Wait for it... wait for it...
Early mornings are still something I'm getting used to. I had to get up this morning cos the duct guys were coming to clean the ducts. Dan came and knocked on my door at 8 this morning. I had been dozing in and out for about an hour. They came in with their giant hoses and compressed air and made lots of noise. I guess I needed to be up anyways. To be honest it was a little fascinating to watch. Two fellas in red shirts and ties with blue jackets on mucking around in the dust. I don't know why they make them wear ties. I'd be cutting my wrists if I had to do that. I understand the concept of looking presentable but that would just suck.
All things considered they were done pretty quickly. I thought they were going to take the better part of the morning. Tyson, one of the duct guys, warned me that the house wold smell like burning for the first five or ten minutes. He says it freaks a lot of people out.
After they left I did a Timmy's run, had a shower and then made and uploaded a video for Eugene's memorial. Seeing as I wasn't going to make it I thought I would like to say a few words. The compression of the video took FOREVER. I knew Xuan was anxious to get downtown and get her passport done but since today was deadline day for the videos I thought I'd better get'er done before I left. It took almost an hour to compress and then start uploading. I think I compressed it too high quality the first time.
We headed downtown to the Sinclair building. We waited in line to have her paperwork checked (about 15-20 minutes) then had to wait another hour and a half to get the paperwork processed. Turns out Xuan has some discrepancies in her various forms of ID. Mostly due to a combination of her inability to communicate the right order the names should have been in and the cultural differences in which the names are presented. I imagine her original conversation with the first piece of ID went something like this:
Official: "So what's your name?"
Xuan: "Nguyen The To Diem Thanh Xuan"
Official: "So Xuan is your last name?"
Xuan: "No. It's my first name."
Official: "So what's your family name?"
Xuan: "Nguyen"
Official: "So it's The To Diem Thanh Xuan Nguyen"
Xuan: "No. Nguyen is first"
Official: "But it's your last name"
Xuan: "No, Xuan is last"
Official: "Xuan is your last name?"
Xuan: "Yes"
Official: "So your family name is Xuan"
Xuan: "No, MY name is Xuan. Nguyen is the family name"
Official: "..."
Xuan: "It's Nguyen The To Diem Thanh Xuan"
Official: "...and the family name is Nguyen?"
Xuan: "Yes."
Official: "So... Xuan The To Diem Thanh Nguyen"
Xuan: "No."
Official: "Ehm... I'm just gonna put it down like this."
The way Xuan explained it to me (and it took a couple of minutes) her last name is Nguyen The. If she were to get married, she keeps Nguyen and the "The" would change to the name of her spouse's family name. To Diem is actually her middle name and Thanh Xuan is her first name. As is in Japanese, the presentation of names is reversed. Family name presented first and then given name. To Xuan, the presentation order makes sense in terms of what comes first, what comes second and what comes last. In reality, by Western standards her name should be presented as Thanh Xuan To Diem Nguyen The. As it stands right now, the government knows her as The To Diem Thanh Xuan Nguyen on her Citizenship and Drivers license, Xuan The To Diem Thanh Nguyen on her SIN card and Xuan The Nguyen on her health card. Fun fun... I figured, for now let's get at least most of these consistent even if it's F'ed up and we'll worry about correctly changing it when she gets back from Mexico. So, after we got her passport sorted, we went up to the fourth floor of the Sinclair building to Services Canada to wait in yet another line to get that figured out.
By the time we were done it was nearly 4pm. Wah. We were both hungry and we decided to try and find Japadog which everyone except Ian seemed to be raving about. We walked up and down Burrard trying to find it to no avail. We even asked for directions. I pulled up their website and found both of their cart locations and couldn't figure out why we hadn't seen it. Then I saw the note. Closed Tuesday March 16. Argle Bargle!! Foiled! We wound up walkig down Denman and decided on Phö Central becuase Xuan would probably not have the opportunity to eat Phö while she was in Mexico. It was a teeny tiny place with just a few tables and not even a restroom. Is that even legal? The food was delightful, the service friendly and all in all a nice dining experience albeit cramped and a need to pee badly after.
We walked down Denman after eating and noticed we were CLEARLY in the gay part of town. I'm not sure what gave it away the most. The Rainbow flags along the light standards, the scantily clad, buff make posters advertising gay porn and fetish wear or the pink garbage cans and bus stops. Hmmmm.... Entertaining anyways. We had a good laugh. Nice to see the community getting out there. I don't think they'd get away with that in Calgary.
At the west end of Denman we turned North and headed back towards Robson. We walked along the busy sidewalk full of young hipsters and tourists as we window shopped and took in the sights. We had a boo at the skating rink and inquired about the zipline over Robson (which is apparently free if you don't mind the wait. It was three hours when we asked about it). We turned down Granville, stopped in at the Olympic Superstore at the Bay which was a complete zoo still. Apparently a new shipment of red mittons had arrived and they had been snapped up in a hurry with only a handful of small gloves left. As we were leaving we saw people in line hoarding them. Some carrying five or six pairs. Nutty.
