Looking back, I had never spent my New Year’s outside of Singapore. Even when I gained financial independence after working, it was still not an item to be struck off my bucket list. After all, I didn’t want to rush back right from overseas on New Year’s day, and squeezing on flights crowded with people who are similarly rushing back for the first work day. I also didn’t want to spend my leave right on the first work day of the year.
Therefore, my 2020 New Year’s day in Vancouver, Canada was truly my 1st New Year spent overseas!
Very much like my Christmas in Vancouver, I spent the holiday roaming around Vancouver. After all, I was very much bogged down with school and work. I barely had time to venture beyond my school in North Vancouver and workplace in Metrotown. And since I didn’t own a car, I had to rely on the skytrain, which also limited my Vancouver exploration to the city limits.
University of British Columbia (UBC)
Since it was winter, I went right to the University of British Columbia (UBC) the moment I saw that it was going to be a clear day. Yup, Vancouver from fall to early spring was super duper rainy and it was really rare to see the sun. And a great place to visit was UBC!
UBC in Autumn
I had earlier visited UBC with my school gang back in autumn. Back then, we went there “for studying”, but of course, that was just an excuse for us to explore the university.
It was a clear day too, so we took some time off to explore the campus grounds before settling down for studies.
We went down the main mall and University Boulevard, which I presumed was the “main attraction” of UBC. It was where I took the picture of the flag pole, right by the UBC Rose Garden, for my “From Singapore to Vancouver” video’s thumbnail.
We finally settled down for a few hours in the library of Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, before we got kicked out (the library was closing). So we decided to move to the lawn outside of the library… for further study. Well, we had our personal KPIs to meet for our revision, and we wanted to make sure we met that before we had fun.
In hindsight, it was really pretentious of us to be sitting at the deck chairs studying in the open. But then again, the air was fresh and there was barely any crowd. That made studying all the more conducive!
And every now and then, the residents of the area would surprise us as they went about minding their own businsses.
At 6pm, the natural light became really non-conducive for studying, so we decided to go exploring the campus grounds.
And explore we did.
We ended up heading for Wreck Beach. We hadn’t known what it was; we just wanted to find a beach to look at the sea, and to see if we could see downtown Vancouver.
UBC was actually on a relatively high elevation, so we had to take a long, and I mean loooong, winding flight of steps down to the beach. As the steps were within the woods, we couldn’t gauge where we were or when we would reach the bottom.
Until we heard some drumming. However, it would still be some time before we reached the beach.
By then, the sky had really started to turn dark and we had a glimpse of the sunset amidst a cloudy sky.
There were many other young people exploring the beach too, and some guys were hanging around having a party of sorts. Their drumming made it feel like we were in a gypsy funfair!
We kept wondering if the lights and mounain line at the horizon were downtown Vancouver. After checking Google Maps, we decided we were looking in the wrong direction. It would have been Vancouver Island we were looking at.
Though I had my doubts that Vancouver Island would be so near to be seen off the horizon!
However, that would plant the seed for us to go visiting Vancouver Island someday. I had written about our road trip adventure, “36 Hours in Vancouver”, back on my now-defunct Sing in Can blog. But I shall find some time to re-post the contents here to reminisce my good old days!
By the way, the killer of the trip was the climb back up to UBC’s main campus. The climb probably took less than 5 minutes, but it was the most gruelling climb in the dark!
UBC in Winter
Back to my New Year’s trip, despite only reaching UBC at about 11am, the sun was barely above the horizon. This meant the rest of the sky was bathed in crystal blue. The weeks of dreariness did make me feel so happy seeing clear blue skies!
I tracked back the main mall to the UBC flag pole to find some familiarity, but at the same time explored other parts of the campus.
For example, I explored the garden behind the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, and entering the building from its historic looking back entrance.
From there, it was a slow walk around the main mall again, and visiting the UBC bookstore (because it was closed the last time I was there).
CF Richmond Centre
Next on my itinerary was to have lunch at CF Richmond Centre. I had watched some Canadian Youtubers introduce its food court as being one of the best places to have affordable and good food.
From UBC, I took the 49 bus to change to the Canada line at Langara–49th Avenue station. That bus route also took me through a part of Vancouver that I had not been to before. It passed through the southern edge of the University Endowed Lands, which I interpreted from online resources as the first “national park” of Vancouver.
