A Sunny day in Vancouver

August 2024

One week has passed since I came to Vancouver and I still haven’t had the opportunity to explore the city with my cousin. On a Sunday afternoon, I finally got the chance to leave the house after giving Adhan to my toddler nephew who was born three days before. It is a mix of religious and cultural traditions for us. We recite the call for prayer on right ear of the toddle and then tell him what his name is. There was debate over his name, but fortunately the name the name that I preferred was chosen. Then after making prayer and taking pictures, we are off to explore the city for the first and last time before I leave for the glorious city of Sacramento a couple of days later.

Okay two of us are now on a journey. He is my oldest friend by the way. We have many cringy secrets from childhood. He is very social compared to me. I am a person who barely knows a guy. But he is like a stereotypical Italian who knows a guy who know a guys who know a guys. It is probably because he is very talkative. The rest of the commute, was filled with conversation about our playlist and majors. He thinks my songs are too romantic and calm, which is true. But recently it has been mostly Coke Studio’s sufistic style music. I am not a hater but his musics irritates my soul. Probably because I am an old fashioned person who does not enjoy songs that are used in TikTok videos.

But anyways, he suddenly started playing romantic songs and I started making fun of him. He played the song “Do I Wanna Know” from Arctic Monkeys. He then said this is the song played in Peaky Blinders. But I assumed that probably they made an edit video of Peaky Blinders badass scenes and added this song. I was sure for some reason that the song was not played in the series. Then he pulled up a video from Youtube, although, I was still not sure but I just said ok sure. Then I said “It is crazy how much influence this tv show had on the young generation of Afghanistan”. The reason I said this was because I saw with my own eyes how obsessed we became in the 2018 and 2019 years with this show. Everyone was imitating Tommy Shelby and wanted to be Sigma like him. I told him a story of a friend of mine who was trying to say that cheating is ok because Tommy Shelby was with many girls but Grace had a special place in his heart all the time. He did not fully agree with me. I told him that movies and shows and influencers puts us inside a circle of influence. He then told me that those people can say the same for us. We cannot say we are outside a circle. I was mad because he actually made a good argument and I didnt know what to say for a while. I responded by saying that in our case, our circle is defined by books we consider divine. He agreed with what I said and I felt good making that comeback.

Then our discussion changed to views about Islam. I told him I cannot make sense of certain groups of people because they consider themselves atheist not because they dont or cant believe in a creator, but to offend a group of Muslims who hurt them in the past. I just don't see the truth or sincerity there. I only see hatred there. Then he told me about a time he argued with one person from that group in his job. The person asked how can you believe in God when you cant see Him. My cousin said he responded by saying how can you believe in the Earth is round when you cant see it yourself. I dont remember the rest of that conversation. Then he mentioned a friend of his who wanted to become a Muslim but didn't want to leave the party life. I told him its okay you can invite him, but he said not now because when you become a Muslim, all your previous sins are forgiven. “I dont want him to become a muslim and then go back to the party life again”.

We stopped at his house to pick up the Camera. There, I asked him why he did not want me to meet his friends in the gym last night. He told me he was hesitant to introduce me to his friends because I was too “liberal” for them and he was shy about it. I was not even mad. It made me laugh when he said it. Because that is a wild assumption about me. I told him if you really want to know what I believe in and what my views are, ASK ME THE RIGHT QUESTIONS. But it was too late. I cannot change his opinion. Then we talked about our majors and how it affects our characters. He thinks Cybersecurity made him too conservative to talk about his personal life and even liar in some cases. I said Economics allowed me to form a new way of thinking about the world where apple-to-apple comparison plays an important role in it. And oh by the way, I didn’t allow him to drive so he is mad about that too and talks about how I will miss the exits when we arrive in North Vancouver. And there we are after 45ish minutes in Capilano Bridge parking. In my phone, it shows that there is 9 minutes left until Asr prayer. I am confused and don’t know whether we should wait and pray in the parking or go to the park immediately. He convinced me to pray later which ultimately led to interesting conversations later. We are inside the park the next minute. Btw he has been telling me a lot about this park and how he managed to buy a 135$ ticket for each of us. I still cannot believe a ticket for a park where tourists cross a bridge and look at beautiful scenes costs 135$. I don’t want to fact check him. I like to believe that my ticket costs 135$. 

We go inside and enter the famous suspension bridge soon. It reminded me of a old bridge in my hometown Baghlan in Afghanistan which was called Larzanak. It sounded funny to me back then and it means “Shaky”. My cousin is behind me and I am behind a family of four I think. The bridge is shaking way more than I expected. Sometimes it gets a lot worse. I keep my hand on the handles to control myself. But as I look back, I see my cousin not holding on to anything. I know exactly why he was doing it. He wants to look cool. But wait I want to look cool too. I let go of my hand and try to walk the rest of the bridge without holding my hands to the handles. Diversity in Vancouver is unbelievable. You see people from all races walking past you. The view from the bridge by the way is very beautiful. It was dark green which is not something I see in Sacramento. The bridge is probably 100 meters tall with a small stream of water below us. I only see a fisherman down there. I wanted to go next to the river but I found out that it wasn’t part of the park.  We cross the bridge in like 2-3 minutes and there is a beautiful mix of trails and scenery on the other side. There is a short discussion over whether to buy coffee before or after walking the train. We decided to walk first. It was unlike anything I have seen before. I experienced walking a trail between big trees for the first time. It is closest to nature you can get in a safe and sound way. 

