Olympics cont'd

Going out everyday, walking around downtown amidst the throng of patriotic Canadians, the city was alive. Never had I felt more proud to be Canadian. The different houses, each showing what their province had. The world coming to Vancouver to take in our cultural, and to celebrate along with us.

Breaking out into song on the streets, in the trains, whenever, wherever. The emotional was just emanating from every single person in the city, be it Canadian or not. Walking along Granville or Robson, cheering along with the crowds in drunken fervour. There are no words that I can use to describe watching any Olympic event with crowds of people downtown.

Waiting in lines to get into events, chatting with people from all over the world. Americans come up to visit, and spending lots of money to experience this once in a lifetime event. Families of athletes here to cheer on their loved ones. The entire 2 weeks has just put me on a cloud, and everything is still so surreal. The free concerts at livecity events, singing along with great canadian music, to the long walks downtown in the rain, everything has just been perfect. Without the free concerts i doubt i would ever have been introduced to some great Canadian music that I now love.

The best house that I visited had to be Atlantic Canada house, where there was free food tasting. The house had food prepared by culinary students from the Atlantic provinces, and it started off with appetizers of mussels and seafood chowder. Then came small portions of lobsters, crab, shrimp, and other seafood delicacies prepared wonderfully. The beer wasn't too pricey compared to other places that I had visited, and the atmosphere was wonderful. I don't think it was possible to be angry or mad during the olympics.

The only draw back to the entire olympics was probably the ridiculous price of beer. But everybody was willing to pay upwards to $10 for a cup of beer. Standing and watching the gold medal game, i spent $30 on 4 cups of beer, which i could've easily got 12 cans of beer for. But people are willing to pay, since hockey just isn't the same without beer.

I only wished that I brought my camera out more, but its not worth the risk to get drunk and carry around $1000 in gear.

Finito.

I can't believe its over. These olympics have been the best 2 weeks of my life. I have nothing else to say because I'm still amazed by how people can protest something so great. I'll post a lot more on the past 2 weeks when i wind down and get back to reality.

The day that never ended

So I realize that I haven't blogged in awhile. I am the epitome of failure in terms of new years resolutions. I don't even want to blog right now cause i'm so tired still. I've been sick, but its olympics, so i've been popping pills to hopefully cure me. Yesterday was a 22 hour day starting with Arnold Schwarzenegger and ending with partying downtown. I woke up at 5am just to go see Arnold the Torchinator run the Olympic torch, and it was exhilarating. The sheer about of people there with you, screaming and yelling. The fresh, crisp, morning air. The vibe of Olympics in the air. You might think that 5am is pretty darn early, and I think I'll have to agree with you. But it was totally worth it.



Then after that was just wandering around downtown, absorbing the Olympic feel. I still can't believe that the Olympic games are actually happening here. Watching the torch get passed from a dragonboat made me feel like a true Vancouverite. The opening ceremony was probably the best one out of the last 4 years of winter olympics, we really did a great job with it. With usage of light was phenomenal, and expressed Canada to the world. Downtown Vancouver was simply incredible, so many people, so... Canadian. Everybody was out there yelling and screaming, fully living out the Canadian life.

"The suppression of uncomfortable ideas may be common in religion and politics, but it is not the path to knowledge, and there is no place for it in the endeavour of science" ~ Carl Sagan

Pulp Mills

So currently i'm up in Prince George doing work taking samples at the pulp mills here and i must say its quite the experience. Walking through the mills is like being in an episode of "How it's made" on discovery channel, but i must say that the work isn't the most pleasant. The temperature at the pulping machines is like standing inside a sauna, and you have to be wearing full protective gear, meaning long sleeves with hard hat, safety glasses. It's an awesome experience, and i haven't even started working really. I just regret not bringing my DSLR cause i can just see all these awesome HDR photos that i can have. Canfor is pretty awesome, paying for everything, including food and the trip. I haven't paid for a single thing yet, and i've got lots of food and i love it. The only thing i'm not really looking forward to is having to eat fast food, since we're gonna be too busy working to have time to get real food.