Our third full day in Vancouver has us seeing a variety of museums of the native art kind and some more variety of food meals. Yesterday we were at Richmond and had Chinese/Asian food for the whole day, today it’s a bit different but more of the same. So it should be more chill and require less walking, so let’s see how that goes.

We got up relatively late today, after a long night yesterday, this day is intentionally a bit more chill by design. We are going to the Bill Reid gallery, which is one of the most popular/famous indigenous Haida artist in Canada. Even here, you can’t avoid the steps of nature.

After paying for entry, $13 per person we were let inside. We were the first ones to go in as the gallery opens at 10am. They have a number of sculptures in this Haida style, one of the most popular native art styles.

Info on Bill Reid and some statue he made. Ok. He’s like half white hence you can probably never tell he is native. Died in 1998, RIP.

You would expect the gallery to have a lot of his work and art but I would say a good at least 70% of the works shown are by his immediate students/apprentices and or other young native artists in the Haida style, which is kind of deceiving considering the name of the gallery.

A mini prototype version of his magnum opus work, some raven on some shell with humans, apparently a creation story in Haida culture. OK, but where is the final product?

The ‘gallery’ only has two levels, and I am now standing on the second level, it’s just a upper overlook with a single additional room with some random shit. Some tour group came in and their guide was talking a lot about Bill Reid and Haida art, ok I guess but isn’t this gallery kind of small?

Other than that other room on the left, this ‘gallery’ had nothing else in with. What the fuck lol? This museum sucks ass holy shit, what a scam. $13 for a couple of pieces by Bill and most by his students, and it’s super small, just this main room and this upper level. Shit’s a scam, would not recommend there are better places to see native art, just not here.

We needed to kill some time from the gallery since it was so shit to wait for our next event/meal reservation so we went into this grocery store we never saw before, called Urban Fare. It was pretty fancy and nice, not bad.

And here is our next location for the day, Ding Tai Fung, the fancy chain from Taiwan known for their xiao long bao soup dumplings and other traditional Taiwanese food dishes.

This is apparently the first Canadian location in Vancouver and according to my sister, you need to do reservations a month earlier to even get a table. Wow. Even still, there was a line up in the front, some people asking for take out, which they allowed. The restaurant itself is on the second level so for once, elevator is recommended here.

Inside they have their mascot in a nice statue, how cute.

The place itself is quite fancy and very sleek, more upscale and posh than any Chinese restaurant that I’ve been to in recent memory. The main target customers is apparently westerners/white people so you can expect good service and clean nice atmosphere.

Our table, not bad spot. The table beside us was interesting. Apparently one of these guys actually works here lol, for some reason he took his friends out to the restaurant he works at on his day off. We only realized later when all the staff were like, what are you doing here? and being jokes with him. Wow, even workers want to eat at this place, kind of rare.

They have a regular menu but you order via a piece of paper and pen, good shit. Proof of sitting at DTF, wow.

Also my own proof of existence holding menu edition with our waiter/server on the right looking odd. His name is Yuta, he’s probably Japanese. Wow, ok.

Thank you so much, for showing me de whey.

Soy, vinegar and ginger huh for dumplings. The ginger wasn’t separately cut enough so it’s just one big clump, ahwell.

We got these pork ribs, they are a bit like sweet and sour but with more vinegar in it, I can’t remember the name for these but I’ve had them before, at like other places and in grocery store food meals. Kinda mid but sure.

Their famous soup dumplings were alright, it’s pretty base as well. They are good but nothing especially stand out.

Some dumplings we got in a clear soup broth. Pretty damn good actually, the soup is very savory and clean, very good umami flavor tho. The dumplings I think were like kurobuta pork and veggie, most of their dumplings you have a choice between the fancy pork or with shrimp combined.

The same kurobuta pork dumplings but not soup type and with shrimp within them. Pretty good shit, I think these are way better than the normal soup dumplings, even though these have no soup, they still had alot of juice inside them.

Taiwanese cabbage stir-fried with garlic. lol I can make this shit at home, but regardless it’s still good. Good for palate cleansing and something crunchy to chew, good shit.

Beef noodle soup with brisket. Not great, pretty mid really. The beef was tender and tasty but the broth was very weak and generic, the noodles not that great either, no hand made. I’ve had far better beef noodle soups at home, one of the weakest dishes we ordered today.

Another selection of steamed dumplings, more gyoza type with kurobuta and veggie, pretty solid good shit. Nice shape too, has some nice chew.

Sweet chili oil kurobuta pork shrimp dumplings, this one I think was the best overall. Shit’s pretty good, well balanced and very umami flavor, not that spicy actually, good shit.

Some good ol chicken fried rice. The way it’s cooked is very similar to salt fish and chicken fried rice…but just without the salt fish. Good shit, but costly honestly without the salt fish.

