Kits, Kitsilano, Khatsahlano, Khats

On the first day of summer the sun sets on the Sechelt Peninsula. On the last day, UBC. I know this because last week I watched it, and yesterday only confirmed it. The sun sets on UBC.

It wasn't hard to find parking at 4:45 PM. Only a couple of blocks from Kits Beach, which is fine because I like to see what people are doing in their gardens. Kits Point is park-like now, like West of Denman has been for the last fifty years.

A small picnic at the beach, then a visit to our old stomping grounds -- and I'm talking getting "served" (alcohol) at sixteen and thinking we'd stolen the world stomping grounds -- the King's Head. A strange place to return to, the King's Head has the same Jailhouse Rock interior architecture as it did in the 1970s, only now it's designation has gone from minimum to maximum.

A place like the King's Head could not get built today. Go see it for yourself.

Kerrisdale Laneway

The lane just west of West Boulevard (Arbutus), linking West 41st to West 42nd. In the distance, the Kerrisdale Community Centre, more a place for seniors these days than for kids.

Years ago there was no retaining wall between the lane and the lawn of the apartment building the Greek family managed. Nor was there a hedge. Properties often bled into public space, and vice versa. Lines were hazy. Not every boulevard had a curb. Sometimes there'd be no sidewalk.

I'm interested in the wooden border atop the retaining wall. Is it simply decorative, or is it holding back the soil? And if so, more at the flat end than over the sloped part? I can see its author feeling there's something incomplete about having the wooden border at the flat end and not up the slope, where it can disappear politely into a bush.

Khatsahlano Days

NADUH performed at Sun Yat Sen Gardens yesterday, an evening that included tattooing and, if I'm not mistaken, public marriages. I thought I would take in the band's show after walking the length of Khatsahlano Days (from McDonald to Burrard and back), but I took in too much sun and was done by the time I reached my car.

Khatsahlano Days also had public marriages, so this is thing now, I guess. As for the rest of it, I thought there would be more evidence of those who were there in the late-1960s, the ornamental hippies of past Days, but the only body artists on display this time were those promoting gyms and pole dancing. As for the descendants of those who were there when Chief Khatsahlano's presided, I saw no more than three booths operated by Indigenous people. Heritage Vancouver was also absent.