Houses of EastVanLand

There is a seemingly endless collection of interesting and strange houses in East Vancouver - far from the manicured lawns of Shaughnessy, the glassy condos of Downtown and the trendy houses of Kits, East Van is one of those places where citizens seem to let it all hang out - and in some very creative ways.



Do you have an eclectic East Van house? Do you have a picture of one in your area? Email them to us and we'll post them as part of our regular feature, Homes of EastVanLand.

The Bamboo: (Watering Holes of East Van Series)

I moved into East Vancouver almost this time last year. I can't believe it will be so soon that I've finally stayed in one apartment for longer than a year! This is a record I haven't broken in 7 years!

I was excited to move into "the city" (from North Burnaby) when my new "first job out of grad school" position mandated I get closer to work so I didn't spend 3 hours on transit each day. As a child of a Metro Vancouver suburb, New Westminster, I'd always seen Vancouver as this high-fashion, fast-paced den of crime and chaos. Oh, and of course, gorgeous mountain views.

In the roughly 9 years since I moved out of my parents' home, I've lived in 11 separate places, none of them in Vancouver. I never had a reason to. I was comfortable in Surrey, Maillardville (Coquitlam), and North Burnaby because I had built-in communities of friends and church family there. There was no real transition for me as I went from roommates with one friend to the tenant of another (though some might suggest that the fact that I never stayed in any of these places more than a year might mean that things were less smooth than I portray).

I guess I was just ready for a change. I admired my friend (a href="http://www.runismymantra.blogspot.com">S&P's home, so close to Starbucks and a green grocer - even better, close to Donalds, the favourite market of the East Van Intellectual. I had already begun my transition from vehicle to public transit, and my mindset from mass market to local food. The solution was Vancouver, but no apartments were to be had in the much-sought-after Commercial Drive area, where the homes are largely old with many stairs, and the apartments are dives or very expensive. I searched for more than a month, finally finding a place by accident in a predominantly Asian and Italian neighbourhood of Renfrew/Collingwood. At the time, I was disappointed to not be closer to the "action," but I truly love my place and my neighbourhood now.

One of my gripes about the area when I first moved in was that there were no decent gathering places for anyone under 65. The Renfrew Community Centre boasted a pool, microscopic weight room, and tai chi classes, with a library upstairs and a senior's centre across the street. More Tai Chi takes place just 8 blocks away at Renfrew Park, where I can see the seniors gathering every morning on the baseball diamond to go through their motions together.

The closest thing to a "gathering place"

Transit Tuesdays

In what I hope is the first of a regular series on this blog, here's what I saw on transit this week.

Does anyone find this even just a little bit ironic?



(As seen at the Joyce Street Skytrain Station)

Trout Lake Farmers Markets

There was a great article in this weekend's Vancouver Sun about the proliferation of today's farmer's markets and their role in sustainable agriculture and foodculture.

For some, farming has suddenly become cool and the small-scale farmer is something of a local hero.

And with good reason. Small-scale local farming provides an alternative to food trucked, flown, or shipped from massive farms, travelling for thousands of miles to reach your table. That's tired food, grown in depleted soil and bred to last a long time and look good.

Zaya and Dick, proprietors of Ice Cap Organics, are newbies in their first year of farming mixed vegetables on leased land. They couldn't do it without farmers' markets. They sell at the Kitsilano and West End markets. "They're our main point of interaction with customers," says Zaya. "Before, it would have been unfeasible."

...

"The primary goal is to still keep the connection between the consumer and producer," she says. "We only carry products from our regular farmers' market and if people want to meet the farmer, they can do it at the main site."

On the weekend before I wrote this, my partner and I began our Saturday morning with delicious crepes at the Trout Lake market -- so delicious, in fact, we went back for seconds. We bought strawberries, greens, biodynamic eggs, some plants and delicious apricot/walnut sourdough bread. Visits to markets are not a chore; somehow the city shrinks down to this little village in a parking lot and you feel a connection to the earth through these farmers.
(Mia Stainsby, Vancouver Sun, June 20, 2009)

I couldn't agree more - the Farmers Markets are creating community where so little previously existed. I didn't even know Trout Lake existed in its little grotto between victoria drive, grandview highway and Nanaimo, and it is the indisputable town centre for EastVan. Stainsby's article reminded me of the pictures I took at the summer's first Farmers Market at Trout Lake:



Don't forget to visit a Farmers Market near you! The Trout Lake market is one of the largest, and takes place from May to October in the parking lot of the Trout Lake Community Centre (off Victoria Drive), Saturdays, 9-2pm. Check out the full list of Vancouver Farmer's Markets at Your Local Farmers Market Society.

Maiden Voyage

So, drawing on the success of blog project TenthtotheFraser, a "hyperlocal" blog about New Westminster's people and places, I figure I'd find a place for my thoughts about the neighbourhood I actually live in.

I've been blogging occasionally on T2F since its inception in Fall of 08, and it's fantastic to be a part of something that seems to be growing into a hub of community information and connection for a suburban town with history, growth and a vibrant community. It's hard, though, to come up with articles to write about the town I grew up in and still see as my "hometown" - when I live in an eclectic outer neighbourhood of the province's biggest city, Vancouver.

Hence - EastVanLand... an eclectic state of mind. I hope you'll join me in this - contribute articles, pictures, thoughts, feedback, and above all, comments, comments, comments!