Having the time of their lives, I am not exactly sure which was works here but my guess is the guy in the blue shirt. Overall I would say Ding Tai Fung is a worth it experience, if not just to see what’s all the hype about, it meets the hype reasonably well, given curtain conditions. Like for instance, if we were to exclude price into the factor, it’s a solid 7.5, it’s standard but good Chinese/Taiwan stuff, some items lacking but some better than others, with their main thing, dumplings living up to expectations. However, if you factor in cost, then it goes down to 7 because damn, you are paying white people restaurant prices, it’s very overpriced and expensive and they largely can get away with it because the service and decor/atmosphere are very good. I would recommend it, at least once, but if you care alot about prices, then I would say probably not.

After DTF, we got an Uber to our next location, MOA or the UBC Museum Of Anthropology, home to a large collection of native art and other old relic shit. MOA is kind of out of the way, it’s hard to get to because there is no public trains or transit to it, it’s located in UBC, university of British Columbia which is far west, far from DT Vancouver. Hence the need to Uber.

It costs about $26 per person to get inside, hope it is worth it after the great disappointment and scam of the Bill Reid gallery. Straight up, it look like I will be getting my money out of this place already, shit looks pretty big with a lot of stuff.

Entering there alot of big native stuff on display with artist and history which is all cool. Good shit for history and context.

They have a large collection of totem poles owned by the university, apparently most of these were collected in the early 1900’s because the fear that no more would be created since native Haida culture was dying out and they were being culturally assimilated (suppressed by white people and colonialism over the years) in order to preserve them so they are not forgotten. Luckily they did not die out and native people even today are still making them, nice.

This mask looks like this expression I have been making lately, the ‘o’ mouth I guess lol.

Wow, pretty big gangster shit here. Could be a boss in some game.

The opening area of the museum is already quite impressive, way more shit than the Bill Reid scam gallery.

The building itself displays the totems and other relics quite nicely in the light, cool shit.

They also provide ample seats and places to sit down and rest which is also a nice thing, gotta take it all in I guess and sit and chill there, even in the opening area.

Inside a fancy door, they have more traditional museum like spaces like this displaying masks and shit, nice.

Some items they even encourage you to touch them because why not, it’s not like some of these are priceless, this one could very well have been made to be touched and made recently.

Ah yes, the full sized large raven shell sculpture that I saw a prototype mini version of is here, the real big one. Pretty good shit. This is Bill Reids magnum opus, they dedicated a whole area with seating circle just for this, pretty good shit.

Another room had an art installation of an native artist women that projected a video on this water falls, pretty cool area and idea.

Other parts of the museum feel like a regular art gallery in nature, with the lighting and spacing.

This women’s art is pretty baller, talking about moments in native history like this guy fucking shit up for Canada and Quebec at the meech lake accords.

Other parts of the museum are just so jam packed full of shit they just don’t have enough space for it all. While this place focuses on native art, they have a huge collection of other shit from all around the world too like asia, africa, australia, india etc. This guy got so overwhelmed, he passed out. Some people just can’t handle the MOA at the UBC I guess.

Some Indian crazy crab thing, looking kinda jokes.

Some sculptures from Africa, some tribe, they look super creepy and monster like, straight up monster designs that can be enemies in video-games, is what I thought.

Tibetan shit, nice.

Puppets from asia/taiwan, this is just straight up thunderbolt fantasy lol.

Proof of samurai bait, every museum needs a collection of Japanese samurai armor, because they have to, the bait is just too strong.

Proof of existence, crazy ass face masks making the same face that I do sometimes, jokes.

In another area they have a large collection of European plates and ceramics, but no one cares about that, place is like dead and empty.

These are pretty cool but I have no idea, they made of ceramics I guess.

After spending a considerably amount of time at the MOA, about 2.5 hours I can safely say that our money was well spent. There is alot of shit to see and even then we just kind of skimmed it, good shit, probably the best musuem that we have seen on this trip, would recommend if your willing to go out this far from DT Vancouver.

After a half hour long Uber drive back into the city center, we asked to be dropped off at in Chinatown, in front of New Town Bakery, which isn’t actually that new and has been in operation in this location for 45 years, since 1980.

While Chinatown over the past number of years has gotten a reputation of becoming a wasteland hub of homeless and hooligans, at least this chinese bakery is still doing great and is probably the most famous thing in this area still in operation. Their most popular bolabola bao bun, which has a whole bunch of shit inside of it.

Whenever I see videos on what to see/eat in Vancouver, this place often comes up as a thing to see in Chinatown, even tho it’s ruinville central now. To me it just seems like a regular Chinese bakery, but we’ll see. Some of their shit is overpriced like the the Bola Bola bao and even hot dog bun etc.

I mean, people also say their egg tart is also good shit here but they were sold out. Ahwell. If they have white people and blacks coming here to get shit, then I guess it must be good/famous then.

Because we have a long day tomorrow in a questionable food location, we ended up buying some more buns like curry, hot dog etc for tomorrow. Nice box you know.

The famous bolabola bao that is being hyped online for this location for some reason.

Open that shit up and it’s a bunch of shit inside. Hmm, I am not sure about this thing, I think it’s more Filipino than Chinese and after a quick look online, I guess it is? I have no idea. Chinese people making Filipino baos? I guess that checks out I guess, even way back in 1980’s and beyond. It’s ok, not really my thing tho.

