More Fun for Olympics in Vancouver!

Only one and a half days in downtown during Winter Olympics was definitely not enough. So I went back on Feb 26. To maximize my activities there, I got up at 5:05 am, left home at 5:45 am and took Canada Line from Brighouse Station at 6 am. I’ve never taken public transit that early in Vancouver. There were lots of passengers and the train was getting full quickly! I was a bit sleepy, hopefully I didn’t look like a panda (with 2 big dark circles)! What waked me up in Canada Line were the colourful uniforms: sky blue volunteer jackets, red CTV Olympic jackets and jackets with big “CANADA” sign! Oops … mine was very casual but I have a grey-coloured Olympic hat.

upper and lower photos - Olympic volunteer jackets. Free for the volunteers, now selling $150 to $200 each on eBay!

First stop for sure was Royal Canadians Mint, I really wanted to see the medals!!! I met my boyfriend there and we were in line just before 7 am. It was a drizzly morning so we had to stand in the rain for 3 hours. I think we were the first 130 in line and by 7:30 the line was very long already, at least more than 200. I was getting excited when we were very close to the entrance (only a couple in front of us), oh no … suddenly a group of 7 including 2 adults 5 kids cut the line!!! I thought only Asians like to do that but this family was Caucasian. Didn’t they feel embarrassed? Even more ridiculous was the Royal Mint staff didn’t say anything to them!

It was almost 10:20 am by the time we got in the room of medals for 2010 Winter Games where they would give out a short presentation, allow each visitor to take a picture with the medal, and provide information how the medals were made. Some interesting facts I learnt from there:

• Each gold and silver medal contains 92.5% silver and 7.5% copper
• 6 grams of gold are plated over the base of silver to make each gold medal
• The medals are among the heaviest in Games history at 500 to 576 grams each
• 615 medals produced for Olympic Winter Games athletes
• 399 medals produced for Paralympic Winter Games athletes
• The patterns of the medals were based on two large master artworks
• Orca design for Olympic medals
• Raven design for Paralympic medals
• The pattern on the medals are unique, no two medals are alike

Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Gold Medal

Vancouver 2010 Winter Paralympic Gold Medal

Orca design for Olympic medals

Raven design for Paralympic medals

draft of Olympic medal for short track speed skating men's 5000M relay

draft of Paralympic medal for biathlon women's 10km individual

After the medals, we went directly to the line for holding the Big Shiny Gold Bar! Wow … we thought it’s easy to lift but it was quite heavy! My friend told me it’s about 20 pounds … no wonder. Even without the chain it’s difficult to be taken away.

After we left Royal Mint, we had lunch at Kimono Restaurant which is near Take 5 Café. I liked it cuz it has a big glass window that we can see the busy Granville Street. But once I went in I found out everything was not as fancy as we expected. Interior was old, the floor was very ugly and dirty. The worst was washroom - ground was not too wet but terribly sticky. Food was not tasty as well. If you ask me the worst place of the day – I would answer “this was the one”.

Around 12:05 pm, we went to get free photo at Shaw Bobsleigh and Canadian maple on our faces … do we look cute?

Then we walked back to Robson Square to line up for the Art Gallery. The line was moving quite fast and we got in within 35 minutes. Based on everybody’s comment, first thing to do in Art Gallery was going up to the top floor where BC Pavilion was held. I really enjoyed this Pavilion since I’ve learnt something about BC forest. I especially like its water curtain cave (水簾洞) – where we had to pass thru a thin layer of waterfall to get into another place. Sometimes I could see a screen of a family welcoming us on this waterfall … amazing! After passing thru the waterfall, we found some big touch screens and we played them like little kids. I really like their concept of indoor sunlight where natural light is used to replace electrical light.

BC Pavilion in the Art Gallery

Faces appeared on water curtain cave: "Welcome in!"

Visitors passed through the water curtain to the cave (another room).

Just touch the big screen and snowflakes come out!

Touch the screen! Little bear (I don't know what exactly it is) comes out! Flowers blooming when the tree is touched!

Around 3:00 pm, we did another kid activity – watched mascots dancing show at GE Plaza!

