Shall I compare thee to a Vancouver season?


Burrard Inlet, May 2022, as seen from a very notorious institution. Only if I could describe the relief after taking this photo...

Finally, much to my lengthy wait, the torrential drizzles of Vancouver visited less frequently, except for the nocturnal downpours that crystalize the grass blades outside the front yard and leave ugly mud stains on my shoes when I pass to school. Well into May, the season is still lingering between the wet spring and the sunny summer, just like me dallying between which college to send scores from AP exams (which, by the way, I have just finished last week!). I could eventually get outside more often and enjoy the sunshine without having to put on my gigantic winter jacket. Everything seems to be entrenched in an everlasting aura of vivacity, from the tulips drooping their heavy purple crowns to the bushes filled with the chirpings of little winged beasts. The joyous springtime daylight has replaced the murky wintertime darkness, as evidenced by the faint glow from the east well before 6 AM and the sound of lawnmowers echoing around 10 PM. 


Watching ducks on a rainy day - a new pastime, I suppose?

With the advent of spring starts the rehaul of my circadian cycle. I have never considered myself a morning person, judging by my vain attempts to resist my eyelids from drooping at first block and most of the posts on this blog being published within the last three hours of the day. My morning routine on school days even adds to the pain: waking up at sharp 7 (with school starting at 8:30 and being a 10-minute drive away from home!) and walking through an endlessly winding street to get to school. Many a rainy morning on the way to school have I mumbled under my breath as I drag myself and my lead-like bag through the muddy train tracks that pierced the woods while praying that I wouldn't slip down the stream below (which was at most 1 meter deep but who knows). However, as April receded and May came by, my daily trip slowly turned into a mini field trip. The train tracks by the creek are now adorned with pristine white rapeseed flowers; the birch trees have grown their jubilant leaves to shade a tired student walking to school; the bowl-sized poppies fluttering beside the towering irises. The whole neighborhood looks like every inch in an everlasting spring, which we all know will go down the drain once November appears on the doorstep again.

 Tulips, tulips, tulips!


A cascade of cherry blossoms

Weekend mornings are even better. I could wake up before the blinding sun streak fill my bedroom, top off my breakfast (the newly-discovered holy combination of toast, tuna, and pickles) with a mug of hot chocolate, and hop on the car to anywhere with a nice coastline and good gelato. After knowing every in-and-out of Fisherman's Wharf, where we spent 95% of our budget on shrimps sold by dear Vietnamese fishermen, we headed to White Rock for a fresh change. The long drive was worth every cent of the gasoline (in these days!), albeit slightly spoilt with the pungent smell of fertilizers along the Steveston Highway leading to Delta. If Steveston is a bustling seaside neighborhood with flocks of tourists, White Rock is the more tranquil version, resembling more closely to Charlottetown. This little town on the south corner of Surrey still bears the remnants from the early 20th century, with a rusty train track winding along a long pier (dating to 1914) stretching to the very end of the shallow waters. A museum with a cobalt green banner and daguerreotypes lining the windows stands modestly along the shady sidewalks. Stately houses take over the rugged cliffs, below which lie cozy candle boutiques, gelateries, and bars flocked with diners from sunrise to sunset. Still, my history side does sometimes subside to the foodie side with the tantalizing aroma of fried tacos filling the salty air.

Sunny White Rock, ready to lull you into a midday slumber


"I want to get out of the train and go back
To see what they were beside the track" - Robert Frost

But the glory of afternoons still enchants me the most. After a scorching cloudless noon, the afternoon breezes return as a sweet endnote to the day. Everything is brimming with life, bursting out their last efforts to be indulged in the majestic sunlight before darkness descends. Sparrows circle the sky, filling the air with their saccharine songs; dandelions sway their golden crowns to the rhythm of the day; weeping birches untangle their hair, which is adorned with exquisitely-rimmed leaves, to let them flow with the wind. The farewell to daylight was so I slowly tread on the lush green carpet, feeling to trample the last fuchsia petals of cherry blossoms scattering all around like firecracker leftovers after a spring festival. The park, aside from the occasional chirping of towhees or a cracking tree branch, is glorious in the stillness of dusk. I linger by a patch of garden cultivated by students from an elementary school near my house. The hand-painted signs, featuring colorful scribbles and caricatures of fuzzy vegetables of all shapes and sizes, add a spark of life to the tiny garden among the vast playfield. 

While strolling around, my thoughts again wander to the realm of words constantly prospering inside me. In Vietnamese, the word for "dusk" is actually composed of two parts: "ráng", which means "trying", and "chiều", which means "afternoon." Put the two parts together, and you will have "dusk" roughly translated as "retaining afternoon." I had never realized the poetic semantics of my mother tongue until when my mother told me this interesting fact on a Friday afternoon, after relishing dinner. We were admiring the sunset behind the row of weeping willows that lined the neighboring houses, our ears filled with the cries of seagulls finding their next. The sun was radiating its last efforts to paint everything in a majestic palette of gold, while amoeboid shapes of silhouettes were starting to creep in. Retaining the last bits of the afternoon. Sometimes life doesn't get any more poetic than that.

Late afternoon walk, accompanied by a few overly friendly mosquitoes


Sunset on the rooftop of Vancouver Public Library - Central Branch. 




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