I believe this is a cultural museum/center for that Chinese museum of history thing that I was briefly involved in but didn’t go through. Too bad, they were closed, it’s a Sunday after all.

If you walk further down into Chinatown you eventually hit a point where you know it’s where the homeless people hang out and chill. Here is that spot, they are chilling sitting there, hmm.

This Chinatown BBQ place is also a highlighted second thing/reason people say to go to to visit Chinatown, seems a bit generic, but who knows. There is so much other Chinese shit in Richmond, it’s not surprising that this place is dying and falling apart, most of the shops are closed and abandoned.

Chinese cultural center huh, nice, closed and empty with homeless white women just chilling there sleeping. Man, it’s rough here.

The only people walking the streets here are foolish tourists like ourselves and homeless, looking for a glimmer of hope and liveliness, but there are more of these empty and abandoned stores than active shops, by a large margin.

We reach one of those standard gate things you normally see to signify Chinatown or something. The only face I can make is I guess “I dunno man?” was it worth coming here got see two shops? Probably not but I like ruin so it was worth it for me. Proof of existence, making it out alive in Chinatown without getting mugged or shot success I guess?

In the next block there is another large shopping complex, which hopefully has more activity, it’s in Chinatown still kinda. A quick look inside seems not really.

Looks like the majority of this mall is abandoned and closed up as well, what the hell I guess? We dead?

While walking, some drug addict/homeless guy can running, probably because he stole some shit and was tackled by security guards, right in front of us. Wow, what a piece of the action, how immersive, I love it.

Upstairs they also had a large food-court, mostly dead and unused, with like maybe 5-6 places still operating. Most are just shut closed down.

Whats interesting is that this place actually has a Cineplex built inside it that is still showing movies, meaning that at one point in time, this mall was alot better and alive. Kind of sad.

I’d roughly guess that about 70% of all units in this mall are either empty or abandoned wow. We are approaching Dragon Center levels of activity and abandonment, wow.

Outside the mall, apparently called the International Village Mall, is home to tons of homeless and addicts just chilling and yea. This dude in the wheelchair isn’t faring any better i don’t think. It is quite sad that Chinatown and the immediate area has become so ruined, i’m sure at one point in the past it could have been something but it looks like revitalization attempts have failed and has just stagnated and died out left to be abandoned. Maybe one day that will happen but that’s not today, too bad.

After safely making it out of Chinatown with our buns and health, we go to our dinner for the day. This Mexican place called La Casita in gastown.

We made reservation for 7pm but since we got here so early, like at 6pm, we asked to be seated earlier and they did. They put us in the patio because inside had no more tables but yea, that would prove to be a mistake in the long run.

After a look a the menu we gave our orders, I got a fancy drink, i think called sunrise casita, it’s alright but too expensive, rum with some other fruit shit in it, like yea.

We ordered nachos and it was pretty good shit, noice. Things were looking up but then the wait happened. After our nachos came, our table was basically forgotten about for the next half an hour. Man, what the fuck. Other people outside in the patio got seated later than us and their food came faster than ours, like that the hell is this?

Things were getting restless and I went inside to check and find a washroom, the bottom floor of the place was empty because they were understaffed, they totally could have had more people/tables but they have like only 3 waiters for the like everyone, it’s not enough.

After I got back from my washroom break in the basement, our food finally came after we complained about how long it was taking. The waiter came and gave us more excuses but whatever. I ordered some Al pastor pork tacos but they were not grilled on a big spinning meat thing, they looked like pan fried in a pan, didn’t have any grill or charcoal flavor either. The double tortillas were also shit, soggy and tasteless white flour ones. The other shit like rice and beans were also mid. Pretty shit mid tacos, sad since the people working seemed like they were Mexican.

My mom’s chimichangas or something, kinda mid shit too she says.

My sister’s chicken mole with tortillas. Mid she says, not that much chicken, she had way better. With that said, I think this was the worst dinner meal that we had on this trip thus far, fucking Mexicans man, fuck. Shit was expensive, service was shit, super slow, forgot about our table and the food was shit, how do you fuck up and have soggy tortillas in a Mexican restaurant? it’s like Japanese people having shit rice for their sushi, you know your shit if you can’t even make proper tortillas. Bad, 4/10, should have sticked to Asian food today and had like ramen or something instead.

From our shit dinner we walked back to our hotel, it’s quite a track back since it’s from gastown but that’s ok we are still early compared to yesterday where it was like 11pm after the train. Nice city and views man.

On the way we saw a gelato store and got some ice cream, to wash away the bad experience of the Mexican restaurant we just had.

I got honey Lavender, my sister got chocolate and my mom got cherry amerletto thing. Not bad good shit, kinda expensive but whatever, still better than the Mexican food. I can’t even remember the name of the place, I took a photo of this but I forgot ahwell.

Well today was a mix of high and lows, just like Ding Tai Fung, some shit was good, others, not so much. Good museums, shit museums, good lunch, shit dinner, nice bun, shit chinatown. Things could have been better but what can you do, sometimes it’s just not good. Hope our last full day tomorrow goes smoothly, let’s end this trip on a high note.