Then my boyfriend found a photo shop where pictures could be taken and placed on Vancouver Sun as headline. Since it’s free, why not have a try? There were 3 backgrounds to choose from: with mascots, on zipline or at GE Plaza. What? Maintenance Break for 30 minutes! The female staff needed a break … okay. Should we leave? I thought people would not stay in line but it turns out nobody left! People get used to be patient during these days so 30 minutes or even an hour was not a big deal. The lady behind us was a mom of 2 kids and she’s been to downtown 6 days in a row visiting all the sites to see which ones were suitable for her lovely kids … what a good mom! She said she lined up for Royal Mint for 6 hours!!! 35 minutes passed by the staff finally came back, an old Chinese man in the line was so excited to yell “Go Canada Go” … haha!

It was around 4:30 now and we took sky train from Granville to Stadium station for Ontario 4D theatre. Holy! It’s the same day as ice hockey semi-final (Canada vs Slovakia) so hundreds of people waiting for the train at Granville station, we were standing in the 4th row on the platform. First train came … full of people … we couldn’t get in. 2 minutes after, second train came … full of people … we couldn’t get in. 2 minutes after, third train came … full of people … should we get in? No need to think or worry … bunch of people behind pushed us in. When we got out at Stadium, many people getting out too since majority of them going to GM place for the hockey game!

It was raining hard and cold. We were in the line for 1 hour and 15 minutes before getting into 4D theatre. There was a huge outdoor screen that we could watch the women curling. By 6:30 pm, I heard CTV announce the start of ice hockey game from GM place since we were just a block away from there. I’ve seen 4D before so it’s not special to me for the use of water spray to make the splash effect or for the artificial snow breeze effect. The only one I didn’t experience from previous 4Ds was the odour effect which I could smell chocolate flavour when the screen showed 4 men drinking hot chocolates … cool!

Ontario 4D Theatre - hundreds of people lined up for the 5 minute show!

Huge outdoor TV showing the women curling game

By the time we got out from 4D theatre, it was almost 7 at night. We had dinner at Kentizen in International Village. It’s a medium size restaurant and only 5 or 6 tables occupied so it was very quiet. We picked this restaurant not for the food but for the comfortable seats and most importantly for the TV since we wanted to watch the hockey semi-final. We didn’t watch the whole game but the score was 3-0 (Canada-Slovakia) when we left. “For sure Canada will win!” that’s what we thought.

We walked to Four Host First Nations Pavilion since I wanted to take a spectacular photo similar to the one posted on citycaucus. Here's the comparison:

From citycaucus.com

From my camera

Then we went into a store in Queen Elizabeth Theatre where we could find number of Aboriginal merchandises. Guess what … everybody was watching hockey game on TV. Oh! How come the score became 3-2? Only 1 minute left before the game ended and Slovakia players were very close to our goal … I could read everybody’s mind at that moment: “don’t let them score please” 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 times up. YES! We Won!!! Everybody was so excited in the store!

The last stop we visited was vectorial elevation light display at English Bay which I felt calm and peaceful after whole day of excitements. Then I took shuttle bus C21 to Yaletown Canada Line Station. When I passed by Yaletown LiveCity I could hear the music there, it was almost 10 pm and more than 300 people lined up to get in. Many of them were very high (Of course, Canada won!) Now I believe Vancouver can be a very energetic city!

Winter Olympics in Vancouver!

What’s the population in Metro Vancouver? I guess less than 3 million, the land is definitely bigger than Hong Kong with less than half of HK population. But these days since Winter Olympics started, many places here are full of people – Canada Line was packed (sometimes even 101% full), Richmond ozone was more crowded at night, normally street is quite empty after 8 pm but I saw lots of people on no. 3 Road in Richmond after 9 pm. I really feel like living in a busy city such as Hong Kong these days.

I really enjoy the Olympics spirit and atmosphere since it is now hosted in Vancouver. It’s very amazing to see vehicles with Canadian flags, people wearing Canadian shirts or jackets, kids with Olympic logo painted on faces and also hear people saying “Go Canada Go” or yelling when a Canadian athlete won a medal.

