Mount Pleasant alley offered refuge for those avoiding the fireworks crowds

Viva Vancouver is billed as a program that turns street places into people places.

That's obvious to anyone who has attended TaiwanFest, Greek Day, or Carnaval del Sol.

But last night, Viva Vancouver transformed a back alley in Mount Pleasant into a lively open-air market.

In the lane just west of Main Street between East Broadway and East 8th Avenue, there were arts and crafts, tasty treats from Chutney Villa, and even a film presentation by Ana Mateescu, a well-known documentary maker in her home country of Romania.

It was a refreshing alternative for those who wanted something a little more easygoing than a night at English Bay with 300,000 other people watching fireworks.

Mateescu told me that she has covered some major world events in the past, including visiting the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. Now, she's filming vignettes of people in Mount Pleasant, which she hopes to pull together in what she calls an "interactive documentary".

Below, you can see what things looked like in the alley last night.