is the tenderloin really in vancouver?

mom and i arrived in vancouver last night. our flight was delayed so we didn’t get here untill 8:40. we hopped in a cab, and our cab driver said he knew where our hotel was so, we didn’t pay much attention… as we are driving down the street that our hotel is on, we see this xxx bookstore and rainbow flags. i asked if this was the “gay” part of town. the cab driver said yes, and said but things are nicer as you get closer to the water. he then took us to a hotel that wasn’t ours. hmm. we said, not the “sands” but the “sandman”.

we turned around, went back up the street to the “sandman”, which is right across the street from the xxx book store. aren’t we lucky. wait, i’m not going to get lucky with my mom in the room, so i guess i’m not lucky.

today we decided to start off with the traditional chinese gardens in china town. they were lovely. we had this very animated, very controling tour guide. she only started each “story” when she had everyones attention, and they were standing exactally where she wanted them to.

after the tour mom and i decided that we wanted lunch. we went to the gift shop and bought these uber cool bracelets made of majong tiles, and asked for recommendations. now, i know mom hates chinese food, so there really wasn’t a reason to ask, but we did. we left the gardens with two restaurants to choose from.

mom said, well what should we do now? i said, the gaslight district isn’t that far away… lets go there. she said fine. so we start walking. as we go, the people are getting weirder and weirder. i’m thinking god, people must be on drugs or something. we get to this street corner and two guys are arguing about a rock. i’m thinking, in my naive little brain, why are the arguing about rocks? then… it happens. a cute, very in-shape guy walks up to this guy that is standing against the brick wall and says, “i want to buy a $10 rock”. yes, i have witnessed my very first drug purchase. and the rocker wasn’t even involved.

mom and i got to the gaslight district, unscathed where we found a place to eat, with a free jazz concert in the street in front of the restaurant. it was greek food, very nice, and cute waiter. can’t really lose.

it was in the gaslight district that we saw a sign for the red elvises. i said, the red elvises! i’d love to see the red elvises. they were playing tonight! wow! how lucky can we be! mom and i decided that even with the lateness of the event (around 11:00pm), we would go! yeah me!

so we had dinner at capones, and listened to wes “bluesman” mackey’s one man show. he played bass with his feet. that was kinda neat. he has a lovely voice. dinner was really yummy. i had a cannoli that was made of pasta with chicken sausage (i know i’m not eating chicken, but it sounded good), spinach and ricotta cheese. it was so tasty. then we asked how to get to the venue where the red elvises should be playing. we said we wanted to walk. the guy said, well, this is how you want to go, but you should take a cab.

mom and i decided to walk. we walked through yaletown. it is very yuppy, urban, a place i could live no problem. as we got closer to our destination, things got a bit, oh i don’t know, dark. we walked close to this couple with a cute pug, then, a strung-out guy decided to start following us. that got me spooked. i found a cab and hailed it. i tucked mom into the cab, and we found that we were a block from our destination… and there were prostitutes out in front of the area we thought we were going.

needless to say, i’m here at the hotel… i’m not at the red elvises. all i can say is, i think mom and i have seen the very worst of vancouver our first day. lets hope things are a bit more “pleasant” tomorrow. ok, well in the surroundings issue anyway. ’cause even with the weirdness we are having a good time. neither of us are letting our illnesses get the best of us.