Because of the Olympics, there are many free events in downtown Vancouver and also Richmond Ozone. One thing very special besides Olympics was Feb 14 – everybody knows it is Valentine’s Day but it was also the first day of Chinese New Year! Next time these two occasions will fall on the same day again will be in 2048, I think I will be an old woman by then.

Feb 19 (Fri)

7:56 am - taking bus to Canada Line. Lots of people when I arrived at Canada Line. Somebody was handing out Province (newspaper) for free! I took Canada Line from the Terminus (Brighouse Station). Train was empty but filled up in 10 seconds, I found it embarrassing to fight for seat so I attempted to get a good spot for standing but a woman tried to take the spot from me. Never mind I’m younger than her (in appearance … hehe). Good that I got on the train at Terminus, it was getting more and more crowded at other stations, at that moment I felt that I could hardly breathe.

8:40 am – arrived downtown Vancouver. First thing to do was to find my boyfriend in the line for ziptrek. Too bad the staff there wouldn’t allow me to get in and she told other people the waiting time for ziptrek was six and a half hours (yes, you didn’t read it wrong … it was 6 ½ hours!!!). Anyway I’m not a big fan of zip line … I didn’t want to be a scary cat when I got up there. So I headed to other free events. (My boyfriend was there at 7:30 am, ziptrek started at 10 am and he finally tried it at almost 1 pm – waiting time 5 ½ hours but he enjoyed it very much though)

9:00 am – passed by London Drugs, many Olympic merchandises on sale, 50% off! Good deal eh. But I didn’t but any. Now I want to buy some since many people are using them and wearing them now. Before I didn’t pay much attention to the mascots but now I really like Miga. I heard people have to lineup for 1 or 2 hours to get into downtown Bay for the Olympic merchandises!

Based on wikipedia, here is the description of 2010 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games mascots:



Miga - A mythical sea bear, part orca and part kermode bear.



Quatchi - A sasquatch from the mysterious forests of Canada and dreams of being a hockey goalie.

Sumi - An animal guardian spirit with the wings of the Thunderbird and legs of a black bear who wears a hat of an orca whale. Sumi is the mascot for the Paralympic Games

Mukmuk - A Vancouver Island marmot described as "small and friendly"

9:10 am – arrived at the Royal Canadian Mint Pavilion. Lineup was extremely long for seeing the Olympic medals, there’s a chance to hold a gold medal but 3 hours waiting! No way, I needed to join my boyfriend before 1 pm. Fortunately there’s another line to see gold coins, gold bars and a big gold coin worth 1 million! Wow … let’s go for this line … waiting time wasn’t bad only for 45 minutes.

picture on coin = construction of Parliament



the million gold coin

12:10 pm – went back to Robson Square to take a video for my boyfriend’s zip lining. Gosh … I’ve never seen that many people in downtown, even an old local man asked me “do you believe that?” Sun was strong. I tried to have my camera focus on the zipline but it’s difficult since the screen was too shiny. I received a call from my boyfriend at 12:55 pm telling me he’s up there so I kept videotaping people when I saw them coming(2 playing at the same time). 1st pair he’s not there, 2nd pair he’s not there, 3rd one no, 4th one no … Oh my god! I was tired holding my camera under the strong sunshine. How many more pairs before his turn? Finally I saw him on the 5th pair. Good my task was done!

The lady was stuck in the middle of zip line so she was hanging above Robson Square .

1:10 pm – went to Sinclair Centre for lunch since it was not as crowded as Pacific Centre. There were some nice Native art displays.

2:30 pm – walked over to Canada Place for more Aboriginal arts

4:00 pm – Lineup for the Olympic Cauldron. By the time we got up there it was almost 4:55 pm. The Cauldron was huge! Made me think of the episode song from martial art drama “The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber - 倚天屠龍記”on TVB in the 70’s: 熊熊聖火 憐我苦痛多 明明亮光 為我消災去禍 … Olympic Flame! Bring me Luck!!!!!!