My cousin has a Sony camera with him. I asked him to start taking pictures. He wanted me to pose for a picture. But it is very difficult for me to pose. And I am acting cool so I tell him to just “take natural pictures of me, I cannot pose for you”. He shows his disappointment. My pictures are mixed with those he took with me half knowing and those where I posed but in a shy way. I was not satisfied when I looked at my photos. They looked fake and repetitive and cliche to me. It kept looking like that until Boom. He managed the capture the picture that I call perfect. It does not need any editing at all. I would even pay him for a picture like that. We finish the trail between the trees and walk down to some beautiful handmade sceneries. Like the one below. I saw a creature in the water that was swimming in a funny way. I still dont know whether it was a frog or a fly. Normally it should be a frog, but why are they so skinny. 

A while ago, I looked at a map and saw a place where they showcased rare hunting birds including hawk and falcon. I walked past the falcon which was on a man’s hand who looked like he was in his 70s. He looked friendly and I wanted to ask about the falcon. But another person was talking to him about some trip to a place. It actually bothered me. I mean you have a rare beautiful falcon in front of you and the guy is literally holding it in his hand, how can you talk about a random trip. But anyways I walk past him and saw think next sections seemed empty so I was disappointed. And my cousin also wanted to leave. But suddenly next to their qafas, I saw a woman who was on his late 50s holding an angry looking dark brown hawk in her hand. We pause and my cousin takes a picture. But then he asks me to leave. How can I leave man? There is a woman who had thousands of things to share about the beautiful wild creature in her hand. It is complete injustice for us to take a picture and then leave. So I hesitate to leave and the woman realizes that I am interested in knowing about the hawk. I ask whether they are local to this place. But to my surprise, they are found in Arizona ane Southwest of US. But they breed them in some facilities in Vancouver. I continued asking and the obviously the beautiful lady was interested in talking about it. I found out that they prey animals like rabbit in a group. Sometimes their groups consists of 20 of them. People train them for hunting. But when they hunt, their intention is to eat it themselves. So you have to trade something to them to get the animal they hunt. They are loyal to their owners, but you don’t want to break their trust. I also learned that they can cut your finger with their sharp mouth according to the lady and also the power of their claws is powerful than the most strong human being which is crazy. Mongolians were actually good in a training them for hunting. 

We said goodbye and then I thought about Mongolians after she mentioned it. I thought about the horror the first group of communities who were attacked by them faced. It must have been terrifying and brutal. I mentioned it to my cousin and then the conversation went to Ghost of Tsushima. We take a picture at one last beautiful scene before going back to the other side of the bridge. We walk a little bit more and then start to slowly leave the park. He goes to the restroom, and I sit next to a tall man who seems to be thinking deeply about something. I sit next to him hoping that he would start a conversation, but no. Then I started thinking what he might be thinking about. Maybe about his job tomorrow and leftover work from last week. Or probably about a recent interaction with a person at work or a recent trip.

Anyways, after looking at the pictures and feeling good about myself, we leave the park. He starts driving and I take him a to a mosque in North Vancouver. We see a bunch of guys outside the mosque before parking the car. My cousin starts making excuses but I force him to join me. We meet the people outside and I realize that they are all Turks. The invite us for the Jammat. I asked which part of Turkey they are from and they responded by saying mostly Istanbul. I said a close friend of mine is from Izmir. We then start praying. Damn. I wish I could go back in time and pray again. Instead of understanding the verses and reflecting upon it, I was thinking about what questions to ask the guys after the prayer. Anyways, the prayer finishes. I ask them whether they are students. Some of them working and some of them students. Normally, I speak English when I interact with Afghans and Turks. I don’t say immediately that I know their language. But my cousin told them that I know Turkish. We had a short discussion about how I learned it and my university etc. And then we say goodbye. I say “Görüşürüz” knowing that it will make them laugh. They looked very friendly and kind. I didn’t know there was a big Turkish population in Vancouver.

After that, we are unsure where to go. It is between RecRoom and home. But my cousin remembered a good ice cream place and we went there and met the Turkish group of friends again. Then after increasing our sugar levels, we go home to relax and plan the next move. On the way, I was feeling proud about myself asking people questions and how it reveals so many truths. I tell my cousin: “You know what, asking questions is an art on itself”. He told me that I need to improve a lot. He told me I was aggressive with the Turkish group of friends and didn’t let them talk by constantly asking questions one after the other like FBI. It is funny because it is true. I don’t know why. Probably because I was excited to meet new people and connect with them quickly. But the truth is, asking the right questions is an art on itself. I remember telling him that I actually learned about a whole life story of an immigrant in a 10-15 minutes meeting in a gym just by asking questions truly being curious about it. So sincerity is important here.

Anyways, we decided to go to RecRoom. I felt bad spending 50$ on the RecRoom credits. But it was a lot more fun than I expected. The machines and facilities were higher in quality than what I have seen in America. We spent a lot of time on a Formula One simulator which made me feel less bad about spending money because I like F1 and love driving. We tried many other games including Basketball and Hunting and I somehow manage to beat my cousin in almost all of them. Again diversity is present in everywhere around Vancouver. The day is ended and I take him to his apartment. I drive home and start to think about some stuff that my cousin said. I think about how I can improve the way I ask questions. I think about writing down everything that happened today. I think about a time when I was told that my writing is a transparent door to my thoughts. I think about writing. The End

“Vancouver, I either conquer you or you Conquer me.” Said no one ever.