.
We flew out of JFK at 10:40PM, on a Cathay Pacific flight that would eventually end up in Hong Kong, but which dropped us off at YVR after a smooth 6-ish hour flight, before continuing on for another 13 hours. Given the cranky baby to tired parent ratio, I’m glad I was only going to Canada. Customs was quick, though confusing…
“Why are you entering Canada?”
“I’m visiting some friends.”
“Why are you entering Canada?”
“… I’m on vacation?”
“Go ahead.”
I can’t wait to compare the process to customs at JFK when I fly home…
The first day was mostly sightseeing, one of the sights being the 4/20 rally downtown, which was still fun even though I don’t partake. A temporary market and political event run entirely by people who are high is pretty hilarious. They had planned to “send a smoke signal” to the government at 4:20PM and would pass out joints to anyone in the crowd who didn’t have one, but they took so long getting the process organized and started that they didn’t actually start handing anything out until about 4:35. The crowd acted on their own initiative, however, and sent the signal on schedule. Vancouver police directed traffic on adjacent streets and kept an eye on things but otherwise didn’t get involved. I was asked if this kind of thing ever happens in New York City, to which I simply replied that the NYPD is not as enlightened as it’s northwestern counterpart.
We had some delicious sushi on Commercial, then headed back to the house to relax and chat, and eventually watched an episode of Madventures, a Finnish travel program that seemed to be a distant relative of Jackass. We saw the two men explore the exclusion zone around Chernobyl, have leech therapy in St. Petersburg, then bungee jump off a building, and have drinks with ex Russian mob enforcers. An interesting show, to say the least.
Data roaming rates are insane, so I’m going to cut this short. More to come when it won’t cost me 15 bucks a megabyte.