In the evening, we walked to BC Hydro Power Smart Village. Nice little village … nice displays. I like the very tall sculptures made by red cedar. They were made by a worker from BC Hydro who is a native. There was also some information about three other BC Hydro workers being Paralympics athletes … very encouraging!

An old washing machine manufactured in 1927

tall sculptures made by red cedar

list of employees joining Paralympics

Then we kept walking until Vancouver Community College where the Aboriginal Artisan Village was held. I was tired already but there were three kinds of artwork that impressed to me

1.Caribou Hair Tufting (http://agora.virtualmuseum.ca/edu/ViewLoitLo.do?method=preview&id=3009&lang=EN)

2.Birch bark biting – bite bite bite on a piece of birch bark to create nice patterns! (http://www.halfmoonstudios.com/)

3.Jasyn Lucas drawings – all look very cool!

After 9 pm, I took Skytrain from Granville Station to Waterfront then transfered to Canada Line to Richmond. I’ve never seen that many people coming down and going up the escalators. It could be compared to Hong Kong MTR Causeway Bay Station!

Feb 20 (Sat)

9:20 am – going back to downtown, Canada’s Northern House opened at 10 am but I was already in the line. It was cold … I was waiting for my boyfriend. The lady in front of me was also waiting for her partner and he showed up with hot coffee for her … so sweet. If my boyfriend was late and didn’t buy me a hot beverage … let’s make a complaint. Yep … he showed up just on time … 9:30 am but no hot beverage. Should I give him a bad look? “That’s for you” … Wow he bought me a present! It’s even sweeter than hot beverage! It was the caribou hair tufting artwork we saw last night from VCC … $135 = lots of cups of hot coffee.

10:20 am – finally got into the Northern House. The exhibition place wasn’t big but very informative. The most exciting thing is we could enter into a contest to win $9000 gold nugget or $8000 diamond! Also we could create a 25 second video with arctic backgrounds which was very fun. I was standing in the middle of exhibition and I heard four Canadians singing “O Canada” on my right side for the arctic video and also the Natives singing on my left … like this … “The True North strong and free” … “ bom bom ba ba” … “God keep our land glorious and free” … “bom bom ba ba” … O Canada we stand on guard for thee … bom bom ba ba … my mind was in two pieces!!!

12:00 noon – we had lunch in Harbour Centre food court. Nothing special except everywhere there’s a lineup for lady’s restroom. How come there’s always a lineup for female but not male? Based on my unofficial research, on average each lady spends one minute in restroom while guy spends 30 seconds or less … that makes sense.

1:30 pm – heading to LiveCity Yaletown … again lots of people. Security check was very serious here, just like in the airport where we had to take out our cell phones and put them together with our jackets on the provided tray. We needed to pass through the security checking gate. LiveCity Yaletown is mainly about technology except Coca-Cola: Acer, Panasonic and Samsung. Oh man … lineup again for these sites … I was tired to do so already.

We saw these street performers while we were waiting in the line to LiveCity. Nice Entertainment!

Finally there were two sites with no lineup … great! West House display – a very small two storey house (total 836 square feet) which is the smallest single house I’ve ever seen in Vancouver. The selling point is energy efficient design for environmental and sustainability purposes. Another site was to demonstrate how Vancouver can be a green city.

3:00 pm – left LiveCity and looking for washroom before going back to Richmond. Finally I found one in Yaletown Roundhouse Community Centre where Casa Italia is held. So lots of visitors. How come the ladies also lined up at the men’s restroom? Oh … because during Olympics it is used as women’s restroom … no wonder. I was a bit thirsty so I bought an apple carrot juice from JUGO for $4.15. After that I walked to Yaletown Canada Line station and there’s free hot chocolate from Salvation Army just at the entrance. Too late, I just bought a juice … I could have saved $4.15 if I found it earlier … Sigh

7:10 pm – walked to Richmond ozone from my house (about 10 minutes walk). The highlight for the day was ICE CARVING CHAMPIONSHIP! There were twelve masterpieces from different teams including Canada, USA, Japan, Italy and France. Each team was allowed 12 hours (7am – 7 pm) to carve the ice into beautiful sculpture. Cool!