As we headed towards the SkyTrain station we passed a Rogers booth and I stopped to inquire about the cost and logistics of switching my number to a BC number. I thought if it wasn't going to cost too much and not be a total hassle I might do it so that I didn't have to keep paying long distance fees. As it turned out it cost nothing and I was able to switch it in about 30 seconds. Shocking. I was expecting to have to do some negotiating and this was just far too easy. Amazing. had I known this I would have switched it sooner. I spent most of the ride home texting the people I knew in vancouver about my new number.
We finally made it home around 7:30. It had been a full day and both of us were tired. I think it's going to be an early night tonight.
Reason to smile today: After waiting in lines all day, being able to switch my cell number out in no time at all with no cost and no changes to my phone plan. Wow. How easy was that.
Something I learned today: Changing your cell number when you move provinces is wicked easy. If only all services could be this easy and hassle free.
All things considered they were done pretty quickly. I thought they were going to take the better part of the morning. Tyson, one of the duct guys, warned me that the house wold smell like burning for the first five or ten minutes. He says it freaks a lot of people out.
After they left I did a Timmy's run, had a shower and then made and uploaded a video for Eugene's memorial. Seeing as I wasn't going to make it I thought I would like to say a few words. The compression of the video took FOREVER. I knew Xuan was anxious to get downtown and get her passport done but since today was deadline day for the videos I thought I'd better get'er done before I left. It took almost an hour to compress and then start uploading. I think I compressed it too high quality the first time.
We headed downtown to the Sinclair building. We waited in line to have her paperwork checked (about 15-20 minutes) then had to wait another hour and a half to get the paperwork processed. Turns out Xuan has some discrepancies in her various forms of ID. Mostly due to a combination of her inability to communicate the right order the names should have been in and the cultural differences in which the names are presented. I imagine her original conversation with the first piece of ID went something like this:
Official: "So what's your name?"
Xuan: "Nguyen The To Diem Thanh Xuan"
Official: "So Xuan is your last name?"
Xuan: "No. It's my first name."
Official: "So what's your family name?"
Xuan: "Nguyen"
Official: "So it's The To Diem Thanh Xuan Nguyen"
Xuan: "No. Nguyen is first"
Official: "But it's your last name"
Xuan: "No, Xuan is last"
Official: "Xuan is your last name?"
Xuan: "Yes"
Official: "So your family name is Xuan"
Xuan: "No, MY name is Xuan. Nguyen is the family name"
Official: "..."
Xuan: "It's Nguyen The To Diem Thanh Xuan"
Official: "...and the family name is Nguyen?"
Xuan: "Yes."
Official: "So... Xuan The To Diem Thanh Nguyen"
Xuan: "No."
Official: "Ehm... I'm just gonna put it down like this."
The way Xuan explained it to me (and it took a couple of minutes) her last name is Nguyen The. If she were to get married, she keeps Nguyen and the "The" would change to the name of her spouse's family name. To Diem is actually her middle name and Thanh Xuan is her first name. As is in Japanese, the presentation of names is reversed. Family name presented first and then given name. To Xuan, the presentation order makes sense in terms of what comes first, what comes second and what comes last. In reality, by Western standards her name should be presented as Thanh Xuan To Diem Nguyen The. As it stands right now, the government knows her as The To Diem Thanh Xuan Nguyen on her Citizenship and Drivers license, Xuan The To Diem Thanh Nguyen on her SIN card and Xuan The Nguyen on her health card. Fun fun... I figured, for now let's get at least most of these consistent even if it's F'ed up and we'll worry about correctly changing it when she gets back from Mexico. So, after we got her passport sorted, we went up to the fourth floor of the Sinclair building to Services Canada to wait in yet another line to get that figured out.
We walked down Denman after eating and noticed we were CLEARLY in the gay part of town. I'm not sure what gave it away the most. The Rainbow flags along the light standards, the scantily clad, buff make posters advertising gay porn and fetish wear or the pink garbage cans and bus stops. Hmmmm.... Entertaining anyways. We had a good laugh. Nice to see the community getting out there. I don't think they'd get away with that in Calgary.
At the west end of Denman we turned North and headed back towards Robson. We walked along the busy sidewalk full of young hipsters and tourists as we window shopped and took in the sights. We had a boo at the skating rink and inquired about the zipline over Robson (which is apparently free if you don't mind the wait. It was three hours when we asked about it). We turned down Granville, stopped in at the Olympic Superstore at the Bay which was a complete zoo still. Apparently a new shipment of red mittons had arrived and they had been snapped up in a hurry with only a handful of small gloves left. As we were leaving we saw people in line hoarding them. Some carrying five or six pairs. Nutty.
As we headed towards the SkyTrain station we passed a Rogers booth and I stopped to inquire about the cost and logistics of switching my number to a BC number. I thought if it wasn't going to cost too much and not be a total hassle I might do it so that I didn't have to keep paying long distance fees. As it turned out it cost nothing and I was able to switch it in about 30 seconds. Shocking. I was expecting to have to do some negotiating and this was just far too easy. Amazing. had I known this I would have switched it sooner. I spent most of the ride home texting the people I knew in vancouver about my new number.
We finally made it home around 7:30. It had been a full day and both of us were tired. I think it's going to be an early night tonight.
Reason to smile today: After waiting in lines all day, being able to switch my cell number out in no time at all with no cost and no changes to my phone plan. Wow. How easy was that.
Something I learned today: Changing your cell number when you move provinces is wicked easy. If only all services could be this easy and hassle free.
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