That was still OK. It meant most parts of the road were lined with tall trees. So the road was shady and yup, the scenery was basically just rows and rows of trees. I thought that since part of the road was running parallel to the coastline, I would catch the view of the sea too. I thought… Thanks to the trees, it felt more like I was on the Vancouver Island road trip!
Lunch at CF Richmond Centre
CF Richmond Centre was the last stop on the Canada line, and was an expansive 2-storey complex. If you ask me, it felt like the malls I saw on US shows. Even more interestingly, I had not visited such malls in Vancouver prior to that ;P
I must admit that I ended up eating the Chinese stir-fry stall, which was a mix between Singapore’s Economic Bee Hoon and Chup Chye Png.
Such stalls are found in every major shopping mall in Vancouver (which also has strong Asian presence). They served food like the Chup Chye Png stalls, but with less variety and options. Furthermore, they also had more than one option of carbs, from Low Mein to Fried Rice, which made them function more like an Economic Bee Hoon stall.
Such stalls also have a better CP value than other food stalls in food courts or even restaurants. For About CAD10, one gets 1 carb and a choice of 2 side dishes – it doesn’t matter if it’s meat or vegetables. (Singapore’s Chup Chye Png charges more for meat dishes) And the serving is also much more than other types of food stalls.
That being said, the stall at CF Richmond Centre still served one of the better foods of its kind!
To top off my lunch, I also bought the egglet. Although the egglet is a snack that’s much like a waffle, such stalls can be found in almost every Asian oriented food court. Yes, an independent stall, just selling one type of snacks.
Thereafter, I had coffee at Starbucks, though the place was too crowded for me to really settle down and enjoy my daily brew.
I had always complained that food in Vancouver was really lacking in terms of presentation and taste, compared to Singapore. The best comparison could be found in Starbucks – since Starbucks could be found in both cities and served similar range of food.
The food here in question was the Christmas-themed snacks. In Singapore, the ones on display were as attractive as what was advertised, and what came onto the plate looked just as good (not just an “illusion” in the display case).
The one found in Vancouver? Only the name sounded festive. It looked bland and the filling was hiding in a small corner on the pastry! lol Same franchise, different levels of sincerity in making food.
Kam Do Bakery
I roamed around CF Richmond Centre a bit and went over to Kam Do Bakery to buy Cantonese pastries for breakfast. Kam Do Bakery was in a standalone building just steps from CF Richmond Centre’s entrance at the skytrain station.
Unlike the Western bakeries we’re used to, Cantonese bakeries served both Chinese style pastries and fusion ones. Their signature was that most of the the pastries were glazed with a layer of savoury, fragrant butter. That glazed coating made the pastries glistened like gold under the light and heating it up would make the whole house smell of pastries heaven.
Since it was my first time there, I bought a standard Char Siew Bun (Roasted Pork Bread Bun) and egg tarts. I would say it was worth the money!
And speaking of money, they only accepted cash (despite being such a big food establishment. And guess what, there was a homeless man who would open the door for exiting customers, in the hope that someone would toss him the change they got from the bakery.
Trinity Street
The sun was already setting when I left Richmond at about 4pm. It was a train ride back to downtown, follwed by a bus ride on R5 (back then it was 95) towards East Vancouver. I dropped off at the edge of PNE, where I started my evening trek to Trinity Street to view the Christmas lighting decorations by the residents.
Read More: Finding hidden Christmas jewels in Trinity Street, Vancouver, Canada!
Parting Words
My first New Year out of Singapore was spent doing rather mundane stuff. Yet, I went to places in Vancouver where I could not afford time to visit during normal school and work days.
Although UBC was a university, it had open public spaces where one could spend some time winding down amidst a busy schedule.
CF Richmond Centre was very much like the other Asian-oriented shopping malls in Vancouver, but as one of the largest in Richmond, it was also a great place to while the time away window shopping and munching on food.
I ended that day with a homemade meal of Laksa and Tang Yuan made with almond drink. Warm food for a cold winter’s night!
If you enjoyed my throwback at my days studying in Vancouver, check out my Sing in Can page for other chronicles of a Singaporean studying and working in Canada. Like and Share this post, so that other like minded people can also find out more about studying in Vancouver,
Till then, sing while you can!