About Me

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Delta, British Columbia, Canada
I took very early retirement from teaching in '06 and did some traveling in Europe and the UK before settling down to do some private tutoring. As a voracious reader, I have many books waiting in line for me to read. Tell me I shouldn't read something, and I will. I'm a happy, optimistic person and I love to travel and through that believe that life can be a continuous learning experience. I'm looking forward to traveling more some day. I enjoy walking, cycling, water aerobics & and sports like tennis, volleyball, and fastpitch/baseball. I'm just getting into photography as a hobby and I'm enjoying learning all the bits and bobs of my digital camera. My family is everything to me and I'm delighted to be the mother of two girls and the Gramma of a boy and a girl. I may be a Gramma, but I'm at heart just a girl who wants to have fun.

Saturday, January 09, 2010

Vancouver's Olympic Fever

I went downtown today with D#2 to the Vancouver Wedding Fair via the Canada Line (rapid transit) and bus so took the opportunity of snapping a few shots of the city in the midst of preparation. Everywhere you look you'll see advertising, a giant Canada flag attached to two sides of a building, new directional signs, (huge ones!) roadwork going on, and the traffic authority. Excitement is building! Only 34 days to go and the world is coming to Vancouver. I hope you enjoy these photos that give you a taste of what's going on. Be sure to click on the photos to see them in a larger format.

On the left is the Canada Flag and on the right is some kind of silver sculpture right on the sidewalk when you exit from the rapid transit station downtown. Any guesses as to what it is? To us, it looked like a giant crumpled up ball of tin foil.


















If anyone wants to read about the Hudson Bay Company's history and importance to Canadian history, click here. It is the oldest commercial corporation in North America, by the way. The original HBC store in Vancouver was a small storefront on Cordova between Carrall and Abbott, but this cream terra cotta building, at the corner of Granville and Georgia Streets, with its Corinthian columns was built in 1927. Plus, it's the #1 department store in Canada and is the official provider of all the official Olympic fashions and other doodads related to the Games.














Here we have the official countdown clock and when I took this photo today (in the pouring rain) there were 34 days, 3 hours, 21 minutes and 53 seconds to the official opening of the Olympics. On the right you'll see advertising for some of the official Canadian Olympic fashions on the side of a bus.


















And down in the Canada Line waiting area, you'll see gigantic posters advertising General Electric and its MRI development. These posters are fascinating because they show bodies of people participating in just about every sport. You see inside the bodies, their skeletal structure and some organs. These are just two - a figure skater and a snowboarder.


















There are going to be concerts and festivities all over the Vancouver area for 17 days and nights. I thought I'd avoid the major areas, but after today, I just might go on downtown between Feb. 12 and 28th to mingle with the tourists. I'm having an Opening Ceremonies party at home for my friends and I'm going to wear one of Lorne's Canada Hockey Team jerseys in honour of my country. I don't know about any of you, but I get all choked up when I watch Canada enter the stadium at any Olympic games, so you can imagine there'll be tears running down my face that night because as a Canadian, I know we've got it good here.

16 comments:

Belizegial said...

Hi Leslie,

I am depending on you to keep me abreast of the news and happenings with next month's winter olympics. Since I can't be there in person, I will have to enjoy vicariously through updates and pictures on your blog.

Hope that the New Year is off to a good start and that things continue to go well throughout this year.

Cheers,
Enid

Leslie: said...

Hi Enid! Good to hear from you! I'll definitely keep everyone up to date on what's going on in the city re the Olympics. Hope you're well. :D

Russell said...

Wow! Only about a month to go!

I really like the photos you took of the Hudson Bay store and those great columns. That is a beautiful building and I like the pictures portrayed on the building.

Vancouver is a big, beautiful city and I hope to get there one of these days!! Yes, the eyes of the world will be on Vancouver and I am sure the world will be most impressed and fascinated.

Nice post!

Powell River Books said...

I know I should be excited, but somehow I can't get into the Olympics. We tried several times to get tickets, but were never lucky enough to make it through the lotteries or online sales. And we just can't see paying the huge prices on the resales. Transportation through Vancouver is also a pain. Flying on Pacific Coastal is finally going to continue, but the Quick Shuttle has been moved out of the airport to a a different station. Now we'll have to pay a taxi to get there rather than making an easy connection in the airport terminal. I just hope things go back to normal after it is all over. - Margy

Leslie: said...

Hi Margy, I took the Canada Line downtown and it was really fast. We got off in the middle of the downtown area and there's just so much going on! And of course Lorne is in the know about everything, so I'll probably take in some of the free events at some point in time. But you're so right about it being hard to get tickets. Plus you have to pay to get up to Whistler on the buses or up to the local mountains, too. No car traffic is going to be allowed unless they're bonafide Vanoc cars. I'm happy to be watching from home cuz at least the big events will be on at prime time. Keep an eye on the TV for our beautiful city and be sure to spread the news. Hugs!

ArneA said...

Been a while since last time I visited your blog, but in the upcoming Olympics you will probably be the first to visit if you get us updated with all the winning results for Norwegian participants.
We still believe the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer to be the best ever, so we are looking forward to your arrangement.
:)

Welshcakes Limoncello said...

I like the clock and I quite like the sculpture though I've no idea what it is! Did you get anything at the wedding fair?

Liz Hinds said...

It definitely looks like crumpled up foil!

That photo of the bus is such a clever image. It looks far more complicated than it is - now I've studied it carefully!

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