DO YOU WANT TO SUCK THE BONE: Feigned Wealth is Hilarious
let me tell you, when the maternal unit and i planned this trip we really went all out. i mean, why not stay at a fancy hotel right downtown and spare no expense for food and daily attractions when you are only going away for two days? there really is no point to be stingy. plus, everything seems more expensive up there already because Canadian money is the one currency left that is still worse than the dollar. i think it's because they name their money stuff like the "loonie." they were just asking for trouble. we decided before leaving on our little foreign adventure that we would just pretend to be wealthy for the next couple days. not to act shocked when the cost of admission to Capilano park is outrageously more than it should be. in then end, those story poles were were the coin.
so we drove into downtown Vancouver and to our hotel, the Hotel Vancouver. that's right. THE hotel in Vancouver. now, technically, it is part of the Fairmont chain of resort hotels, but that's beside the point. it's old, and gorgeous on the outside and in. and it's smack dab in the center of downtown, right next to the art museum, or what the hoity-toity Canadians call the "gallery," and the now zeroed Olympic countdown clock. we had our car valet parked (i know, we are soooo fancy) and headed up to room 629, our home away from home. we each had a nice double bed to ourselves, both with really great mattresses, and a nice view of the city streets below. there was even a mini-bar. that's how you know you are in a fancy place, when they have the audacity to charge you $12 for a candy bar.
after dropping off our stuff, we headed back out into the concrete Canadian jungle and made our way towards the Gastown neighborhood. for whatever reason, my mother had decided she wanted to walk around Gastown while we were on our little romp in Vancouver, so we had to make this dream come true. we trekked that direction along the water wandering through other neighborhoods along the way. Gastown is the historic neighborhood of Vancouver, kind of like Pioneer Square for us Seattleites, with brick streets, old timey lamp posts and a steam powered clock. just what every major city needs. a clock powered completely by steam that plays the Westminster bells chime every quarter hour. we were fortunate enough to be walking by just at half-past the hour and were literally feet away when it chimed. loudly. then we continued on to see Gassy Jack, the founding father of Vancouver. what a classy man, that Gassy Jack. his statue is pretty cool, i have to admit.
by this point we were both pretty worn out from our long day of traveling, as well as hungry. while i'm sure there are restaurants in and around the Gastown neighborhood that would have been delightful, we, as visitors, had no idea where they were hiding. so we decided to walk back towards our hotel in hopes of seeing something along the way that struck our fancy. apparently we chose the less-traveled of roads back, because we walked for several blocks in what can only be described as the whitest and eeriest of ghettos ever. now, being the hardened big-city girl that i am, i wasn't all that scared to be walking on not so nice streets in a foreign city. it was before dusk still, too. but i will say that for some reason being yelled at by a toothless and drug addicted member of the First Nations in the same day as learning her people's history and culture through story poles was the saddest encounter with a bum i've had. she called us "purdy ladies" though, so i can't really be upset about it.
along our walk we saw a surprising ZERO restaurants. well, that may not be entirely accurate, but we didn't find one to actually stop and eat at. we did, however, see some sort of crew with overly bright lighting setting up for a film shoot of some kind in an old bank building, get asked directions by two different pairs of lost tourists, and eventually ended up eating at a restaurant less than a block away from our hotel. i won't go into the selection process of said restaurant, although it was a scene my boyfriend might call a "doosie."
we had what can only be described as a delectable meal in a very nice Italian restaurant, Don Francesco's. we shared a caprese salad to start, which was refreshing and delicious. and since the wealthy drink wine, so did we. for dinner i had my old standard, fettuccine, but this one was special. there was prosciutto in it. yum. my mom ordered ossobuco, which, if you are like me and didn't know, is braised veal shank in a hearty tomato stew-like sauce. it was tender and tasty baby cow. it is also the origin of this installment's title. apparently, one is supposed to suck the marrow from the bone as part of the ossobuco meal. my grandpa was a big bone sucker, so i'm told. after we both decided that was strange and very disgusting indeed, my mother picked up the bone and asked "do you want to suck the bone?" i politely declined this offer, and laughed hysterically. even when we are pretending to be wealthy and refined, we still manage to give ourselves away.
we ordered our desserts to go, mostly because we wanted an excuse to sit in bed wearing the nice hotel robes we were provided with, and also because we didn't want anyone at the fancy restaurant to know what fatties we really were. tiramisu and chocolate ganache cake to go brought our dinner bill to nearly the price of our one-night hotel stay. but boy was it worth it. good food and even better company made our rich ladies night on the town a rousing success.
up next - ORANGE EGGS AND DYLAN: A Seuss-like Undersea Afternoon
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