Homeless in Vancouver: You really had to be there

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      This panorama photo looks east down the alley on the south side of West Broadway. My back is to the alley on the east side of Granville Street. Closest to the viewer on their right-hand side is the back of Fire Hall No. 4 and beside that is the back of the Firehall Vancouver Public Library branch.

      On the other side of the alley is the back of Jordans, a large, family-owned, furniture store.

      Last year, Jordans began gussying up the alley entrance to their building with modern-looking brown metal cladding. Just in the last two weeks they have added a very large lightbox sign. So it would seem that they’ve decided to showcase the alley-side entrance to their store—perhaps the street side on West Broadway now looks a bit too “street” for the carriage trade, which is their bread and butter.

      Record of the day’s briefly sunny disposition

      Probably the best that can be said of the above panorama is that it worked—which is more than can be said for all but one of my last few attempts at large, multiphoto composites.

      It conveys little of what made the scene impressive when I was standing there this morning, particularly the clouds and the sunshine.

      As I was snapping successive photos, the sun was being veiled and increasingly unveiled by the clouds. By the 30th photo or so, the sun was in full command of the sky. It really looked like we were in for beautiful sunny spring day.

      But no sooner had I taken the last photo, comprising the bottom left-hand corner of the panorama, than clouds, which had somehow sneaked up behind me, completely swallowed up the sun—which hasn’t been seen since.

      Stanley Q. Woodvine is a homeless resident of Vancouver who has worked in the past as an illustrator, graphic designer, and writer.

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