I loved going
to New York City to stay with an aunt. She was a Canadian diplomat with access
to all kinds of interesting people and places. But perhaps the best time with
her, was when I went to stay with her whilst working (for a very short time) on a photography
exhibition at Time Life Inc.
Aunt Mary had a
one bedroom rent controlled apartment at 84th and Park Avenue West.
(Her upstairs neighbour was Greta Garbo, with whom I had a lovely visit.)
Mary’s mother and brother lived in palatial splendor in a grand home on a
double lot here in Vancouver. Their home was exquisitely landscaped and lit.
The first time
I went to Mary’s she showed me a hydro bill for a month’s electricity for her
mother’s estate here and then she showed me her one-month hydro bill for her
one bedroom and her bill was vastly larger.
“That’s why we
only have toast on Sunday, we don't take showers and why baths only two inches
deep,” she told me on my first visit.
In my early
twenties, I went to live in Nice where I developed close friendships with two
Niçois. Through them I learned how expensive living spaces were on the Riviera
and I often heard stories about why and how fast land and home prices had
escalated over time.
In my thirties,
I took artists to Florence for art tours and to spend time in an atelier there.
My local contact was a couple: He had the bus and drove my clients and I to all
the sites and she was our guide—she had a PhD in renaissance art history. Both
Catarina and Massimo were from multi-generational Florentine families and their
real estate stories were chilling.
All the
conversations with my friends in Manhattan, Nice and Florence about the cost of
life and housing came up naturally. The cost of real estate is not an interest
of mine but the insights of my friends have been in the forefront of my mind as
I hear incredibly naïve people here talk about real estate prices. People are
going mad and saying things that reveal a shocking lack of understanding of
both capitalism and the inevitabilities of life in a highly desirable city.
They talk about
foreign buyers and the need for government action so I ask them: “What kind of
action?” You should hear the things they say. I also ask them; “Why are you
talking about real estate prices at a party anyway?” Everyone has an opinion
that seems to come from frustrated ambition and hearsay.
I sympathize
with those who find themselves unable to break into the real estate market
here. But they talk like victims who want their daddy (government) to help them
out. They love hearing how high Vancouver scores on global “best cities of the
world” lists, but they don’t like the consequences.
I also owe a
great debt to my ninth grade geography teacher. Geography was, perhaps, my
favourite subject and one day Mr. Grimmet said something like this: “Vancouver
will have an incredible future for three reasons—water, air and youth. In the
future, the most valuable commodities will be fresh water and clean air and
Vancouver has both and our youth allows our urban planners to benefit from the
planning mistakes and triumphs of the older cities of the world.”
The he added,
“But it’s going to get awfully expensive to live here because we are compressed
between the ocean, the mountains and the agricultural land reserve between us
and the border.”
His insight and
my foreign travel experience have given me a rich context for understanding life
in my city.
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