Keeping Life Spicy

Where did I leave off? So, I was writing an entry about seizing control over my life while I waited around the train station on Tuesday evening. It occurred to me that I was living one of those "movie moments" when the protagonist thinks back to a memory of a smiling stranger and regrets not taking action during that fleeting moment. I decided not to be that guy... instead I decided to be the awkward Jewish nerd kid, but I'll get into that later.

After exchanging my ticket I decided to check into the Comfort Inn that was just around the corner from the hostels. I figured I'd saved quite a few bucks from pushing out the date of my departure, so I might as well indulge in a little bit of luxury and not worry about my shit getting stolen in the middle of the night. I took a 45 minute shower and set out for a night of new experiences. Of course, with my extended stay in Vancouver I felt that I needed to also indulge in the culinary scene of the city. Something I didn’t do during my short stay during the prior two days.

As I walked around downtown I spotted a food stand selling “japadogs” – a Japanese version of a hotdog which tastes surprisingly good. The nori and sweet mayo work well with the saltiness of the sausage, which is absolutely butchered so the dog retains very little juice. The sausage looked as though it were thrown through a field of barbed wire, but it was still pretty good. Nothing to base a new religion on, but a great appetizer.

For my 2nd dinner I decided to try out Guu – a Japanese tapas place that was recommended by someone on the bus between Seattle and Vancouver. Compared to Spanish tapas the portions at Guu were significantly larger, making the cost-to-quantity ratio quite reasonable. The only exception was the sockeye salmon sashimi, which was a special of the day. For less than the cost of those 4 pieces of so-so sashimi, I got a huge plate of pan-fried pig intestines, which were deliciously chewy and some “aigamo” (?), which is basically duck sliced thinly and garnished with a few other things and some hot mustard. I got this dish at the suggestion of some hapa dude named Jason who sat right next to me. The last dish I got was the pan-fried pork cheek, which was absolutely delicious. Note to self, eat more of this when I get back to Cali. I don’t know if it was the quality of the pork or just the preparation but everything was absolutely delicious and I would come back here again in the future.

After dinner I walked the mile or so to Boss, not minding the time. Of course, by the time I got there I was already half an hour late and the class had covered most of the basic moves. I couldn’t see the bus girl around, so I asked a girl who was standing on her own if she wanted to practice with me. She more or less turned me down saying that she was waiting for a friend and rejected my offer to let him take over once he's arrived. I played the rejection off by saying I'd just practice by myself next to her, which I did for a bit. In the middle of my shadow salsa dancing, a spritely blonde girl tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I wanted to practice with her. I happily agreed and we made some brief introductions. Eloise, was a slender blonde girl of about 21 years, traveling the world and doing odd jobs with a program named ARCH. She was originally from Mauritius, a small island next to Madagascar, which I had never heard of before. She took no offense when I scratched my head and had her repeat the name a few more times. Our communication was about as bad as our footwork. We were a mess of twisted joints spinning each other into submission holds on the dance floor. Luckily, we did get two moves down, but those were intermediate steps that followed a series of basic moves that we had no idea how to execute.

After the lessons I bought her a beer and talked to her and her friend for a while. They were both working as caretakers for the elderly. Eloise’s friend’s was a cute half-Turkish / half-German girl named Meltem, who had a very close definition of personal space when talking. I didn’t mind, but it was awkward since her boyfriend was standing almost as close to me while they all spoke. It felt like I was stuck in a night at the Roxbury. Some space freed up when they announced that they had to leave early for work the next day.

I decided to stick around to see if anyone else would like to dance with my rhythmically challenged ass. As I was walking around I saw a girl that looked sort of like the bus girl, but I couldn’t be sure as I couln't really remember her face. Whatever this girl’s name was, she seemed to know how to dance, as she and her short-haired Asian female friend were dancing together. Perhaps I should have gone straight up and asked if her I'd met her before, since I didn’t really know for certain. Of course, that would have been the easiest and least awkward thing to do, but I approached the pair and asked which one was the male lead since I’ve been watching and trying to learn. They said they both were and gave me an icy glare… I only realized after the fact that I'd inadvertently made a lesbian joke, which might have been true.

I stumbled away from the situation and bumped into Sara, who was standing near the bar and staring out at the dance floor. She was a fellow Los Angeles native who was in town for a pediatrics convention. She explained to me the variations of latin dancing (salsa, merengue, and bachata) and explained the basic moves. She suggested that I try out a merengue since it’s basically a simple side-to-side motion that you make which frees yo up to get creative with twirls and stuff. When a merengue song came on we went to the dance floor and I realized it’s more or less what I instinctively do when I hear a good beat and all I had to do was use a few of the twirls that I had just learned. I think I can merengue, who knew?

I’ve procrastinated about taking salsa lessons for so many years, but finally managed to muster the courage to do it once I was in another country. Sara told me that there’s a salsa scene in almost every country and it’s one of the things that she does when traveling. It seems like a handy skill that I can use in the future, but that conversation reminded me that my thing is karaoke and that the Two Parrots bar was doing karaoke that night – I learned this from the same girl that suggested going to Checkers the night before. I took my leave and I swore to myself that I’d sign up to learn salsa once I got back to the states.

The two parrots was a bit more chill than the scene at Checkers since the KJ was an older gent that did a great rendition of Mack the Knife. As usual, there were a few parties that mainly kept to themselves, but once I got on stage and performed “Unbreak My Heart” the crowd warmed up a little and started talking to me. The girl who suggested the place to me the night before showed up, so I asked if she wanted to sing a duet. She politely declined, so I sang “Say It Ain’t So” instead, wrapping up my night with a little frantic pacing and air guitaring. Anyway, the night was pretty excellent and it made up for the countless hours I spent sitting around the train station, trying to figure out what exactly I was going to do with my vacation/trip/life. Overall, I think I did a pretty decent job living in the spur of the moment and making the most of my ever-changing situation. There are still a few days left with no solid plans, so let's hope this continues.

'til next time,

Andrew Lee
Vancouver, BC